Dear GarageSale Users,
If you want to try out GarageSale’s new synching feature, please read this FAQ (frequently asked questions) document.
The help section with images is available here: Synching Overview
Always backup your data
Synching is incredibly complex, with several interconnected components (GarageSale, Sync Server, Database, Image Storage) needing to work together over the internet.
Most likely, there are still uses cases or error scenarios we haven’t thought of, so please make sure you have recent and frequent backups on the Macs you are using synching with. If in doubt, enable Time Machine on your Mac.
Prerequisites
Here is what you need to make synching work:
- the latest GarageSale 8 Beta version
- an active GarageSale Pro subscription (we will credit the fees you paid during the beta phase, once we release the final version of GarageSale 8)
- two or more Macs with your GarageSale Pro subscription details filled in the preferences panel
Enable Synching
To enable synching in GarageSale 8,
- open the Preferences window
- select the “GarageSale Pro” tab
- sign in to your GarageSale Pro account on that Mac, if you haven’t done yet
- click the “Enable synching” button
If this is the first of your Mac’s for which synching is enabled, GarageSale will start uploading the contents of your library to the sync server.
If there’s already data for your account stored on the sync server, the data on your current Mac will be overwritten with your data from the server. If this operation would be erasing listings or inventory items you don’t have exported anywhere else, make sure you export these items, so you can re-import them after the server data has been downloaded.
Pause Synching
If you don’t want your changes to be uploaded to our server (e.g. you are on mobile internet connection), you can temporarily pause synching from GarageSale’s “File” menu.
Disable Synching
- open the Preferences window
- select the “GarageSale Pro” tab
- sign in to your GarageSale Pro account on that Mac, if you haven’t done yet
- click the “Disable synching” button
Warning: If you disable synching, and re-enable it later, GarageSale will replace the data on the current Mac with data from the server. If you’d rather have the data on the server replaced with what’s on your current Mac, please get in touch with us.
What data is synchronized
Basically, everything that’s in the main window will get synched, except for eBay orders.
- Listing section:
- Smart Groups
- Regular Folders
- Listings
- Inventory section:
- Smart Groups
- Regular Folders
- Inventory Items
- Orders section:
- Smart Groups
- Reports section:
- Smart Groups
- Regular Folders
- Listings
- Mail messages templates
When is your data synchronized
GarageSale will synchronise your data every 5 minutes. You can force a synchronisation right now by use the “Synchronize Now” menu item in the file menu.
Why aren’t orders synched between Macs
Orders can already be kept in synch on the different Macs, by authorising your eBay account on both Macs.
It’s more challenging to keep orders in synch than other data types, because two Macs can download the same order information from eBay at the same time, independently of each other. This order would be stored using different ids on each Mac.
Special steps from our side would be required to identify equal orders during synchronisation, otherwise there would be duplicate entries for that order on each Mac.