esync Setup

Set up esync — a lightweight file sync tool that watches for changes and automatically rsyncs them to a local or remote destination.

Quick Reference

Setup Workflow

1. Install: go install github.com/louloulibs/esync@latest (or download binary from releases)
2. Init: cd into the project, run esync init -r <destination>
   • Auto-imports .gitignore patterns
   • Detects common dirs (.venv, build, __pycache__, dist, .tox, .mypy_cache)
3. Customize: Edit esync.toml — adjust ignore patterns, SSH, rsync flags
4. Verify: esync check to see what files will be included/excluded
5. Sync: esync sync (interactive TUI) or esync sync --daemon (background)

Config Structure

[sync]
local  = "."
remote = "user@host:/path/to/dest"

[sync.ssh]                          # Optional: explicit SSH control
host             = "myserver.com"
user             = "deploy"
port             = 22
identity_file    = "~/.ssh/id_ed25519"
interactive_auth = false            # true for 2FA servers

[settings]
watcher_debounce = 500              # ms between batched syncs
initial_sync     = false            # full sync on startup
ignore = [".git", "node_modules", ".DS_Store"]

[settings.rsync]
archive    = true
compress   = true
extra_args = ["--delete"]           # pass-through rsync flags
ignore     = ["*.log", "*.tmp"]     # rsync-only excludes

[settings.log]
file   = "/var/log/esync.log"       # optional log file (daemon mode)
format = "text"                     # "text" or "json"

Language-Specific Ignore Patterns

When setting up esync, add project-appropriate ignores:

Python: [".venv", "__pycache__", "*.pyc", ".tox", ".mypy_cache", "*.egg-info", ".pytest_cache"]

Node.js: ["node_modules", "dist", ".next", ".nuxt", "coverage", ".turbo"]

Go: ["vendor"] (most Go artifacts are in separate GOPATH)

Rust: ["target"]

R/Data Science: [".Rhistory", ".RData", "renv/library", "*.rds"]

General: [".git", ".DS_Store", "*.swp", "*.swo", ".env", "*.log"]

SSH Setup

Simple (when ~/.ssh/config is already set up):

[sync]
remote = "myserver:/opt/app"    # uses SSH config alias

Explicit (full control, enables ControlMaster keepalive):

[sync.ssh]
host          = "192.168.1.50"
user          = "deploy"
port          = 2222
identity_file = "~/.ssh/deploy_key"

2FA servers: Set interactive_auth = true in [sync.ssh].

Common Customizations

Delete extraneous remote files: extra_args = ["--delete"]

Bandwidth limit: extra_args = ["--bwlimit=5000"]

Set remote permissions: extra_args = ["--chmod=Du=rwx,Dgo=rx,Fu=rw,Fgo=r"]

Dry run first: esync sync --dry-run

Force initial full sync: esync sync --initial-sync