What we are looking for here is a QUICK SYNC, none of the above mentioned methods are suitable for super-fast computing when there are no limitations that MTP/PTP connections impose.
USB Mass Storage Mode or SD card sync are the only two methods that are superfast.
Respectfully, I disagree. Any of the methods I mentioned, Unison, owncloud, syncthing, btsync, SpiderOak, are all quick, reliable and can do real time syncing.
Is the root of the problem you are syncing 2 devices over USB? That being the case, of the above, only Unison will do that.
If you want to do a folder <--> folder on the android device itself, I currently know of no way to do that.
Since we have established that it is not possible to run a a folder to folder sync on Android itself, we have reached the answer to this thread's question, hoping one day this would change since there are apps that do top level syncs but not subfolder syncs.
Having finished with that, I do believe I can run a program that can force a Galaxy S4, which I can borrow to run a test on, into UMS Mass Storage Mode.
I will then do a stop watch test that would measure any of the apps you mentioned against a direct folder to folder sync - which is possible under UMS Mass Storage mode.
The test would demonstrate how wrong or right I am about everything I said. If you could pick one app, which would it be, so I can include it in the tests?
Unison would be the fastest if you arent doing real time sync like owncloud or syncthing. If you have a network connection I don't believe that "fastest" is much of a concern in that, the other programs can be set to sync real time.
Ultimately I am comfortable with all options mentioned.
Well ok, I would be doing a Wi-Fi test vs. USB cable test through MTP mode vs. USB Cable test through UMS Mass Storage mode.
UMS Mass Storage would mimic direct folder to folder sync and thus prove/disprove everything we've been talking about.
If UMS Mas Storage mode completes identical test syncs 200% faster - then the implication would be clear.
If it is 1000% faster, then we would be crossing into "is the whole world crazy" territory
All right. I usually sync personal files, data, but I decided to keep the test simple.
Let's instead take a folder filled with 128 kbps mp3 music albums. Folder has less than 15GB of music, and I have one on PC and an identical folder on a (very fast) Samsung Evo microSD card.
So now to test the time it takes to make microSD card folder identical to the PC folder, I simply did this to the microSD card folder: -removed one single folder with 16 files (songs)
-removed 5 files (songs) from another folder
-added one single folder with 15 files (songs).
So for each test, the sync task has those three things to reproduce.
TEST 1: microSD card directly inserted into PC: 3 (three) seconds for a complete sync!
TEST 2: I am using a Galaxy 4 for which someone made a widget making it possible for USB cable connected phone to show up in mass storage mode (as a drive letter): 7 (seven) seconds. Not bad at all.
and now here we go:
TEST3: I used to widget to switch the phone back to its native MTP (Media Transfer Protocol) mode so now phone shows up as a portable device, not a drive letter, so it shows up just like my Galaxy 5 does on PC as pictured:
270 (two hundred and seventy) seconds.
That is 38 times slower... NOT having a direct letter access (UMS Mass Storage mode) would make a sync task which would take minutes, take hours instead.
Please tell me what, if anything I did wrong, because I've been grappling with this for years, no drive letter - no quick sync. Not having UMS Mass Storage mode on Android absolutely destroyed quick access to my phone.
Finally, your suggestion:
TEST4: Unision wanted 6 bucks which I would give them if it would resolve my problem but I know it won't so I tried SyncThing freeware suggested earlier instead: about 15 minutes or 900 seconds
When you compare 3 seconds or 7 seconds to 900 seconds, it appears that the term a thousand times slower was not way off. This is entirely unacceptable.
It is *much* faster to open up my Galaxy S5, manually get the SD card out, and sync it directly on a PC then reinsert it back. What a hassle.
And Galaxy S6 HAS NO REMOVABLE SD CARD. What an insane idea not to have a removable SD card.
So in the end, I think the best solution is to install a custom operating system on your phone like CyanogenMod which would allow for UMS Mass Storage mode to be used, which would cut down the sync time a thousandfold.
Theoretically speaking all this makes a lot of sense. There is no way upload speeds on devices can compete with direct cable connection.
And we absolutely need to find a way to get the UMS mass storage mode back or else we stand to lose a lot of time transferring files in any other way. If it could be done on Galaxy S4, why not on newer phones like Galaxy S5 and similar....
Can you provide links to Unison and Syncthing you used? I went to the Unison website (a foreign concept since its just in the standard linux repos) and downloaded the windows binaries.... they didnt charge anything
Also I cannot reproduce your problem in linux. I.E. my NEXUS 5 shows up as a mount point and I just sync as if it was another folder on my machine. This must be a Windows specific problem?
Further to this, I think you are a super fringe case compared to the "average" user. I use owncloud which does basically real time sync so I never really think about syncing. Further to this, as stated above if I have something massive to sync I just plug in and sync to the folder.
My suspicion is that the "average" user is fine with using some sort of cloud service for syncing their stuff. I cannot see my wife yanking her card out and throwing it in her computer. Thats too much hassle. She always has a wifi connection and therefore is more likely to do real time syncing (in some fashion) than she is to walk over to a computer
To further address your point and to clarify the ROOT of this problem:
WINDOWS has *nothing* to do with Android device mode. Some devices can be, many newer ones cannot be switched from MTP to UMS mass storage mode.
That is the root of this problem. Android MTP mode does not show up as a drive letter. Android UMS mass storage mode does.
And finally if I may comment on the last part using logic: there are millions of people using folder to folder sync on their PCs. We know this because the number of folder to folder PC sync software installations is in the millions.
Yet NO ONE, not a single Android user wants to sync folder to folder directly, just like millions of PC users do?
To further address your point and to clarify the ROOT of this problem:
WINDOWS has *nothing* to do with Android device mode. Some devices can be, many newer ones cannot be switched from MTP to USB mass storage mode.
That is the root of this problem. Android MTP mode does not show up as a drive letter. Android USB mass storage mode does.
And finally if I may comment on the last part using logic: there are millions of people using folder to folder sync on their PCs. We know this because the number of folder to folder PC sync software installations is in the millions.
Yet NO ONE, not a single Android user wants to sync folder to folder directly, just like millions of PC users do?
Ok part of my ignorance is probably because I only have ever had the nexus line of phones when it comes to android (except for my original G1). I dont know much about MTP, I simply plug my nexus 5 into my linux box and it mounts as any other drive. (It currently has MTP checked). Also feeding the confusion: lack of windows understanding. As I cannot reproduce your results in linux, I dont know much about drive letters or how the other side of the fence handles things.
I wasn't expecting you to have to install clients for syncthing or unison on anything other than windows, as on linux, it treats everything as a local device as soon as you plug it in.
I can see your frustration though. You have a problem in windows which I cannot reproduce in linux and because we are using different OS' to do the same task it would be frustrating to have someone on the other side of the text not being able to sympathize/reproduce.
In terms of windows having nothing to do with android device mode that is true and its not. It doesn't from the stand point that you only have MTP or PTP on the android device regardless of which OS you plug it into. But it IS a windows problem from the point of view of how Windows and windows drivers handles MTP. I have to assume that because its instant, and I can walk the folder structure with standard linux tools, it comes down to the way the OS handles things
Further to that just because millions of auto drivers have a drivers licence and pay insurance doesn't mean that E-bike riders require or even think of either of those things. Phones are inherently thought of as "cloud" devices for better or worse and they were designed this way. Take away the cloud backend of a "smart phone" and things get substantially harder to do. Because they were designed to push people towards cloud services, I am not surprised that there are limited (or no?) options to do what you want.
The only use cases I hear about are to sync pictures or audio to or from a device and even then people are usually using some sort of service instead of doing it manually (i.e. podcatchers, itunes/google music, iphotos/google photos etc).
I received a reply from the creator of the Samsung Galaxy S4 widget toggle to UMS (Universal Mass Storage) Mode, he said that as far as Galaxy S5 and beyond are concerned, he has already given it a shot and it is not possible without some serious work.
So the ultimate solution is to wipe the phone's native operating system completely and install CyanogenMod 12.1.
They are working heavily on the nightly releases of 12.1 so I figure I would give them another couple of months before switching.
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