Topic: Data upload/profiles and Fling

[Cienega32]

I find the data upload in WL to be a bit limiting in that the templates are grouped into one optional sub-dir and/or filetype. Maybe it's the 8 profile limitation.

My main problem is with the one sub-dir option for all templates under any given profile. I might have 4 "templates" converted to the same extension but needing to be tossed into different destination folders on the server which means using another profile just to toss where I want. It seems short-sighted that I can source from various directories but can only toss them into either the default dir or a single, optional dir. Unless I'm missing something in the data upload window?

Anyway - I notice (their online info) Fling can run scheduled tasks with each file having it's own source/destination option. Would this be the solution I need to get around WL's "one or the other" upload destination limitation by scheduling the desired upload when a file change is detected?

[ncpilot]

At first I thought maybe... but upon reflection (I use Fling to upload hi-res snapshots), I'm pretty sure Fling can only perform one action on any given folder. So if you have a WL profile that produces 4 files, but they are all in the same folder on your local computer (which is the limitation of WL you don't like), Fling can only send all those files to one location via FTP... it doesn't look like you can pick individual files within a folder for Fling to FTP...

[Cienega32]

Hmm, I'm looking at one of the screen caps on their site and it looks like the main window is populated with various source/destination actions - all in manual mode tho'.

I guess I'll have to splurge on the freeware  I bet if I did that, I could find out, huh...    I need some new FTP s/w anyway...

I should get it anyway as it seems so many here use it. There must be a reason for that!

[ncpilot]

I read through the sparse "user manual" for Fling, and it seems to be based on folders, not going down to the specific file level--at least I couldn't see any way to base actions on a specific file...

[Cienega32]

I d/loaded it and looked thru it a bit. Turns out I already had d/loaded it in March. Anyway - I'm thinking the 'scan for file changes' could be a bit helpful. As far as where they'll get tossed when uploaded - guess I'll play with it this weekend.

Is it quicker than the WL upload engine? That seems to be a problem now & then for me, tho' I haven't had any hangs in a few weeks since I redid all my profiles and replaced a few drives in some machines including the Wx box.

[ncpilot]

You'd think FTP is FTP... but I don't know if Fling is better than WL's upload or not...

You tell Fling where to upload the files, but it will upload all files in a folder to the same location. I use it to watch a folder for the appearance of a new image file (hi-res photo), then it will FTP to my website... works great for that.

I've never had an issue with WL's uploads, but it would be interesting to see what happens when you set WL to just create the files, then let Fling do the uploads...

I spent probably over an hour last night searching for programs that will selectively watch at the file level for changes, then upload--but didn't find any free programs... there didn't seem to be a lack of programs you'd have to pay for, but I didn't look into those at all...

Here's a path to go down though, and someone else might know of a program that simply monitors a file for a change status, when changed, it will execute a program of your choice--which could be a command line FTP program that will then send the file anywhere you want... but I couldn't find anything like that... at least not for free...

[tinplate]

I think this one will do it
http://www.cyberkiko.com/FTPSync.aspx

It's a console app, and you configure via a hand edited ini file, but it's pretty simple to set the ini file up, and it allows you to control the files that get processed.

Steve
SoftWx

[ncpilot]

It doesn't look like it will continuously monitor the files/folders though... still has to be executed on a periodic basis? If so, couldn't you just create a batch file that would execute a command line FTP program for each file you want to transfer, and then just schedule it using windows scheduler to run at the same frequency as WL creates files?

I can see that it has some additional features, but basically you are still creating a sort of batch file (ini file) for it to operate on...

Thanks for the info though, it still might prove useful...

[tinplate]

You just run it in a batch file, where the ftp program is run in an infinite loop, with a sleep for about 10 seconds in the loop to keep cpu usage down. Then you'd have in effect the same polling that goes on internally in a program that does this itself. If you don't have a sleep command (they're out there), you can do a sleep using the ping command that pings a non-existent address. The ping command has parameters that lets you control how long it tries that gives you something quite similar to sleep, that uses very little cpu. A batch file like I just described would only require about 4 lines.

:top
rem run ftpsync here
ping -n 1 -w 10000 192.168.199.199
goto top

[tinplate]

If so, couldn't you just create a batch file that would execute a command line FTP program for each file you want to transfer

Yes, and I ran this way for awhile, but with a batch file like the one above. It worked just fine, except Windows built-in ftp program lacked some essential features such as passive mode (if I remember correctly). Using something like ftpsync would have been an improvement on what I was doing though, because it only uploads the changed files, and it has better error handling. FTP is pretty basic stuff, and I don't think it requires a bit fat Windows client application.

Steve
SoftWx