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Remote agent when using Synchronize over slow connection

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CJW123
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Remote agent when using Synchronize over slow connection

Post by CJW123 »

I use Syncback to keep an offsite copy of data for one of my clients. I have a remote PC and using a VPN (I use Hamachi for simplicity) I run Syncback on a nightly basis to synchronise the data on their server to a disk on the remote PC. Currently it is keeping about 1.7TB of data in 772000 files and 79000 folders in sync. Typically jobs run for about 8 hours of which about half of the time is spent scanning and half of the time is spent copying. I would like to use this at other clients but data volumes would start to make the jobs run for too long.
Could an 'agent' running on the remote machine do the scanning locally and pass the results back to the server running Syncback? Maybe the scans on the 'Server' and the 'Client' could be started at the same time and just the results passed back from the 'client' to the 'server'. In effect I am wondering whether there is a better way of implementing the scan which utilises local processing power and local disk searches rather than doing the work across the VPN.
Of course I may be trying to do something stupid in which case I am very open to improvements in my current methodology.
Thanks in advance.
mickyj
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Re: Remote agent when using Synchronize over slow connection

Post by mickyj »

Hi, we already have such an agent called SyncBack Touch: http://www.2brightsparks.com/syncback/sbt.html

It can be installed on Windows, OS X and Android.
CJW123
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Re: Remote agent when using Synchronize over slow connection

Post by CJW123 »

Thanks mickyj. I was excited to test Touch and have been trying to get it to work for a couple of hours.
On the 'client' (receiving PC) I have installed Touch and I can see with a netstat -a that something is listening on UDP 0.0.0.0:254671
However when I try to find the Touch machine on the local LAN from Synckback on a different PC it finds nothing. There are no firewalls running on either of the 2 PC's and as well as trying Find I have specified by name and by IP address, in each case trying with and without \\ ... no joy.
Can you suggest what I may be doing wrong please.
Thanks
Kostas
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Re: Remote agent when using Synchronize over slow connection

Post by Kostas »

CJW123 wrote:Thanks mickyj. I was excited to test Touch and have been trying to get it to work for a couple of hours.
On the 'client' (receiving PC) I have installed Touch and I can see with a netstat -a that something is listening on UDP 0.0.0.0:254671
However when I try to find the Touch machine on the local LAN from Synckback on a different PC it finds nothing. There are no firewalls running on either of the 2 PC's and as well as trying Find I have specified by name and by IP address, in each case trying with and without \\ ... no joy.
Can you suggest what I may be doing wrong please.
Thanks
Hi,

By default SyncBack Touch is listening on port 8080. Can you verify that the service is actually running on the 'client' PC?

Also please check the Windows Event Log (via the Event Viewer) for any entries under the Application branch made by SyncBack Touch.

FYI, if you try to connect to SyncBack Touch by IP then you only need to type the IP address, without the '\\'.

Thanks,
Kostas
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CJW123
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Re: Remote agent when using Synchronize over slow connection

Post by CJW123 »

I am impressed by the speed of response, Thanks !
FYI The help file says the default port is 24671
The service is running (it took 3 attempts installing Touch without any obvious errors before the service started running, which was odd). During the period when the service was failing to start there was one SyncBackTouch event 0 and 3 event 1's in the Application log. Since the service has been running SyncBackTouch has not been writing entries to the Windows logs. I just did a reboot and there are no new entries in the logs.
Still failing to find Touch on the LAN and failing to connect when I use an IP address (without \\).
Kostas
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Re: Remote agent when using Synchronize over slow connection

Post by Kostas »

Hi,

Here is what the help file says regarding firewalls and routers:
Firewalls and Routers

By default SyncBack Touch uses TCP port 8080 for all communication with SyncBack. This port number can be changed/set during the installation (see below) or by using SyncBack. If you want to access SyncBack Touch through a firewall then you must open this port. If SyncBack Touch is behind a router then you may need to enable port forwarding. Refer to your routers documentation for details.

To discover SyncBack Touch installations broadcasts are made on the UDP port 24671. You may need to open this port on your firewall (not your router as broadcasts are only made on the local network).
The event log should have some more info in the event details about why the service had failed. Can you copy-paste those details here?

I assume you are doing your test while both computers are on the same LAN?

You said that there are no more events in the event log. Actually starting and stopping the SyncBack Touch service should generate Information entries in the log with an EventID = 1. Can you verify again that the service is running? A quick way to find out is to use the Task Manager and try to locate the process named SyncBackTouchSvc.exe.

Thanks,
Kostas
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CJW123
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Re: Remote agent when using Synchronize over slow connection

Post by CJW123 »

Kostas, I am making some progress now, and I apologise for wasting your time on this. All is now good connecting to Touch over the LAN (although only via IP, it doesn't seem to be discoverable). But it is still not working over the software VPN. I am using a software VPN by LogMeIn called Hamachi. This creates a virtual network adapter on a machine. I am getting out of my depth here but my guess is that Touch is only communicating with the physical network adapter. Is there a way to configure Touch to communicate with the virtual network adapter? TIA.
Kostas
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Re: Remote agent when using Synchronize over slow connection

Post by Kostas »

Glad to hear you made progress. =D>

Problem though is that it's starting getting a bit too specialized for me as well. The SyncBack Touch server doesn't bind to a specific adapter, for example I can reach a SyncBack Touch server via wireless and wired connections on the same PC on my local network with each connection being on a different adapter.

Do you have any other servers running on the same computer (where Touch is running)? If yes, can you access those over your VPN? Any routers involved that you have to go through before getting to the PC running SyncBack Touch?

Thanks,
Kostas
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CJW123
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Re: Remote agent when using Synchronize over slow connection

Post by CJW123 »

Thanks to the staff for taking the time to help me through my issues, many of which were down to me rather than your product. The Hamachi issue turned out to be my fault and is resolved.
I would like to suggest very strongly that rather than Touch starting once the scan of the initiating machine is finished (ie. the scans being sequential) that the scan should start on both machines at the same time (ie. the scans run in parallel) In my case that would save well over an hour in completing the mirror.

The lessons learned/issues I have had :
I was looking for a product with a word like 'remote' as part of it. I never investigated Touch because of its name.
Touch didn't install the service for the first 3 attempts, including reboots. For some reason it installed the service on the 4th attempt when I did a local save and run rather than just a run of the installer from the cached download.
I never got Syncback to 'Find' the Touch enabled machine on the same LAN
It worked once I used the IP address (without \\) and left the 'Find and connect to the Syncback Touch device using its name' unchecked
I had to change the port from 0 to 8080 (why not have that as the default, if it is the default port?)
It never worked using a machine name even though a ping of the name works fine.

Thanks again for your help and for producing a useful utility at no additional charge (at least for the use I have put it to). I continue to recommend Syncback to anyone interested in this type of product.
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