Unison file synchronizer

Why use unison

Unison in action

Lets sync two local folders dir1 and dir2. The two folders are called roots in unison.

1. First time sync

Lets create two empty folders dir1 and dir2 and sync them. Syncing for the first time is a bit special, since unison informs us that these two roots have not been synced with unison before.

$ unison dir1 dir2
Contacting server...
Warning: No archive files were found for these roots, whose canonical names are:
    /Users/mrepic/Desktop/LCBC_retreat/unison/example/dir1
    /Users/mrepic/Desktop/LCBC_retreat/unison/example/dir2
.
.
.
Looking for changes
Reconciling changes

2. Syncing files

Lets create a file file1.txt in dir1 and file2.txt in dir2. This kind of copying cannot be performed by rsync so simply.

Contacting server...
Looking for changes
Reconciling changes

dir1           dir2
new file ---->            file1.txt  [f]
         <---- new file   file2.txt  [f]

Proceed with propagating updates? [] y
Propagating updates

UNISON 2.48.3 started propagating changes at 12:06:54.09 on 17 Oct 2015
[BGN] Copying file1.txt from /example/dir1 to /example/dir2
[END] Copying file1.txt
[BGN] Copying file2.txt from /example/dir2 to /example/dir1
[END] Copying file2.txt
UNISON 2.48.3 finished propagating changes at 12:06:54.10 on 17 Oct 2015

Saving synchronizer state
Synchronization complete at 12:06:54  (2 items transferred, 0 skipped, 0 failed)

3. How to set up

Download binaries from official website and make sure the version number is the same. Unison will not work if they differ. Put it somewhere in your PATH, so that it can be invoked locally and remotely. Test if it works by executing unison -version on the local machine ssh deneb1.epfl.ch unison -version on the remote machine.


It is a good idea to sync the ~/.unison/*.prf files, so that the profiles will be available on every machine and you will be able to start sync from both sides if two-way passwordless ssh works.


4. Additional options

Selective sync The roots do not have to be completely synced. For example, certain paths and files can be excluded from the sync, also files based on size (large trajectories, folder display files,...).

Conflict resolution unison can be used in batch mode, syncing the nonconflicting updates without user intervention. Conflicting updates are displayed and user is prompted to select the direction of the sync, or they can be ignored and not synced.

Continous sync Each root can be continously synced on a fixed time interval. There is also support for sync on change so it behaves very much like dropbox.

Preference files Complex syncing preferences can be saved in a file residing in ~/.unison/dirs.prf. When such a file exists, you can invoke unison with unison dirs.

A sample preference file looks like this:

# Unison preferences file
root local = /Users/mrepic/hpc
root workstation = ssh://mrepic@l27//data9/mrepic/hpc

# Useful settings 
confirmbigdel = true
sortybysize = true
logfile = /dev/null

# Main sync paths
#path = maogmx/adacta2/4.1-equil_bilayer
#path = scratch

# Override files matching ignore spec
ignorenot = Name *.out
ignorenot = Name *.off

# Ignore Mac files
ignore = Name .DS_Store
ignore = Name *~
ignore = Name .*~
ignore = Name ._*
ignore = Name .localized

# Ignore Torque files
ignore = Name *.o*
ignore = Name *.po*
ignore = Name core.*
ignore = Name .*

# Ignore trajectories
ignore = Name *.trr
ignore = Name *.xtc
ignore = Name *.nc
ignore = Name *.dcd
ignore = Name TRAJECTORY

Drawbacks

Additional info