Quote:
Originally Posted by Tanjamuse
Would you mind giving me a guide as to how I sync? And does it pick up changes in the metadata or added metadata or custom columns ?
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I am assuming that you want a backup of your library only in order to protect against loss of your library through disk failure or similar, and that you are not looking to backup Calibre's own Preferences settings.. I don't know how much of a guide you are wanting so if I go overboard or do not cover enough, apologies.
I have used Free File Sync for many years and it has proved itself to be totally reliable and it has a very good reputation. That said, one has to be aware that error on the user's part can result in loss of data, and it can be a challenge initially for those not particularly computer literate.
My suggestion would be to download Free File Sync (
http://freefilesync.sourceforge.net/ ) and create a test folder with some files copied into it (it could be a copy of your Calibre Library) and play with backing those up to your SD card (or USB drive should you get one) in order to get an understanding of how it works.
To set up FFS you will see a tabular region where on the left you enter files or folders you want backed up or synched (in your case I am assuming that will be just your library folder) from the source drive and on the right the destination drive and folder for each left hand side item.
In each case there is a choice of how one wants the synchronisation to occur (a little gearwheel icon); for a backup one may select "Mirror" as Copyrite suggests which will only write or delete from the left hand items (your hard drive) to the right (your SD card).
However, if you are making a backup only i.e. you will never be manually adding, deleting or editing files on that, for the sake of simplicity and learning until you gain familiarity you can just leave the sync option at the default (the gearwheel icon stays grey) if you wish; ordinarily this syncs both ways, but if nothing is ever going to be changed by you on the backup there will be no changes to be synced back to your hard drive (so the result is you get a "Mirror").
When done the synchronisation setup you have created can be saved.
A problem with backups of files such as books where you may not notice a book is missing from the library for many months, or even years, through accidental deletion, corruption or whatever, is that unless one makes periodic archived backups which are stored forever that one can go back to, ones next backing up will just replicate the library sans the missing book to ones backup and the book is lost.
So, on the top left hand side of the FFS window is a Compare button, this will compare the files on both drives (the hard drive and the SD card) and tabulate all changes that it will make on both drives. It pays to run down this and check to see that the books that FFS says will be deleted in the backup are indeed ones that you have yourself deleted out of your library and so want to be removed forever. When absolutely happy hit the Synchronise button at top right of the FFS window; pretty obviously, don't use or have Calibre doing anything during the above process (Calibre can be open but inactive, however).
Back to Calibre itself, as long as you have selected your library folder (or each library should you have several) this will backup the changes in the metadata for each book and the information in columns (with respect to columns that has been my experience, including user created columns; however I am not familiar enough with the innards of Caibre's coding to know if this is always so, but I have never noticed an exception).
You will also notice that FFS places a small file in both the originating and backup folders in order to keep track from session to session. If you do Library Maintenance in Calibre you will find that while these files show up as invalid authors they should just be ignored and no maintenance action taken.