jFTPSync FTP-site Synchronization and Backup Utility v1.0.0.0

jFTPSync Features:

• Automatically copy updated files from your computer to or from a remote FTP site.
• Can send email notification to one or more recipients when differences are found between FTP and local directories.
• Can copy files or just report that differences exist.
• Supports synchronizing multiple directories
• Adjustable synchrionization period.

jFTPSync is free and can be used and distributed without restriction. I would be interested in hearing from you if you have suggestions for improvements. You can download it here:

Download jFTPSync!

How to use jFTPSync

• Using the Administration Interface
• Configuring jFTPSync to send email reports
• Viewing the email reports

What jFileSync Does:

jFTPSync is primarily intended to provide a means for backing up SQLExpress databases located on hosted web sites.

The problem with hosted web sites is that they can often contain hundreds of megabytes of files that don't change very often and can be located on faraway servers accessible only by low-bandwidth connections; thus, to completely back them up is a time consuming process.

jFTPSync provides a less painful system for backup of remotely hosted web sites. It runs in the background on your local PC as a windows service and maintains a local list of the files on your web site and the time/date that each file was last changed. If during one of its periodic scans of your web site it detects a file that has been updated (so that the time/date stamp of the remote file is newer than that it detected during its last scan) then it copies the file down from the web site and remembers the file's new time/date stamp. If any updated files were detected during a scan, then a list of updated files is emailed to you.

The primary purpose of the program is to back up SQL Express databases which in high volume web sites are often locked by the database engine and can't be copied. To circumvent this locking issue, jFTPSync has the ability to call a web page before it begins the sync process. This web page can perform a backup of one or more SQL Express databases to a temporary location.

Some other features are:

• Support for multiple synchronizations. Want to back up more than one remote web host? Not a problem.
• The synchronization can work the other way around to keep files on a remote web host synchronized with those in a local directory. (Good, for example, if you want to automatically publish data in a spreadsheet to a web site).
• The ability to exclude files with designated file extensions. This is a good idea to do with .MDF and .LOG files as these often can't be copied and when the app tries it will fail, generating an error message.

Note that my hosting service uses Microsoft Windows Server 2003. This application uses the WININET.DLL library in Windows to provide FTP services. I haven't tested the application with non-windows FTP sites and am not sure if it will work properly.