ExcludeSyncFolders Syntax and Kobo Directories

[Tattvadarzin]

I understand the concept and am playing with my own bespoke versions:

• ^\\(?!Library$) exclude all except the folder \Library (I organise my books for clarity into a top level directory called Library. For me this is the simplest if not the most general solution.)
  
• ^\\(\..+|fonts|icons)$ exclude any top level directory starting with a . or called fonts or icons

I do know about (\\.(?!kobo|adobe).*?|([^.][^/]*/)+\\..+) but from what I can see it is interestingly complicated and inadequate assuming you want to exclude fonts and icons (sorry if I am treading on toes here - I just want to understand and I am a newbie of a few days).

I could spend a lot of time experimenting but my questions may be able to be answered quickly here.

1. Is the OS character for a new subdirectory level \ or /?
   
2. If the text after the = is not preceded by \ or even .\ does the OS assume the top level? I.e. are Library, \Library, .\Library treated as the top level directory called Library?
   
3. Is the exclusion a full path exclusion or are subdirectories automatically excluded? I.e. does excluding \MyFolder exclude files in MyFolder and recursively files in its subdirectories?
   
4. What is special about the characters . and / that the "standard" exclusion regex part ([^.][^/]*/)+\\..+) seems to care about? (I know typically . means the current directory and as for / see above questions.)

Thanks in advance for reading this far.

[DNSB]

For a bit of history on the ExcludeSyncFolders option, you can read the Prevent Kobo from importing dotfiles/folders . The area of interest starts around message #10.

Good judgement comes from experience, experience comes from bad judgement

[geek1011]

Is the OS character for a new subdirectory level \ or /?

Forward slash.

If the text after the = is not preceded by \ or even .\ does the OS assume the top level? I.e. are Library, \Library, .\Library treated as the top level directory called Library?

Is the exclusion a full path exclusion or are subdirectories automatically excluded? I.e. does excluding \MyFolder exclude files in MyFolder and recursively files in its subdirectories?

I don't remember (although I'll probably be looking at this later this week for an unrelated project doing stuff with Kobo sync). The KOBOeReader partition is mounted on /mnt/onboard.

Also, you'll probably find answers to those on the original thread from a while ago.

[*]What is special about the characters . and / that the "standard" exclusion regex part ([^.][^/]*/)+\\..+) seems to care about? (I know typically . means the current directory and as for / see above questions.)

It's for Unix-style hidden folders/files, which start with a period. I've attached a diagram of the regexp.


Also, if you don't want to deal with this stuff, I have a mod which works on pretty much any firmware version that deals with this from the outside. https://github.com/pgaskin/kobo-mods...otfile-hack-ng

[NiLuJe]

Originally Posted by Tattvadarzin

If the text after the = is not preceded by \ or even .\ does the OS assume the top level? I.e. are Library, \Library, .\Library treated as the top level directory called Library?

Yep, this is actually sandwitched between a ^/mnt/onboard/ and a $ (or something to that effect), so, no need for a leading path separator. (And if you mistakenly duplicate it, I'm fairly sure Qt will optimize it away).

Originally Posted by Tattvadarzin

Is the exclusion a full path exclusion or are subdirectories automatically excluded? I.e. does excluding \MyFolder exclude files in MyFolder and recursively files in its subdirectories?

IIRC, an excluded path won't be traversed, effectively blacklisting everything under it. (I may have a post with more details on that specific point in the threads @geek1011 mentioned. And/or in the commit message of the latest regex update in KFMon's OCP scripts).

[Tattvadarzin]

Thanks all. I will read the indicated thread (I may be some time ).

Here is what I ended up with:
[FeatureSettings]
ExcludeSyncFolders=(fonts|icons|\\.(?!kobo|adobe). +|([^.][^/]*/)+\\..+)