Editing a Campaign From Multiple Computers

[MaxAstro]

I have a campaign I am working on, and I have three different computers I am likely to want to work on it from (home, work, and home office).

Is there a convenient way to facilitate this? For example, if I tell Fantasy Grounds to store the campaign inside my DropBox, is that likely to break anything? Has anyone else found a good solution for doing this?

[LordEntrails]

Yes, Drop Box is known to break things.
Cloud syncs like that work fine if they do not attempt to sync while FG is writing to the files. The only way you can control this is to disable updates while you are using FG and then re-enable them when you are not. Lots of human error potential.

If you are good with scripts, you can write a shortcut that copies your FG Data folder (or just your campaign) to your local computer and then starts FG when done. Then when FG closes it write the file back to your shared location. Then use that script from all 3 computers so it keeps the cloud location as the shared/master repository.

Which ever way you go, you will want to make regular backups.

[blashimov]

Hopefully not breaking an necro rules but is there another cloud system that works? Alternatively, is there a guide /video to file paths so whether using script or not I'm backing up / running from the right places? At a minimum I want to just completely switch to a new computer to run the campaign and keep it backed up since I have a lot of homebrew. Thanks.

[Zacchaeus]

Hopefully not breaking an necro rules but is there another cloud system that works? Alternatively, is there a guide /video to file paths so whether using script or not I'm backing up / running from the right places? At a minimum I want to just completely switch to a new computer to run the campaign and keep it backed up since I have a lot of homebrew. Thanks.

Any Cloud system works as long as you don't use autosync as LE says above. There have been cases where users have lost entire campaigns because the software tried to back up at the same time as FG was writing to disc (at least we think that's what the problem was). SO you can use any method you like as long as you don't have aut-sync turned on - or at least only have it on when you know that FG definitely won't be running. Another method is to use an external drive to transfer your data between computers.

[LordEntrails]

If you use the default installation locations for FG and the FG Data folder, then just make sure that the FG Data folder is included in your regular backups you do weekly or monthly for all of the rest of your computer.

If you want a sample script for manually backing up FG, you can read this post. Not sure how current the scripts are. https://www.fantasygrounds.com/forums/showthread.php?35578-How-to-back-up-AppData-folder-to-OneDrive-automatically&p=308736&viewfull=1#post308736

[MaxAstro]

Thank you all, good advice here. I'll have to check if I can set DropBox to not autosync a particular folder, otherwise I will probably just go the route of manually copying the campaign into the Dropbox as needed...

[blashimov]

Thank you so much all!

[MrDDT]

Thank you all, good advice here. I'll have to check if I can set DropBox to not autosync a particular folder, otherwise I will probably just go the route of manually copying the campaign into the Dropbox as needed...

You can also set it to autosync at a certain time, a time when you are not actively playing. It will be updated and backed up less often/fast but still able to be in the cloud.

[damned]

Losing your entire campaign should never happen.
All of these sync tools have the ability to recover previous versions and your db.session files are still going to be created each time you launch.
Im not recommending the use of these - Im just suggesting that the worst case scenario should never happen either.
Yes you could lose a sessions worth of data....

The most important thing to ensure you do - is do not leave FG running on 2 computers - they will overwrite each others changes and you will most likely end up without your new edits.

[Trenloe]

Unless you are 100% aware of how any synch you're using operates, don't use synch on your FG active campaign data. Even losing one sessions worth of data can be a big thing. So, unless you're prepared to lose data and have to manually restore a previous db.xml file, don't do it.

[damned]

I agree - you can end up losing some or lots of data so if you insist on doing this make sure you know what you are doing and if you lose data its up to you to recover it or rebuild it.

[LordEntrails]

Can you tell we've had people use cloud sync against our advice and then get upset when they lost data?
:)

[Mephisto]

I have been using OneDrive to sync my campaign, actually my entire FGU setup between computers. I didn‘t run into issues as long only of PC is online and you should give the system time to sync first if you switch PCs so you don‘t access data the system wants to sync.

Your mileage may vary and I strongly recommend to do backups but that is advise independent from Cloud providers. :)