How to deploy a synchronized joplin instance on a second device?

Hi,

I installed joplin-desktop on archlinux and it seems that I achieved a correct configuration of webdav with pcloud service, though, after installing joplin on my android phone, setting up webdav on it and get a message sinchronize completed, I did not get the notebooks that are on my joplin-desktop.
For pcloud, I used the following configuration:

WebDAV URL https://webdav.pcloud.com
with my username and password.

I really don't much about WebDAV. I also did not find a guide that would explain how to deploy synchronized devices like in my case, for example, installing joplin-desktop and then the android app. I hope I didn't miss something too obvious.
As I did not find a manual for that I did an export all before trying to "deploy" joplin.

With that problem I got to know what is nextcloud. I will probably try to use nextcloud instead of pcloud.

In fact, I just gave a look at how to nextcloud on archlinux and it is quite complicated. Therefore, I don't yet have a working solution for synchronizing joplin-desktop and joplin on my smartphone.

Though, I observed that one notebook on my smartphone appeared on joplin-desktop. This notebook is "Welcome!(Mobile)". I created 3 other notebook that don't appear on joplin-desktop.

I thought that one of my problem maybe memory problem on my smartphone as the notebook that I expected to be imported is about 300 megas.

Sadly, I'm having a similar problem with Sync'ing with Dropbox. I have about 2500 notes in 13 notebooks and subnotebooks on my Win10 maching and trying to synch to Android and Linux... I am only getting 2 notebooks. It seems some of the notes are synched as I can search for them but definitely not all. When I look at my Android drop box app it tells me I am at 0% of 8.5GB.

I also tried Local folder for sync'ing and used a share folder on my NAS... sync'd with that and it see to pull about 700 or so files but again missing the notebooks. I can see notes (in All Notes) the belong to notebooks that are not showing up in the interface.

On the adroid app when I open one of these notes that are missing a notebook and try to change it's notebook. It seems to see some of the missing notebooks (but not all). this might be material, but I have some notebooks with subnotebooks where the parent notebook has no notes.

I'm at a loss at what else to try.

The app must not be closed on mobile devices until the syncronisation is once complete, because there is no background sync?
Don't turn off the display!
After a a complete sync you cans check if your desktop and mobilde device hase the same sync status (items count)
Desktop: Help > Syncronisation Status
Mobile: Konfiguration > SYNCRONISATIONSTATUS

thanks for the suggestions... I should also not I have the same issue on trying to synch from Win10 PC to Linux Laptop... same 2 notebooks show up not the other 9...

Another interesting note... in the status it sees the Folders... but they don't show up in the interface.

This is not good. I renamed a notebook (Archive -> zArchive) on the Win10 PC (which didn't show up in the Linux or Android (though it detected the subnotebooks in the synch status but not the interface) and then hit the synch button. It delete the notebook locally and the folder are no longer showing up in the Sync status.

Another strange behaviour. Android... on synch proceeded to delete the notes and folder from the status update (it never showed up in the editing interface)... but in Linux the synch did not delete notes and folders. on all systems Fail-safe is turned on.

This is worrysome. luckily I do have backups of that notebook. I think I should make backups of my other notes.

not sure if this makes a difference. Many of the notes and notebooks were created from importing from Evernote. After import I renamed some of the notebooks and moved note around to aother notebooks etc. Then synched to dropbox and them proceeded to install on android and Linux to try to synch the notes down... which is when I ran into problems.

Same Sync target on every device?
Data in Dropbox available?

Maybe start again from 0?

  1. Export everything as JEX on the PC where everything is there.
  2. Delete apps on the mobile devices incl. data.
  3. On the Joplin delete .config\joplin-desktop
  4. Import JEX
  5. Start sync on this device and wait until sync is finished.
  6. Now set up the sync on the other devices
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I did a simple test similar to your instructions with a smaller set of files and if I pre-seed notes in target systems then turn on synch then those notes will end up being duplicated. Which is why I tried to synch all into a clean install.

I'm not sure if all notes are in dropbox... as all the files seems to be hashed names and don't know how to tell is the folder structure is in there. Suggestions?

The Total numer from the Syncstatus should be reflected in at least as many files in the dropbox folder?!

Hmm only 242 files in dropbox joplin folder but that might be because the of the delete after the notebook name change. That folder had the bulk of my notes. So If I retally what is left on my Win10 PC that comes to 131 notes across 8 notebook and sub notbooks.

image

The Linux and Android device have only created the Personal and Recipes Notebooks... but it has notes from other notebooks just doesn't seem to have the notebook.

On Linux...

Edit interface:
image

Synch Status
image

the 2 blurred folders were inside the Archive folder I tried to rename to zArchive... but joplin just removed them and didn't rename.

Feeling stuck. Not sure what else to try. But most of all I want it to be explainable so I know what pitfalls to avoid.

Thanks for the suggestions. btw are there support folk that read the forums and help or is it all community helping each other?

@laurent do you have any ideas I should try?

@SleekSpeed22 That sounds very similar to some problems I had in the past with Dropbox sync. You have to keep in mind that Dropbox sync is quite slow because the transfer speeds are artificially limited by Dropbox. That is why the first sync will always take a long time. So be patient. I am using Joplin with Dropbox and it is super reliable for me.

As @JackGruber suggested you should start from scratch. Messing with Joplins folders and folders on the sync target (Dropbox in your case) isnt a good idea because it just creates problems. Furthermore it makes troubleshooting really difficult.

I expect you to have a backup of all your data. So lets start by removing everything:

  1. Uninstall apps on mobile
  2. On Windows and Linux uninstall Joplin and delete .config\joplin-desktop
  3. Remove the folder on Dropbox
  4. Remove Joplin as a Dropbox app here: https://www.dropbox.com/account/connected_apps

Now we are back at the beginning and can setup everything again.

  1. Install Joplin on one of your computers and import the JEX data. Check if all your data is imported correctly. (I would use your really data not some test data. With test data you would have to do all the steps of removing again and that takes a lot of time)
  2. Setup Dropbox sync in Joplin. Check that Dropbox is selected as a sync target in Joplin settings (should be default). When you start the synchronization you will be asked to authenticate Joplin with Dropbox. After that syncing starts.
  3. Yyou have to wait until the full sync is finished. Sometimes the sync stops early when you sync a large amount of data. To be sure that everything is uploaded to Dropbox click the "Synchronize" button again (better do it several times). If it just says "Completed: 27.01.2021 14:23" an nothing else everything is synced.
  4. Now start to sync one of your other devices. On a mobile device keep in mind, that there is not background sync. I would suggest to delete the "Welcome" notebook before start syncing. Setup Dropbox sync on the device (similar to step 2) and wait until everything is synced. Keep in mind that with large amounts of data sync sometimes tops early so click the button again.

I hope that helps to get everything going again :slight_smile:

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Thanks for all the detail. Got it working. I don't like unexplained things as I never know when they will come back and I don't know how to avoid them.

Thanks again for the very detailed instructions.

Glad that my explanation helped you. After this first sync all others should be much faster.

I will try to set joplin from scratch following your ideas and hopefully solve my problem!

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