File types in filter configuration

Discuss new features and functions
Posts: 8
Joined: 14 Feb 2016

mjdtjm2

Thank you for your great work on FreeFileSync.
I'm using it on Debian Linux for years and it's very good.
A suggestion: Add an option to the Filter configuration window for including/Excluding some file types in/from synching operation. For example: socket, fifo, named pipe, symbolic link, ...
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xCSxXenon

There are inclusion and exclusion filters
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huuurz

Mmhm there currently is no real file type filter.
*.doc
will also match a folder like that:
source\something.doc\somefile.txt
You would need e.g. a "stop" character like $ in RegExps:
*.doc$
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xCSxXenon

True, but having periods on directory names is bad practice in the first place
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Paladyn

I, too, wish to have an exclusion filter for symbolic links (Windows). Through an inclusion filter they are attempted to copy--which is the only error my process has.
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Zenju

I, too, wish to have an exclusion filter for symbolic links (Windows). Paladyn, 04 Mar 2021, 15:27
"Symbolic Link Handling"
https://freefilesync.org/manual.php?topic=comparison-settings
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Elhem Enohpi

I'd also appreciate the ability to exclude socket files, in particular. There are a number of them on my Mac, and they don't necessarily have any particlular file extension, so it's not possible to use a wildcard. They stop the sync process, so I had to enter every pathname into the exclude filter. It would be more convenient to have a checkbox to ignore them all. Socket files, at least on Unix/Mac, are created and destroyed as needed by the application, so there's no need to copy them, nor to worry about the fact that they're not copied (I don't know about Windows, but I think it's the same).

PS, I found a few other threads asking about it:

viewtopic.php?t=6106&p=20097&hilit=socket#p20097
viewtopic.php?t=600&p=2263&hilit=socket#p2263
viewtopic.php?t=2285&p=9507&hilit=socket#p9507
viewtopic.php?t=3724&p=12487&hilit=socket#p12487
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Zenju

I'd also appreciate the ability to exclude socket files [...] They stop the sync process Elhem Enohpi, 01 Jun 2022, 23:14
Is that really the case? Trying to copy a socket should fail with an error, not hang the process.
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Elhem Enohpi

It fails with an error, which stops the process of syncing. I just figured out that I can check "ignore errors" in Comparison Settings to avoid that.

Btw., it seems to me that the "ignore errors" checkbox should be under the Synchronization Settings tab, not Comparison Settings. I never really knew what it meant before, like what kind of errors there would be during a comparison, and it's not explained in the manual.
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Zenju

Btw., it seems to me that the "ignore errors" checkbox should be under the Synchronization Settings tab, not Comparison Settings. I never really knew what it meant before, like what kind of errors there would be during a comparison, and it's not explained in the manual. Elhem Enohpi, 01 Aug 2022, 20:41
"Ignore errors" applies to both comparison and synchronization. So not sure where else to put it.