I have this strange issue on mobile app(1.4.0[reinstalled too]) where the files(txt, odt for example) updated/changed on mobile device with apps like TextMaker or any other app does not automatically sync on save.
Even though the file changes on mobile, if i reopen it in the app it have the latest changes… While on the web it still showing the old file and no sync on desktop too(of course).
It only get updated if i force synchronize from the menu individually for each file.
Cant recall this was the issue on previous version.
Some time the mobile device even hold the old file data and does not sync at all after synchronize.
Hard to tell… The described behavior is the one known to me / expected by me with the app in mind. So there hasn’t been any change in the sync behavior and afaik the client never did any pro-active sync at all, except for the available offline marked files and in case the bug report is correct (haven’t tried it myself yet)9 also for any other file with a folder where a single file has been marked to be available offline.
I did some tests like make the files available offline and updated it after that. It did work after that. Sync was fine.
So it has to be set available offline to sync correctly. But i am a bit confused here, Nextcloud do download the file and after editing->save that file, updates are in the app afterwards but it does not sync to the server.
that is actually the normal behavior at the moment. If you “open” a file lying on the server the client will download it. The fact that the file is now (also) lying on your devices storage gives you the ability to open and edit it, and since it is stored on the device all changes you made a persistent (on the device). The “available” offline state is for telling the app that it should keep the file in sync with the server.
Nevertheless this behavior seems to confuse many users since it is the implemented behavior by the app but seems to clash with the expectation of what users anticipate the app will do (which it doesn’t). So it is a UX flaw I’d say.
In my workflow when I open a file from the cloud, edit and save it, I would definetly expect the changes to be uploaded to the cloud.
I might not necessarily expect the file to be offline available on the phone.
But even though the file is stored on the device as you said, I would expect the file to get updated from the cloud on the next opening.
Maybe give an option to automatically mark edited files as offline-available, if this is possible?
@Andy I agree there is some flaw in the design/UX here. It should be the other way around. The normal flow would be edit-> save and expected result would be sync automatically. Available offline would make the file available for offline use and update accordingly when get the connection.
@Snowyo Yes it has to be that way as it will make sense to normal users.
I’ll open up a discussion/issue on the development tracker to be discussed with the developers and designers. Just to weaken the specific/strong point of view: if you open a file from the internet via your browser you usually also just download it any the changes you do (locally) won’t be uploaded by the browser again.
Good thing is we all agree that we have found room for improvement here. What also needs to be taken into account is yet another opinion which comes from other users who actually expect the app to treat this as kind on “read-only and discard” as in open the file on the phone in-memory, remove it from there right after it has been closed. So the files on the server stays exactly the same as before and the one on the client is gone…
Working via browser one doesn’t expect file to be auto-synced to cloud.
But with desktop or mobile client we usually expect this. And GoogleDrive/Dropbox/OneDrive works this way as I know.
Hi,
december 2020 and the behavior of the mobile app (v3.14.1 with Android 10) is not quite different. When we create a file or a folder on the mobile device, it is not seen by the app and not synchronized. Oddly, the app shows the new size of the parent folder. Is there a scheduled improvement for this point ?
This behavior is frustrating, but it doesn’t make me forget the great services Nextcloud (and Owncloud before that) give to me. Nextcloud stay a very great app, for sure.
LM
