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Local Filesystem

The Local adapter reads and writes to your computer’s filesystem. This is particularly useful in the desktop app for backing up local files to cloud storage or syncing cloud files locally.

Capabilities

Section titled “Capabilities”
  • ✅ Browse folders and files via the desktop file picker
  • ✅ Create directories
  • ✅ Upload/copy files
  • ✅ Download/copy files
  • ✅ Delete files and directories
  • ✅ Move files
  • ✅ Get file metadata (size, dates, permissions)
  • ✅ Real-time file change detection

Prerequisites

Section titled “Prerequisites”
  • Blober Desktop App installed
  • Read/write permissions to the directories you want to access

Path Format

Section titled “Path Format”

Local paths are standard absolute paths on your operating system:

Windows:

C:\Users\YourName\Documents
D:\Backups\photos

macOS:

/Users/YourName/Documents
/Volumes/ExternalDrive/backups

Linux:

/home/yourname/documents
/mnt/backup
/media/yourname/external-drive

Configuration

Section titled “Configuration”

No credentials are required for the Local adapter. Access is based on the permissions of the user running the Blober desktop app.

Browsing Files

Section titled “Browsing Files”
  1. In Blober, go to Workflows => New Workflow
  2. Select Local as source or destination
  3. Click Browse to open the file picker
  4. Navigate to and select your folder
  5. The path will be populated automatically

Use Cases

Section titled “Use Cases”

Backup Local Files to Cloud

Section titled “Backup Local Files to Cloud”

Create a workflow to automatically backup your Documents folder to Azure Blob, S3, or other cloud storage.

Example:

  • Source: Local /Users/you/Documents
  • Destination: AWS S3 my-backup-bucket/documents/
  • Action: Copy

Download Cloud Files Locally

Section titled “Download Cloud Files Locally”

Sync your Google Drive or cloud storage files to a local folder for offline access.

Example:

  • Source: Google Drive My Files/Projects
  • Destination: Local /Users/you/Projects
  • Action: Copy

Local-to-Local Copy

Section titled “Local-to-Local Copy”

Copy files between different drives or directories on your computer.

Example:

  • Source: Local /Users/you/Downloads
  • Destination: Local /Volumes/ExternalDrive/Archive
  • Action: Move

Testing Workflows

Section titled “Testing Workflows”

Use local storage to test workflow configurations before running against cloud providers.

Important Safety Behavior

Section titled “Important Safety Behavior”

To avoid accidentally listing your entire filesystem, the Local adapter will not list anything when no start directory is specified. Browsing is always done via the UI file picker.

Permissions by Operating System

Section titled “Permissions by Operating System”

Windows

Section titled “Windows”
  • Access depends on NTFS permissions and UAC settings
  • Run Blober as Administrator if you need access to system directories
  • Right-click folder => Properties => Security to check permissions

macOS

Section titled “macOS”
  • You may need to grant Files and Folders or Full Disk Access permissions
  • Go to System Preferences => Security & Privacy => Privacy => Files and Folders
  • If prompted, click Allow when Blober requests folder access

Linux

Section titled “Linux”
  • Permissions are based on the user running the app and mount permissions
  • Check permissions with ls -la /path/to/folder
  • Fix permissions if needed:
    Terminal window
    chmod -R u+rw /path/to/folder

Common Issues

Section titled “Common Issues”

Slow Performance

Section titled “Slow Performance”
  • Exclude directories with many small files (1000s of files)
  • Check if antivirus is scanning files during operations
  • Ensure disk health is good (check SMART status)
  • Consider using filters to exclude temporary files

External Drive Not Showing

Section titled “External Drive Not Showing”
  • Ensure the drive is properly mounted
  • On Linux, check /media/ or /mnt/ for mount points
  • On macOS, check /Volumes/
  • On Windows, check if drive letter is assigned

Best Practices

Section titled “Best Practices”

Path Selection

Section titled “Path Selection”
  • Choose specific folders rather than entire drives
  • Avoid system directories:
    • Windows: C:\Windows, C:\Program Files
    • macOS: /System, /Library
    • Linux: /bin, /etc, /usr
  • Create dedicated backup folders for organization

Performance

Section titled “Performance”
  • Local operations are generally faster than cloud operations
  • For directories with thousands of files, use filters to limit scope
  • Consider excluding temporary files (.tmp, .log, cache directories)

Security

Section titled “Security”
  • Local storage never leaves your computer
  • No data is sent to Blober servers
  • Perfect for sensitive files that shouldn’t be uploaded to cloud

Advanced Configuration

Section titled “Advanced Configuration”
Section titled “Symbolic Links”

Blober can follow symbolic links:

  • Useful for organizing files across locations
  • Be careful with circular links (A => B => A)
  • Enable in workflow settings if needed

Hidden Files

Section titled “Hidden Files”
  • By default, hidden files (starting with . on Unix) may be hidden
  • Enable “Show hidden files” in settings to include them
  • Useful for backing up configuration files (.bashrc, .gitconfig)

File Filters

Section titled “File Filters”

Exclude certain file types from operations:

Example filters:

*.tmp      # Temporary files
*.log      # Log files
.DS_Store  # macOS metadata
Thumbs.db  # Windows thumbnails
node_modules/  # Dependencies

Security Considerations

Section titled “Security Considerations”

Sandboxing

Section titled “Sandboxing”

The desktop app respects OS-level sandboxing:

  • Limited access to system files
  • User explicitly grants folder access
  • No access to other applications’ data

Privacy

Section titled “Privacy”
  • Files stay on your computer (for local-to-local operations)
  • Cloud transfers go directly to the destination provider
  • Blober doesn’t store your files on its servers

External References

Section titled “External References”