Explain how "cloud" storage and sync with other computer currently works

[tobiasdiez]

• For normal users: OneDrive, DropBox whatever
• For "power" users: bib file under git, pdfs synced as above

Setting: link pdfs as relative paths

[Finebouche]

Could Syncthing be a solution for that as well ? I am using it to synch pdf file together with postgreSQL to synch the database but I am not sure whether it's an optimal workflow

[ThiloteE]

Syncthing is equivalent to dropbox, OneDrive, etcetera and all those are a "not very professional" solution. They work fine within a trusted small scale environment, but that is it.

As far as I am aware, they cannot adequately control and monitor who modifies what, cannot limit access to files and databases to certain users and control what other users can put on your local disc (prevent spam / viruses / trojaners; prevent dataloss because of limited space on disc; etc.), in short: as soon as you have inadequate communication, expertise and/or malicious actors that have access to your environment, those options fall flat.

Edit: I know that DropBox can provide links to files, which are "read only". This workflow gives you control over your local space, but obviously if you want to synchronize your database, this will lead to a very suboptimal workflow of having to manually send and merge files, which takes a lot of time.