Difficulties with BC4 (Linux) and Dropbox

[tanker]

First off let me say I really like Beyond Compare (BC). I work for Boeing in a system support role and use the supplied BC3 for comparing files/directory structures between servers, comparing scripts and script output. It is an everyday tool for me.

I thought it would be useful at home too so I loaded it on my Linux system and am currently within the evaluation period. I was especially eager to use it with my 1TB Dropbox account. But it seems I'm having problems syncing files from my system using BC4.2.3 (build 22587). I'm running Linux Mint 18.2

I sent an email to the support address because I didn't want to register on yet another forum. However, I found I needed to register to view screenshots on a post. So here I am.

After spending most of the day yesterday and couple hours today (so far) researching the problem I have found that;
a) BC doesn't support OneDrive in the Linux environment.
b) There seems to be an ongoing problem with BC and pushing large files to Dropbox. (around the 100mb size)

As some one that troubleshoots system problems and tools, usually more info is better. So I will post most of what I have run across in the past couple days:

I found the knowledge base article regarding the limitations of using BC4 with Dropbox, however, I think it is out of date. Dropbox does seem to preserve the modified date of the files. The difference seems to be between the dates shown in BC4 and the web page. One hour later on the web page, like there is a time zone adjustment. What doesn't seem to copy is the date on the folder there all the current time. (see "Screenshot from 2017-12-22 11-38-03.png")

I have had no problem creating a profile and using it to set up a folder compare. However I have been getting errors during the compare and it seems to crap out during copy or sync operations on large files. When doing a compare I get errors like, "HTTP can't parse response". When I navigate to that folder it completes its compare as being the same. (see below and "Screenshot from 2017-12-22 12-04-16.png" "Screenshot from 2017-12-22 12-05-52" and "Screenshot from 2017-12-22 12-06-57.png")

12/22/2017 11:41:04 AM Username: stan
12/22/2017 11:41:04 AM Load comparison: <->
12/22/2017 11:41:51 AM Load comparison: /media/stan/USB DISK/Manual Backups <-> Dropbox: /MyBookDrive/Manual Backup
12/22/2017 11:50:11 AM Unable to load Dropbox: /MyBookDrive/Manual Backup/Quicken 2006/1997 - present/Attach/1997/Txn/0001445A: HTTP can't parse response
12/22/2017 11:56:10 AM Unable to load Dropbox: /MyBookDrive/Manual Backup/Quicken 2006/Q06Files/Attach/1997/Txn/00014261: HTTP can't parse response

Continued in a reply...

[Aaron]

Hello,

We're seeing this error occur sometimes with either large Dropbox locations or over slow connections. The API we're using has trouble recovering automatically when it hits it. What do you mean by "completes compare as being the same"? The error files should be different sizes, and should show as a difference, although if it has a newer timestamp might not show as part of the Sync preview.
Improving our handling of this behavior is something we're looking into, but doesn't look like it'll be an easy or quick fix. 100megs is on the low end of "large file sizes"; how often are you hitting this with those files and how many total files are you working with in the comparison?

Folder timestamps are often updated as soon as another file is copied into them (including the initial copy of the folder with items inside it). The Touch command can manually override the Last Modified timestamp of the folder, although it will update again as soon as anything else is added.

OneDrive is limited to Windows support due to the library we use. We try to document this on the website with OS icons, and provide full functionality with the trial for testing:
http://www.scootersoftware.com/shop.php?zz=kb_editions