Managing the Cloud Drive Content

You can manage the folders in your cloud drive and then share them with other users. You can also specify specific subfolders to exclude. For details about collaboration, see Sharing Content.

This section describes the following:

• Adding Content to the CTERA Portal Cloud Drive
• Understanding the Overlay Icons
• Syncing Other CTERA Portal Folders
• Controlling to Which Local Folder a Cloud Drive Folder Syncs
• Excluding Folders
• Removing Files From the Caching Agent
• Manually Managing Folder Syncing

Adding Content to the CTERA Portal Cloud Drive

To add to the CTERA Portal cloud drive:

• In Windows File Explorer, right-click any folder on your computer that you want to sync and select CTERA Agent > Sync this folder.

A folder is created in the Cloud Drive and synced with the local folder you selected. The newly synced folder is displayed in the Cloud Drive page under Synced with this Computer.

Alternatively:
To add to the CTERA Portal cloud drive:

1. Right-click the CTERA Agent tray icon, , and select Settings.
   The CTERA Agent Settings window is displayed.
   
2. Click Main > Cloud Drive in the navigation pane.
   The Cloud Drive page is displayed.
   The following information is included in the page:
   • All the Cloud Drive folders that are currently synced with folders on the CTERA Agent computer such as the My Files folder.
   • Any other folders on your Cloud Drive.
3. Click Add Folders.
   The Find Directory window is displayed enabling searching for the folder to add.
4. Select the folder or subfolder you want to sync to the cloud drive.
   Note

   You can add a new folder under an existing folder.

5. Click Choose.

A folder is created in the Cloud Drive and synced with the local folder you selected. The newly synced folder is displayed in the Cloud Drive page under Synced with this Computer.

Understanding the Overlay Icons

Icons in Windows File Explorer provide information about the status of the folder or file.

Folders that have not been synced to the PC, are represented by the icon. When you click a folder that is not synced, the following window is displayed:

Clicking Sync this folder, downloads the folder and the metadata about the folder contents. The folder content is downloaded as stubs.

• Folders and files with the icon are fully synced with the CTERA Portal.
• Folders and files with the icon are being synced with the CTERA Portal.
• Files with the icon are stubbed, via a Caching Agent and the actual file content is not saved locally. Clicking a file to open it, downloads the file. In the following example, the first and third files in the list have been opened. All the other files are stubs.
• Files with the icon have an error with the sync.

Syncing Other CTERA Portal Folders

You can only sync folders at the top level in your CTERA Portal cloud drive.
Folders at the top level in your CTERA Portal cloud drive that are not synced with your computer are listed under Other folders on cloud. You can sync these folders, adding them to the local cloud drive.
To sync CTERA Portal cloud drive folders to your computer:

1. Right-click the CTERA Agent tray icon, , and select Settings.
   Or,
   Click the settings icon, , in the bottom right corner of the CTERA Agent window.
   The CTERA Agent Settings window is displayed.
2. Click Main > Cloud Drive in the navigation pane.
   The Cloud Drive page is displayed.
3. Select Other folders on cloud.
   All the folders in the CTERA Portal that are not synced with your computer are displayed.
   
4. Click next to the folder you want to sync.
   
   If you want to sync to a location other than your Cloud Drive folder:
   1. Click Sync to a different location, to select or create a new location on your computer to which to sync the folder.
      The Find Directory window is displayed enabling searching for the folder to add.
   2. Select the folder or subfolder you want to sync to the cloud drive.
   3. Click Choose.
5. Click Start Syncing.

The folder is synced in your local cloud drive.

Controlling to Which Local Folder a Cloud Drive Folder Syncs

To specify the local folder for syncing:

1. Right-click the CTERA Agent tray icon, , and select Settings.
   Or,
   Click the settings icon, , in the bottom right corner of the CTERA Agent window.
   The CTERA Agent Settings window is displayed.
2. Click Main > Cloud Drive in the navigation pane.
   The Cloud Drive page is displayed.
3. Click the button for the parent folder of the folder you want to exclude and click Manage Synchronization Settings.
   
   The Synchronized folder settings window is displayed.
   
4. To sync the folder to a subfolder of the Cloud Drive folder, select Sync to the Cloud Drive folder.
   The local synced copy of the folder you selected is moved to the Cloud Drive folder.
5. To sync the folder to a folder other than the Cloud Drive folder:
   1. Select Sync to alternate local folder.
   2. Click in the text box.
      The Find Directory window is displayed enabling searching for the folder to add.
   3. Select the folder or subfolder you want to sync to the cloud drive.
   4. Click Choose.
6. Click OK.

The changes are applied.

Excluding Folders

You can exclude subfolders, so that the content on the CTERA Portal is no longer synced with the local content. You can do this as part of the CTERA Agent configuration or by manually stopping or starting the sync of a folder, as described in [Manually Managing Folder Syncing].

To configure folders to exclude from syncing:

1. Right-click the CTERA Agent tray icon, , and select Settings.
   Or,
   Click the settings icon, , in the bottom right corner of the CTERA Agent window.
   The CTERA Agent Settings window is displayed.
2. Click Main > Cloud Drive in the navigation pane.
   The Cloud Drive page is displayed.
3. Click the button for the parent folder of the folder you want to exclude and click Manage Synchronization Settings.
   
   The Synchronized folder settings window is displayed.
   
4. Under Excluded subfolders, click Add.
   A row is added to the Excluded subfolders list.
5. Click in the row and type the name of a subfolder under the parent folder you want to exclude from syncing. For example, to exclude subfolder1 that is under subfolder that is under the parent folder, enter \subfolder\subfolder1.
   Note

   You cannot browse to the folder to exclude.

6. Repeat step 4 to add more subfolders as necessary.
7. Click to remove an added folder from the exclude list.
8. Click OK.

The changes are applied.

Removing Files From the Caching Agent (File Eviction)

When a Caching Agent is configured, files that are not marked as available offline, but have been downloaded to the cache, get evicted from the cache based on the following:
The eviction policy checks if the amount of storage exceeds the allocated cache size and if it is larger than the allocation, files that can be evicted and that have not been accessed for at least 4 day are evicted from the cache, file by file until the amount of the storage that is used is less than the allocated cache size. A file is only evicted if:

• All modifications to the file have been synced to the CTERA Portal.
• The file is not open in an application.
• The file is not marked as available offline.

These files are grouped according to the time since they were last accessed. The files are evicted within these groups, the files in the oldest group first, followed by the files in the next oldest group.

In Windows File Explorer, the evicted files are represented by their stubs. The folders remain synced.

To manage file eviction:

1. Right-click the CTERA Agent tray icon, , and select Settings.
   Or,
   Click the settings icon, , in the bottom right corner of the CTERA Agent window.
   The CTERA Agent Settings window is displayed.
2. Click Main > Cloud Drive in the navigation pane.
   The Cloud Drive page is displayed.
3. Click Settings and in the Cloud Drive Settings window that is displayed, click Advanced in the navigation pane.
   The Cloud Drive Settings page is displayed.
   
4. Click Empty Cache to empty the cache of all the files that can be evicted or Evict Now to immediately start evicting files based on the eviction policy.
   Note

   The eviction policy can be configured. For details, contact CTERA Support.

Files that are evicted, leave only the stubs in the cache.

An entry is written to the log when eviction starts and when eviction completes. The entry when eviction completes includes the amount of data that was evicted.

Manually Managing Folder Syncing

You can manually stop, suspend and unsuspend syncing content.
To stop syncing a folder:

• Either:
  In Windows File Explorer, when the CTERA Agent is not configured as a Caching Agent, right-click the folder on your computer and select CTERA Agent > Stop syncing this folder. For a subfolder, select CTERA Agent > Exclude folder from sync.
  Note

  To include a folder that you stopped syncing, select CTERA Agent > Sync this folder. To include a subfolder that you excluded, select CTERA Agent > Include folder in sync.

  Or,
  1. Open CTERA Agent Settings window.
  2. Click Main > Cloud Drive in the navigation pane.
     The Cloud Drive page is displayed.
  3. Click the button for the parent folder of the folder you want to exclude and click Stop Syncing This Folder.

To suspend syncing:

• Either:
  Right-click the CTERA Agent tray icon, , and select Suspend Sync.
  Or,
  In the CTERA Agent window, click to the right of View online.
  Or,
  1. Open CTERA Agent Settings window.
  2. Click Main > Cloud Drive in the navigation pane.
     The Cloud Drive page is displayed.
  3. Click Suspend.

To resume syncing:

• Either:
  Right-click the CTERA Agent tray icon, , and select Unsuspend Sync.
  Or,
  In the CTERA Agent window, click to the right of View online.
  Or,
  1. Open CTERA Agent Settings window.
  2. Click Main > Cloud Drive in the navigation pane.
     The Cloud Drive page is displayed.
  3. Click Unsuspend.