Unsyncing turns into a complete mess, data deletion

Bugs and issues Linux
#1

I wanted to move my folder with photos (about 2TB worth) over to a different cloud storage, ironically because after years of constant problems and breakages I don’t trust InSync with certain data anymore.

What I did

  1. Unsync the folder, which tells you “data will be kept on both your computer and in the cloud”.
  2. About an hour later, shut down your computer.
  3. Start back up your computer, and watch chaos unfold.

What happened

  1. The supposedly unsynced folder is now flooding the errors pannel with “to avoid data loss, the folder was not removed completely” – I thought you weren’t meant to be deleting any data to begin with???
  2. It’s still trying to upload new data to the supposedly unsynced folder
  3. The parent folder shows up as unsynced, but the child folders do not, and apparently unsyncing them does cause data to be deleted from the system (unlike what InSync told me for their parent folder)
  4. It’s still scanning and monitoring the unsynced folder, even the child folders that show up as unsynced in the UI
  5. Eventually it starts deleting most of my photos folder from my local system – Remember when it said in the beginning no data would be deleted?

I’ll be honest, at this point I don’t think I’m even interested in a solution anymore. It’s one thing after the other with this piece of software. I need a sync solution to sit in background and do its job reliably, which InSync has over the years simply proven itself incapable of doing.
It’s a shame, it really had a lot of potential.

#2

This just gets better.

Upon later (once “unsync” appeared to have finally completed) setting up a one-way sync to an external disk to get a copy of the data to move, InSync proceeded to delete seemingly random child folders from the cloud.
I’ll repeat: Upon setting up a one-way sync from cloud to local, InSync decided the right course of action is to delete files from the cloud.

#3

There seems to be a steady stream of issues with Insync. I have been considering switching completely to another cloud service.

#4

@RobinJ1995 This is a serious case that we would need to investigate.

Could you confirm how you setup the sync for the files that you initially unsynced? The default unsyncing behavior for items synced from cloud to local is to remove the local copy. However, there are other behaviors depending on how you set-up the sync as described here.

Could you also please email support@insynchq.com and send the following:

  • logs.db
  • out.txt
  • data folder
  • live folder

Do include the filenames of what you unsynced (that got removed locally even if Insync said it wouldn’t), and the files deleted from the cloud.

#5

The default should be not to delete anything.

#6

@Robert_Keeney That is the default indeed, which is why we would need to investigate the deletion issues via the logs. This is definitely NOT how Insync should be handling your files.

Just checking on your setup specifically: has there been any deletion issues recently? Please do let me know what issue/s you’ve been dealing with, so we can look into it accordingly.

Thank you!

#7

No problems here. I’m only syncing one computer.