Please, add peer-to-peer (p2p) feature to the work of nextcloud. This means, that users can continue sharing files and collaborating using desktop clients and javascript offline mode in case the server is temporarily inaccessible due to different reasons. Once the network access recovery the data will be synced backed with the Nextcloud.
So, this is not about standalone work but continuing to share the data between users when the central server is not accessible. Of course, not all functions may be covered, but sharing files, working with the calendar, contacts, mail may be.
PS This feature request is called by today terrorist attack from russia to Ukrainian cities, when our server located in one of the western cities (seemed to be more safe comparing to the rest of the country subjected to the military intervention), became not accessible due to power outage, and remote users located in less safe parts of the country do not have access to it and cannot continue to share files and synchronise activities.
This is already accomplished with Syncthing. That is the tool if your goal is p2p and lan / delta sync while your Nextcloud is offline.
For the web server you can use same user www-data or simply manually re-scan once your Nextcloud comes back online. This process has been recommended many times, because it is a totally different approach than what Nextcloud offers. Hope it helps.
Thanks a lot for the reference to Syncthing! This project deserves attention, as well as it supports Ukrainians.
My suggestion is to augment the philosophy (like youāve said) of Nextcloud by providing elements of its functioning when thereās network purely relying on clients (web and standalone desktop). It may be compared with Google Workspace which provides basic access to its tools in web when thereās no connection to Google servers (editing docs, reading mailsā¦). So, this is basic feature, which I suggest to embed and go on by elaborating next features, which may cover the risks of loosing collaboration when thereās no reliable connection with the server, when it is compromised, when thereās no one. The basic need is to exchange with files, keep versioning, later having access to shared contacts and calendars.
I was reflecting what to do in this situation:
My fist though was to launch backup server on something like raspberry pi (in my country it costs now ~$100) + HDD. This leads to building the strategy how to provide efficient mirroring?
What so called federated nature of NC my suggest here?
However this approach seems to be not so reliable, as it may be needed to launch several copies in various locationsā¦
I cannot have own data center like Google/Amazon/Facebook/whatever! So, taking into account this assumption peer-to-peer connection comes in my mind, when I can sync with my colleagues/friends using ANY accessible tcp/ip network. That is why I suggest to think whether it is possible to augment NC with the mechanism of offline work.
Respectfully, this is not happening unless you use a different tool. As you can imagine, every point you bring up is an important one already discussed many times on this forum.
Some underlying philosophies of Nextcloud are:
Everything depends on Client / Server relationship
Monolithic design - if you want a better server you will invest in improving your existing system.
Goes against Point 2: you will be on your own due to monolithic design.
There is no mirroring in Nextcloud for casual users like ourselves. Hence, syncthing.
All federation offers is the ability for a server to remotely mount files to another server (single point of failure still applies). That is it; no actual mirroring or replication is possible apart from client devices on both servers.
In this situation Nextcloud is not for you, because it is not meant to be offline.
It is not possible as of 2022, nor is it in consideration. Tooling for the [nextcloud] project is developed for the largest user bases possible, which means we home enthusiasts are on our own. But, we also use the project at no cost with effectively zero restrictions.
Probably not what you want to hear, but also completely honest. Please search the forum to continue this discussion in the previous threads.
Please search the forum to continue this discussion in the previous threads.