New to iOS scrivener, so do i move all my projects to dropbox folder.

Good Afternoon,

 I am relatively new to Scrivener.  I have maybe 5-8 projects (scrivener files) in a certain folder.

1. With this new dropbox capability (syncing), I am just wondering if I should just move all my projects and backups to the designated dropbox folder?

   • You know like best practice or lessons learned?

2. I actually have no reservations with this, unless there are known issues about doing what i am suggesting and the potential for LOSING projects.

thank you for your help

Hi:

To answer your last point first. I use Scrivener on iOS and Mac every day and sync at least once a day. I’ve not lost any data or projects since I started using Scrivener on both platforms - sync conflicts yes, but that’s my own fault I know from these forums that others have had some different experiences but that hasn’t been my experience.

I tend to sync all of my in progress projects to iOS - there’s about a dozen at the moment, ranging between ideas repositories, random notes, and actual work in progress. Once I complete a project and it’s ready for submission, it comes off of the iOS sync and into a separate archived folder on my Mac. New projects get added as they come to the top of the list and actually start being worked on regularly.

Hope that helps.

Richard.

Thanks Richard, That is some good perspective.

In asking the question, I realize that a person could do whatever they want. i.e. there isnt one answer or way to use it.

I was just faced with this reality that on my mac i had my projects in a non-dropbox folder .

So it seems kind of obvious that I should just have my projects in this dropbox folder to access and use them on my two devices, if that is my goal.

But like you said, you seem to take them off and store them on the side when you get to a certain point.

thanks for the ideas.

I do prefer the advice of only syncing what you need to take with you. Something to consider with how Scrivener must work is that it has to process, in a minimal accounting sense, all of the internal components of every project you put in there. There is no way around that given how the core Dropbox API works—it has to download a whole list of everything to know which things need to be copied one way or the other. So the more projects you have, the slower it gets. If you have things you rarely or never really need to access on the go, then you are just making things slower than they need to be.

As for backups though: unequivocally, no. It’s a bad idea to store backups in the same place you work anyway, but especially so when adding a bunch of complicated sync tech on top of everything. If the backups are zipped, Scrivener won’t bother with them directly (though again they will slow down syncing).

I don’t know about losing projects—that would take quite a chain of unfortunate events. More likely is just simple “oops” editing the project before it is fully downloaded kind of mistakes. The sync system is generally pretty forgiving of that however, and there are numerous safeguards in place for protecting against known snafus, including rudimentary detection of just that kind of problem and warnings that you should wait before opening and syncing the project.

Amber,

Thank you.  That is what i was looking for too.  Great Insight I can use.  I will take backups off there.  Also i had not considered the sync time.  I guess I just need to make sure I keep things straight, as far as their location and not to overload sync.

I have all my Scrivener projects in a Dropbox folder, ”Scrivener Projects”, but inside that folder I have a subfolder ”Scrivener Active projects” which is the one I sync with my iPad. That way it is easy to move projects out and in of the synced subfolder in Finder on my Mac.
So far everything has worked like expected. Just remever to Take it slowly when you return to your Mac efter having used the iPad. Wait for the green light telling hou that the project has synced before you start Scrivener.