Eclipse, workspaces, DropBox and source control

Question

Eclipse has an idea I've always been kinda uncomfortable with - the idea of the workspace.

The workspace is that folder you store ALL your projects in. You cannot store projects outside the workspace. There is a painful import/export procedure you are subjected to to bring projects into your workspace. There's an enormous .meta folder inside the root of workspace that always seems to keep growing.

In GIT and other source control packages, you can easily stop a folder from being committed (namely the .meta folder) by using a .IGNORE file. Fine.

But if you want to also sync the source of small projects you don't want to bother commiting to a repository, you're kind of screwed here. The DropBox ignore folder feature isn't complete 2. I for example use Texclipse to develop LaTeX documents. Of course every document in Texclipse must be within the Workspace folder, which means I can't sync these files to dropbox easily (without syncing the massive .meta folder as well).

Is there a clever workaround to sync my Eclipse workspace folder, excluding the .meta folder, to my Dropbox?

Answer 1

Dropbox can follow symbolic links when syncing files and folders. You should be able to create symlinks from your Dropbox folder, to the folders you want to sync.

Also, I have not used Dropbox in awhile, but I believe it has a 'Selective Sync' feature now. This may be similar to the symlinks solution (i.e. you have to select all the folders you want, rather than only the few folders you don't want).