I’m using Syncthing since some years to synchronize folders between several linux machines without any problems. Thanks for your great work!
Now I want to install Syncthing on a dual boot machine (Win10 + Linux) to synchronize a folder f between the dual boot PC and some other PCs. An instance of folder f will exist on the windows partition and one instance of folder f will exist on the linux partition (It will not be one shared folder accessed from both operating systems).
After reading the device_id documentation and some posts about dual boot I am a little bit confused. Can I just install Syncthing on the Windows and on the Linux partition or will this cause conflicts because of an identical device_id between both Syncthing instances?
If you want the two to stay completely separate (and not re-use the same folder), then you definitely should not use the same ID, which won’t happen anyway unless you copy the key files manually from one OS to the other.
The problem has been discussed on the forums quite a few times, but usually the case was opposite, i.e. the user did want to use the same folder, and in that situation, I always think it’s the best to keep both Syncthing, its config and database, and folders contained in a semi-portable state, so that everything uses relative paths and is re-used between the two systems.
In sum, you shouldn’t experience any issues unless you go out of your way and try to re-use the key files that already exist in the previous OS. If you just install Syncthing in each of the two and configure it normally, it will be the same as if you’ve just set up two different devices.