Peer to peer syncing over wifi?

[tonyt]

Hi Brendan
If this happens, how will it work. Im just thinking! If I have three devices and make a change on one of them and sync while the other two devices are off, where does the sync go? Or am I being thick and it is the case that all devices would have to be on and running TForms to get the sync done? What would happen if one of them WAS off, would there be a way of ‘catching up’ without messing up the sync cycle? Muddled I know but just curious!
Cheers
Tonyt
Good news re Couchbase start on Mac platform by the way!

[Brendan]

Hi Tony,

Peer-to-peer sync will require that all devices that you want to sync with be online and in range connected to the same LAN.

If one device is offline it won’t matter. It’ll catch up once it comes back online with the other devices. Syncing will happen in the background without user interaction. I guess every once in a while the screen will refresh with new data as the sync progresses.

I’m basing this info on the sample Couchbase Lite apps that I’ve played around with. Tap Forms is a MUCH BIGGER app than their simple ToDo Lite or Grocery Sync app that they have for demos, but if all goes well, it will be great for me (less support requests) and great for you (seamless sync). I’m not saying there won’t ever be problems with syncing with the new system, but I’m hoping the problems will be fewer and far between.

The way their peer-to-peer demo works is it displays a screen that lists all the devices that are nearby. You tap on which devices you want to “follow”. You do the same for all devices so that everyone is following every one else. That’s basically it. Once you’ve set that up, as you make changes to the data, it’s automatically synced to the other devices a few seconds later. Now, I have had some issues with their demo where it wasn’t accepting my changes, but a simple quit and re-launch of the apps and they were back in sync again. Not sure how it’s going to be with a much bigger app like Tap Forms, but I’m sure it’s going to be pretty awesome. At least that’s my plan :-)

Thanks,

Brendan

[Jim Burgess]

Brendan,
When you make this switch to Couchbase and the private cloud that’s required, how is this going to affect the current sync methods? I’m perfectly fine with iCloud sync, and have experienced only minor issues. And I have no desire to switch to a syncing solution that will cost me more money. Will I have a choice?
Thanks.

[Brendan]

Hi Jim,

You will definitely be able to sync over WiFi to any of your devices for free without using a cloud service. I haven’t decided what cloud service to use just yet, but I’m leaning towards IBM’s Cloudant. Unfortunately they don’t offer it for free though and iCloud and Dropbox are not compatible with Couchbase. You could run your own cloud server and connect to that as an option. I’m hoping to have 3 options. Cloud based (Cloudant), Wifi peer-to-peer, and a make your own cloud service. You would need to run your own copy of Couchbase Sync Gateway and Couchbase Server for that though. But they’re free open source software, so it’s possible. I may not have all 3 options available out of the gate though.

Another option I’m considering is to release the Couchbase versions as new separate apps with limited time upgrade pricing. So that would allow you to continue to use the older versions and migrate to the new versions at your leisure.

All these decisions are up in the air at the moment though.

Thanks,

Brendan

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