Syncovery Support Forum

How does Syncovery distinguish when a file has been changed?

I have noticed that certain files are sometime not synced when the file size remains the same, despite changes made to the file. Is there a way to ensure files are synced, regardless of having the same file size?

Hello,
the most important thing is the file's "Last Modified" timestamp. The size is not relevant. Make sure you haven't set your profile to "Ignore timestamp" on the Comparison tab sheet. And of course, the profile has to be run to detect anything. It could be a scheduled or manual run. In many cases, depending on the storage type, real-time synchronization is also possible.

The modification timestamp is a reliable indicator for when a file has been changed, with extremely few exceptions.

The only known exception are some encrypted disk containers, or maybe some VM files, which may not regularly update their modification timestamp while they are in use. There are two ways around that:

- under Comparison->More, you can choose "Always copy, even if timestamp unchanged" (but that means all files are always copied).
- under Special->More, you can choose "Detect Changed Files Via File System Monitoring Even If Timestamps Unchanged"

But both of these should be used only in extremely rare cases, and only on profiles that copy a few specific files. Never use these on jobs that copy many files. They are potentially expensive in terms of performance. If you do use either of them, you would usually combine it with the Block Level Copying feature from the Special tab sheet.