Introducing Liferay Sync

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Liferay makes it easy to create compelling websites, publish and share content, and manage documents through its award-winning open web platform.  Today, Liferay is introducing Liferay Sync, an innovative way to extend the reach of your documents and files to desktop and mobile environments.

What is Liferay Sync?

Liferay Sync is an add-on product for Liferay 6.1 CE and EE that enables your users to publish and access documents and files from multiple environments, including Windows and Mac OS Desktops, and iOS-based mobile platforms.  As users add and collaborate on documents and files, Liferay Sync automatically synchronizes them across all configured Sync clients, making documents available for viewing or editing in the native environments in which Liferay Sync is supported.  Liferay Sync is fully integrated into the Liferay Platform --  features such as authentication, versioning, workflow, and social collaboration extend naturally into the supported environments. Liferay Sync also makes documents available while offline -- with automatic synchronization once reconnected.

Downloads

For Mac OS or Windows, visit the Liferay Sync product page, and click Get it Now (on the right-side navigation menu) to download the client application for your desktop environment.  Once installed, follow the on-screen instructions to configure your client to connect to an existing Liferay 6.1 deployment using valid credentials.

For iOS, visit the App Store and search for Liferay, and install the Liferay Sync App.  Once installed, follow the on-screen instructions as above. (Update: We are in the process of working with Apple to get the Liferay Sync iOS app published - we expect it to be available by February 8).

How does it work?

Liferay Sync manages documents and site information through Liferay 6.1's built-in web services.  Clients securely communicate to Liferay using user-supplied credentials, such that each user can only access those documents and sites for which they have permissions.  Changes made through Liferay Sync are immediately available to the rest of the Liferay Platform, including users accessing Liferay through traditional web-based interfaces.

For desktop environments, a new folder structure is created and used for synchronizing files.  Files found therein can be treated as any ordinary file.  Credentials, sync frequency, and other folder options can be configured in-client.  Native desktop notification events keep you abreast of what Sync is doing, and native menu and taskbar integration keep Sync controls within easy reach.

Mobile environments are naturally dependent on the way in which documents are handled.  For iOS, documents are maintained in a file list, and can be viewed by clicking on the files themselves.  External files accessible from other apps can be "opened" using Liferay Sync, thereby dropped into your Sync folder and synchronized across other Sync clients.  "Pulling down" on the Sync file list forces a refresh (automatic sync frequency can be configured as well).

This Liferay Sync release is designed to work with Liferay 6.1 Community Edition and the upcoming Enterprise Edition.  When used with the Enterprise Edition of Liferay, Sync will enable users to synchronize documents and files across all of the sites for which they have access.  

Beta Release

This release is a beta release.  As such, you may come across bugs or unexpected behavior.  Like other Liferay projects and products, we are using our JIRA installation at issues.liferay.com to manage issues. If you find an issue, make sure to read and understand the JIRA Guidelines, and file issues under the new SYNC project.

You may also visit the Liferay Sync forum and post questions or feedback.

What's next?

We hope that the wider Liferay community will find this add-on useful for both CE and EE use cases.  In the coming weeks, we will work with the community to iron out any last minute issues before general availability (GA).  In addition, full documentation will be available for this add-on when the GA release is available.  

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