Include File Specification

[TonyTooley]

Hello - I am using v10.5 (donor) and need to set an include mask. I have many *.zip files in my source folders but only want iix*.zip When I specify iix*.zip nothing is sync'd. *.zip works but I get too many files synced. Can someone please explain what I need to do and why. I see there are many examples for Exclude but have not found any for Include.

Thanks for a great product.

[TonyTooley]

Just checked a run using \*\iix*.zip as the include mask. I guessed at this taking my cue from the explanations of the Exclude masks. But only 50% of the .zips were synced. The two .zip families I want to sync are: iix*_Images.zip and iix*_Data.zip Windows explorer finds both these sets of files. Ideas?

[Plerry]

... using \*\iix*.zip as the include mask. … But only 50% of the .zips were synced.

If the 50% not being synced is in the root of your left- or right-base location location, that result is to be expected.
By specifying an include definition \*\iix*.zip you include all iix*.zip files in subfolders of the base location, but not the ones in the base location itself.
Try removing the first backslash so that your include filter becomes *\iix*.zip .

By the way:
You do not need to run the sync to see the result.
If you run just the comparison, you can see in the compare result window the intended actions.

[TonyTooley]

Thx for you reply Plerry. I tried what you suggested (*\iix*.zip and just "Compare" but on a subset of my source folders to save time). But that yielded zero files. Below I will try to explain my heavily nested folder structure and hope that will trigger something in your knowledge base that will help me solve this problem.

I need to traverse/enumerate all folders and files under this network source path: \\iix-prod-fs1\IIX\Data
(I have used URLs like this before with success so I assume that I don't need to use a drive letter for the source)
An example of a final folder where my two *.zip files reside is:
\\iix-prod-fs1\IIX\Data\Texas\Midland\MCTP(698001)\External\iixMCTP_Midland_20120823_1506

The two files in this final folder are as follows (and I have 100's of 1000's like these in other final folders:
iixMCTP_Midland_20120823_1506_Data.zip
iixMCTP_Midland_20120823_1506_Images.zip

It is possible (but very unlikely) that there will be similar files in subfolders other than these "final" folders. If so, I want to sync those too. But 99+% of them will be in similar "final" folders.

For some reasons too complicated to explain here, my preference is actually have two masks so that only these two types of files are synced. I would like to specify the following as INCLUDE masks but these do not work either:
*\iix*_Data.zip
*\iix*_Images.zip
I even tried this mask because I thought it might be slightly more efficient for FFS: *\iix*_*a*.zip because that should (IMO) find both types of files.

I wondered if perhaps the "_" was an additional problem b/c it was being interpreted as a single-char wildcard. But if it was I still don't understand why it is not successful.

I suspect I am not understanding the way the include (and exclude for that matter) masks are being interpreted.

I will look forward to your next reply with appreciation.

[Plerry]

It is not clear where exactly you stand now in terms of definition of left- and right-base-locations and include and exclude filters.
Possibly you are making some (in hindsight) obvious mistake.
So, let's starts simple.

I would suggest you clear your include filter (make sure it contains just an * (asterisk) to initially include all files.
and delete all entries from you exclude filter.
* Now run your comparison
You should see a big list of files FFS would intend to sync.
If necessary make all results visible with the buttons mid below the compare results (behind Select View:).
* Identify a _Data.zip file, e.g iixMCTP_Midland_20120823_1506_Data.zip, right click and choose include via filter the sub-choice "*\iixMCTP_Midland_20120823_1506_Data.zip" (note it starts with the asterisk) files (I know this is too restrictive ...)
* Do the same for a _Images.zip file, e.g your iixMCTP_Midland_20120823_1506_Images.zip
* Open your Include/Exclude filter and verify the Include filter now reads
"*\iixMCTP_Midland_20120823_1506_Data.zip" and "*\iixMCTP_Midland_20120823_1506_Images.zip" (without the quotation marks), and only that, and your exclude filter is still empty.
* Close the filter edit window
* Re-run you comparison
It should now only show (all) iixMCTP_Midland_20120823_1506_Data.zip and iixMCTP_Midland_20120823_1506_Images.zip files.

* Now open the filter edit window and change the include filter definition "*\iixMCTP_Midland_20120823_1506_Data.zip" into "*\iix*_Data.zip" by selecting the "MCTP_Midland_20120823_1506" part and replacing it by an asterisk * . And close the filter edit window.
* Re-run the comparison.
It should now show all iix*_Data.zip files and still only all iixMCTP_Midland_20120823_1506_Images.zip files in the compare results.
* If this has worked out for the iix*_Data.zip files, repeat editing the include filter for your iix*_Images.zip files.
* Re-run the comparison and verify that/if now all iix*_Data.zip and iix*_Images.zip files would be included in the sync.
* If this has worked, you are done, and you probably initially had some abnormality in your filter definitions.

If all of the above does not work and does not result in any compare results, your left- and/or right base location specification might be incorrect, or you might have an access-right problem, as \\iix-prod-fs1\[etcetera] seems to be a network location.

[TonyTooley]

Plery - my apologies for the late response. I had a client hit with Ransomware and it has taken a while to recover for them.
I am happy to say that your suggestion worked for me. Thank you also for the FFS tips I was not aware of.