Is introducer needed for other devices to sync?

Support
1

Hi,

My current setup is:

  • 1 device as introducer
  • 4 other devices connected to the introducer and received the devices and folders

When I shutdown the introducer and introduced a new file in one of the other 4 devices, sync did not happen between them. Did I understand it correctly that an introducer is needed to sync items? Or, something failed on my end?

As a workaround, what I did was to create a separate connection between those other 4 devices, one an introducer to the other, with one folder for file transfer called “sync”.

Now I have:

  • Device 1 (introducer) to Device 2 with only “sync” folder
  • Device 3 (introducer) to Device 4 with only “sync” folder
  • Device 1 (introducer) connect to Device 3 (introducer) with only “sync” folder
  • Then Device 0 (introducer) connected to Devices 1-4 with “sync” and other folders.

It seems my setup is wrong or not a good idea but I can’t get the folders (in particular “sync” folder) to sync if Device 0 is offline and there are no other introducers.

Did I do something wrong with setup?

Thank you. Shalom.

2

Please check https://docs.syncthing.net/users/introducer.html. “Introducer” is only used to automatically add/connect devices for mutually shared folders. It has no impact on the actual file synchronisation that happens later.

Can you post screenshots of the Syncthing Web GUI from all four devices?

3

My guess is that when you added a new device (with the help of the introducer), you only shared folders between the new device and the introducer.

If you go to each device and add the other devices (unless they already are), and then on each folder you set it as shared with all the other devices - then the introducer will not have to be online for sync to work anymore.

Basically you will go from having the folders shared in a “star” pattern, to an “everyone to everyone” network.

4

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