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As a small team of developers/friends, we had created a simple intranet platform (years ago) to share ideas, files (and keep backups), manage our e-mails, etc.

Few days ago, after discussing "how awesome it would be to use the file sharing module of it from a Dropbox-like application", I started searching for any open source tools that can do the job.

As expected, yes, there is open source for everything and found very nice resources that can help us accomplish the project with almost no (or few) coding.

Considering you may use them in your own projects/platforms or have an idea of building a file storage and fileshare application, here is a complete list of open source Dropbox alternatives (that are updated regularly):

SparkleShare (Mac & Linux)

This is a file sharing and collaboration tool which allows you to instantly synchronize with any Git repository (SFTP is on the way).

It can connect to any number of hosts + allows you to follow and add/remove files into any number of projects.

Growl notifications let you know when a change by a team member.

Syncany (Windows & Linux)

Syncany is a very promising and open source file sharing + storage application which is still under heavy development.

It can use almost any type of storage including local folders, FTP, Amazon S3, Google Storage, IMAP and more.

The data is encrypted locally which is nice for the security of sensitive information and has support for versioning.

iFolder (Windows, Mac & Linux)

Using a centralized storage space (iFolder), the application keeps the copy of files/folders both locally and remotely by keeping them in sync.

For a minimum bandwidth usage, it only downloads/uploads the modified file portions.

You can share the folders with other users and set the access rights of each user.

Also, optionally, a web interface allows reaching files from anywhere, anytime.

IQBox (Windows)

IQBox is a SVN client which keeps files in sync automatically using any SVN server.

It runs quietly in the background, only syncs when CPU is available and upload the changed parts of files for a quick synchronization process.

ownCloud (Mac & Linux)

The application stores files centrally and encrypted with automated versioning and backup.

It runs under a Apache, PHP and MySQL/PostgreSQL environment and can be reached from any device.

QtdSync (Windows & Linux)

QtdSync is a feature-rich GUI for the popular rsync which can backup both local and remote files.

It can take differential backup or just synchronize and has a restore option.

Multiple users can work with the same account and comes with a user management system.

The server requires Windows but the clients can also work in Linux.

Other Related Projects

• RubyDrop: a Dropbox-like clone built with Ruby.
• DVCS-Autosync: a Dropbox replacement based on Git.
• Build an Open Source Dropbox Clone: a "how-to" on creating one.

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First of all, sorry that WRD had a downtime (around 8 hours) yesterday.

The post: 27 Adobe AIR Applications – Handy For Web Designers got pretty popular in most of the social-bookmarking / voting websites. I realized that the website was getting slower & about to take action on it. Then the post moved to frontpage at digg.com & I was not able to reach to server anymore.

As the server was not responding, rebooted from the power-strip several times, got ping results but after sometime, reboots weren’t pinging.

Thanks to the hosting company that they reached the server & told that the server was not able to boot because of corrupt system file errors (confirmed via KVM).

A fresh OS is installed & they added the previous harddisk as a secondary one so I could get the data.

After setting up the server, here it is, WRD is back online.

Lessons learned:

• Don’t underestimate the digg effect, it is really strong.
• Don’t reboot a server via power-strip (several times).
• Backup frequently (I’m good at this from past experiences).
• Apply all of your own tips.
• And maybe it is because the server is Windows, think about that.. : )

Hope that this post may help you to stay online.

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There are projects which I’m using Subversion and some that I don’t. There are also other things which are very valuable to me like bookmarks, code snippets & more.

And every designer, developer, for sure, lost a few days work because of not backing up the files regularly.

I have started using Mozy Online Backup Free version as a backup solution for my dev. files in general. It provides 2GB space for free, very easy to configure, can take scheduled backups and works silently.

It is an impressive product as it totally reduces the risk of losing data. And works both in Windows and Mac.

There are also other versions of Mozy:

• Mozy Free – 2GB – free – personal use
• Mozy Home – unlimited space ($4.95/month)
• Mozy Pro & Mozy Enterprise with more features like SQL or server backup

P.S. This post is an advertorial (and I really like the product ).

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MySQL restore is sometimes a bad experience if the database size is bigger than the allowed limit or the execution time of the restore script is not enough. Users generally restore databases with desktop softwares or through the command line in such situations.

MySQLDumper is a backup & restore management script for MySQL Databases, written in PHP and Perl, which fills this gap and offers a complete control over the databases.

MySQLDumper uses a proprietary technique to avoid execution interruption. It only reads and saves a certain amount of commands and then calls itself via JavaScript and memorizes how far in the process it was and resumes its action from its last standby.

MySQLDumper offers to write data directly into a compressed gz-File. The Restore-Script is able to read this file directly without unpacking it. Of course you can use it without compression, however using Gzip saves a sizeable amount of bandwidth.

Users can get e-mail notifications after the automated backup process:

Features

• MySQLDumper can read dumpfiles from other scripts via the integrated parser (for example from phpMyAdmin).
• Security: MySQLDumper can generate a .htaccess-file to protect itself and all of your backup-files.
• MySQLDumper can do multipart-backups. That means: MySQLDumper can automatically split the dumpfile if it gets bigger than your chosen size. When you want to restore a backup and choose the wrong part – it doesn’ matter: MySQLDumper will notice that and will get the correct start file automatically.
• Automatic error module.
• MiniSql: You have access to your MySQL-Tables. You can delete tables, edit or insert data. You can run/ save any SQL-statement.
• Database-overview: look at running processes or even stop them.
• Very good file-overview: backups of the same database are shown as one entry. Click it to see all of the files.
• Automatic file-deletion: set your own rules to delete old backups. Specify the age or the number of files when it will be deleted automatically to save server webspace.
• Perl cron script: all features of the PHP-Script are now integrated in the Perl script that can be started via a cron job.
• Configuration can be set seperatly for each script (PHP and Perl).
• Before you start a backup all your parameters are shown again, so you definitely know what you are doing.
• Send e-mails with or without your dump file attached / you can set the maximum size of the attachement. If it grows bigger it won’t be attached.
• Send dumpfiles via FTP to another server. This is also working using the multipart feature.

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