File System - Synchronize folders

Declaration

<AMFILESYSTEM ACTIVITY="synchronize_folders" FOLDER1="text" FOLDER2="text" INCLUDE="text" EXCLUDE="text" SUBFOLDERS="YES/NO" INCLUDEREADONLY="YES/NO" />

Related Topics    

Description

Synchronizes two folders either uni-directionally (one-way) or bi-directionally (both ways).

Practical usage

Ideally used to replicate folders between a machine and the local network or to backup one or more directories. If specifying a network location, folders should always be specified using UNC (Universal Naming Convention) paths instead of a mapped drive. For example: X:\pathname\ should be \\servername\pathname\. This is because mapped drives are available only when a user is logged on, therefore, tasks set to run in the background when the user is logged off will fail.

Parameters

General

Property Type Required Default Markup Description
Folder 1 Text Yes (Empty) FOLDER1="c:\firstfoldername\" The folder that should be synchronized. If synchronization method is set Unidirectional, then files from this folder that do not exist or are newer than their counterparts in Folder 2 will be transferred to the folder specified in the Folder 2 parameter. If synchronization method is set to Bidirectional, then files from folder 2 that are newer or do not exist will be transferred into this folder as well.
Folder 2 Text Yes (Empty) FOLDER2="c:\otherfoldername\" The destination folder and (optionally) file name that the files should be copied to. This can be a fully qualified path or a file name. Folders that do not exist will be automatically created at runtime.
Synchronization Text (options) Yes bidirectional METHOD="uni" The method by which the files should be synchronized. The available options are:

  • Bidirectional (Default) - The files will be synchronized both ways, from folder1 to folder2 and from folder2 to folder1.

  • Unidirectional - The files will be synchronized one way, from folder1 to folder2.

Advanced

Property Type Required Default Markup Description
Include masks Text No *.* INCLUDE="*.txt" The wildcard masks (such as * or ?) representing the files that should be synchronized. The default of *.* includes all files.
Exclude masks Text No (Empty) EXCLUDE="*.doc" The wildcard masks (such as * or ?) representing the files that should not be synchronized. If left blank no files are ignored.
Include subfolders Yes/No No No SUBFOLDERS="YES" Specifies whether subfolders and files inside them should be included in the synchronization. If selected, subfolders will be included in the synchronization. If disabled (default), subfolders will not be included.
Include read only Yes/No No No INCLUDEREADONLY="YES" Specifies whether files and folders marked as read-only are synchronized. If selected,  read-only files and folders are overwritten by the proper source file before the read-only attribute is reset. This parameter is disabled by default.

Description

Error Causes

On Error

Example

NOTE:
  • Copy and paste the sample AML code below directly into the Task Builder Steps Panel.
  • To successfully run the sample code, update parameters containing user credentials, files, file paths, or other information specific to the task to match your environment.

Description

Synchronize folder "C:\Dev" bi-directionally with "C:\Dev2".  Process sub folders.  

Copy 
<AMFILESYSTEM ACTIVITY="synchronize_folders" FOLDER1="C:\Dev" FOLDER2="C:\Dev2" SUBFOLDERS="YES" INCLUDEREADONLY="YES" />