Diffoniq can synchronize two folders — interactively from a
directory comparison, or headless from the command line for scripts and the
Windows Task Scheduler. In both cases the same compare engine as the
interactive directory comparison (including the
persistent hash cache and
rename/move detection) decides what to do,
then a plan of copy, rename and delete operations is carried out. For driving
/sync from scripts or an AI assistant, see
Scripting and AI Assistants.
In a folder comparison, File > Synchronize... opens a preview built from the comparison already on screen — no second scan. Pick the mode (Mirror or Update, see below), the direction (left to right or right to left) and the deletion policy; the action list and the summary line follow immediately. Execute carries out exactly the listed actions with a progress dialog that can be canceled between actions; afterwards the comparison is refreshed from disk.
/sync)The headless twin of the dialog — it reports through an exit code
and a log file (started through
DiffoniqC.exe, the log
lines also appear in the console):
Diffoniq /sync <left> <right> (--mirror | --update)
[--execute] [--content] [--reverify] [--permanent]
[--log <file>] [compare switches]
From a script, call DiffoniqC.exe:
Diffoniq.exe is a windowed program, so a shell neither waits for it nor sees
its exit code. The console launcher DiffoniqC.exe next to it
takes the same arguments, waits, prints the log lines and returns the exit
code (Scripting and AI Assistants).
Ctrl+C there stops the sync, also mid-way through --execute. The
log file is written to a temporary name and appears only when the run is
complete.
--mirror | The right folder becomes a mirror of the left one: new and changed files are copied, files existing only on the right are deleted, and files recognized as renamed or moved are renamed on the right instead of being copied again. |
--update | Copy only: new and changed files go left → right. Nothing is ever deleted or renamed on the right. |
On the command line the direction is always left → right; to synchronize the other way, swap the two path arguments. Both paths must be folders — archives can be compared and viewed, but not used as a synchronization root.
--execute nothing is touched. The
run is a dry run: the planned operations are written to the log
file and the exit code reports whether differences exist. Add
--execute — typically after checking the dry-run log
once — to apply the plan.--permanent deletes for good. Network drives have no
recycle bin; deletions there are always permanent (noted in the
log).By default a file pair is compared the quick way — by size and
timestamp: a file whose size or last-write time differs counts as changed.
Timestamps up to 2 seconds apart count as equal, because FAT drives
(many USB sticks) store them in 2-second steps. The window's
Ignore Date and
Ignore Time settings do not apply
here — their factory setting would reduce the check to the size alone
and miss an edited file of unchanged size. To ignore timestamps
deliberately, say so on the command line (/g t, see
Command Line); a size difference is always a
change unless Ignore Size is set.
With --content the decision is made by file content instead:
equal-sized pairs are hash-verified, so a touched-but-identical file is not
copied and a same-size/same-date change is still caught. Repeat runs
— the scheduler scenario — resolve those hashes from the
hash cache almost for free. The cache trusts a
file whose size and timestamp did not change; --reverify (implies
--content) reads every equal-sized pair again, like
Re-verify Contents in the window.
The result of /sync is the process exit code plus a log file
— ideal for schedulers, which capture exactly these two things.
Started through DiffoniqC.exe,
the log lines also appear in the console:
0 | No differences — nothing to do |
1 | Differences found; dry run: reported ·
with --execute: synchronized successfully |
2 | Finished with errors (partially synchronized) |
3 | Invalid arguments, or aborted before any operation |
The log is written to
%APPDATA%\Diffoniq\sync\sync_YYYYMMDD_HHMMSS.log (the 30
newest logs are kept) unless --log <file> names a
different location.
Create a scheduled task that runs the sync every night at 02:30:
schtasks /create /tn "Nightly backup sync" /sc daily /st 02:30 ^ /tr "\"C:\Program Files\Diffoniq\Diffoniq.exe\" /sync D:\work \\nas\backup\work --mirror --execute --log D:\logs\work-sync.log"
Tip: run the same command once without --execute and review
the dry-run log before arming the task.
During the trial period only dry runs are
available; --execute requires a licensed copy and otherwise exits
with code 3 (a note is written to the log — no dialog interrupts a
scheduled run).