syncthingctl is a command-line tool designed to manage and interact with Syncthing instances. It provides developers and system administrators with a powerful way to monitor and control Syncthing operations without relying on its web-based interface.
Key Features:
Check the status of Syncthing instances
Trigger rescan, pause, resume, or restart operations
View and modify raw configuration files
Add items to ignore patterns for specific folders
Support for Bash completion with folder and device names
Audience & Benefit:
Ideal for developers and system administrators who need precise control over Syncthing configurations. It enables efficient management of file synchronization tasks, streamlining workflows and allowing for custom-tailored integrations.
This tool can be installed via winget, making it accessible for users to integrate into their existing development environments.
README
Syncthing Tray
Syncthing Tray provides a tray icon and further platform integrations for
Syncthing. Check out the
website for an overview and
screenshots.
The following integrations are provided:
Tray application (using the Qt framework)
Context menu extension for the Dolphin file manager
Check out the official forum thread for discussions
and announcements of new features.
This README document currently serves as the main documentation, so read on for details about
the configuration. If you are not already familiar with Syncthing itself, you should also have a look at
the Syncthing documentation as this README only covers the
Syncthing Tray integration.
Syncthing Tray works with Syncthing v1 and v2 (and probably v0). Syncthing Tray is maintained, and updates will
be made to support future Syncthing versions as needed.
Supported platforms
Official binaries are provided for Windows (for i686, x86_64 and aarch64) and GNU/Linux (for x86_64) and can be
downloaded from the website and the
release section on GitHub. However, this is only a fraction of
the available downloads. I also provide further repositories for some GNU/Linux distributions. There are
also binaries/repositories provided by other distributors. For a list of links, check out the
"Download" section of this document.
Syncthing Tray is known to work under:
Windows 10 and 11
KDE Plasma
Openbox using lxqt/LXDE or using Tint2
GTK-centered desktops such as Cinnamon, GNOME and Xfce (with caveats, see remarks below)
COSMIC (only simple tray menu works, see remarks below)
Sway/Swaybar/Waybar (with caveats, see remarks below)
Android (still experimental)
This does not mean Syncthing Tray is actively tested on all of these platforms or
desktop environments.
For Plasma 5 and 6, in addition to the Qt Widgets based version, there is also a "native"
Plasmoid. Note that the latest version of the Plasmoid generally also requires the
latest version of Plasma 5 or 6 as no testing on earlier versions is done. Use the Qt
Widgets version on other Plasma versions. Check out the
"Configuring Plasmoid" section for further details.
On GTK-centered desktops, have a look at the
Arch Wiki
for how to achieve a more native look and feel. Under GNOME, one needs to install
an extension for tray icon support (unless
your distribution already provides such an extension by default).
Limitations of your system tray might affect Syncthing Tray. For instance, when using the mentioned GNOME
extension the Syncthing Tray UI shown in the screenshots is only accessible by double-clicking
the icon. If your system tray, like on COSMIC, is unable to show the Syncthing Tray UI, you can still use
Syncthing Tray for the tray icon and basic functionality accessible via the menu.
Note that under Wayland-based desktops there will be positioning issues. However, the Plasmoid is not affected
by this.
The documentation on known bugs and workarounds
contains further information and workarounds for certain platform-specific issues, such as the positioning issues under
Wayland.
Documentation on how to use Syncthing Tray on Android can be found in a separate document.
Features
Provides quick access to the most used features but does not intend to replace the official web-based UI
Check state of folders and devices
Check current traffic statistics
Display further details about folders and devices, such as last file, last
scan, items out of sync, etc.
Display ongoing downloads
Display Syncthing log
Trigger a re-scan of a specific folder or all folders
Open a folder with the default file browser
Pause/resume a specific device or all devices
Pause/resume a specific folder
View recent history of changes (done locally and remotely)
Shows "desktop" notifications
The events for which to show notifications can be configured
Uses Qt's notification support or a D-Bus notification daemon directly
Provides a wizard for a quick setup
Allows monitoring the status of the Syncthing systemd unit and starting and stopping it (see section
"Configuring systemd integration")
Provides an option to add the tray to the applications launched when the desktop environment starts
Can launch Syncthing automatically on startup and display stdout/stderr (useful under Windows)
Browsing the global file tree and selecting items to add to ignore patterns.
Provides quick access to the official web-based UI
Can be opened as regular browser tab
Can be opened in a dedicated window using either
Qt WebEngine/WebKit
the "app mode" of a Chromium-based browser (e.g. Chrome and Edge)
Allows switching quickly between multiple Syncthing instances
Also features a simple command line utility syncthingctl
Check status
Trigger rescan/pause/resume/restart
Wait for idle
View and modify raw configuration
Supports Bash completion, even for folder and device names
Also bundles a KIO plugin which shows the status of a Syncthing folder and allows to trigger Syncthing actions
in the Dolphin file manager
Allows building Syncthing as a library to run it in the same process as the tray/GUI
English and German localization
Does this launch or bundle Syncthing itself? What about my existing Syncthing installation?
Syncthing Tray does not launch Syncthing itself by default. There should be no interference with your existing
Syncthing installation. You might consider different configurations:
If you're happy with how Syncthing is started on your system, just tell Syncthing Tray to connect to your currently
running Syncthing instance in the settings.
When starting Syncthing via systemd it is recommended to enable the systemd integration in the settings (see section
"Configuring systemd integration").
When starting Syncthing by other means (e.g. as Windows service) there are no further integrations provided. Hence,
Syncthing Tray cannot know whether Syncthing is expected to be running or not. It will therefore unconditionally
attempt to connect with Syncthing continuously as-per the configurable re-connect interval. It will also
unconditionally notify when disconnecting from Syncthing if this kind of notification is enabled (so it makes perhaps
most sense to disable it).
If you would like Syncthing Tray to take care of starting Syncthing for you, you can use the Syncthing launcher
available in the settings. Note that this is not supported when using the Plasmoid.
The Linux and Windows builds provided in the release section on GitHub
come with a built-in version of Syncthing which you can consider to use. Note that the built-in version of Syncthing
will only be updated when you update Syncthing Tray (either manually or via its updater). The update feature of
Syncthing itself is not available this way.
In any case you can simply point the launcher to the binary of Syncthing which you have to download/install separately.
This way, Syncthing can be (but also has to be) updated independently of Syncthing Tray, e.g. using Syncthing's own
update feature.
It is also possible to let Syncthing Tray connect to a Syncthing instance running on a different machine.
Note that the experimental UI tailored for mobile devices is more limited. Currently, it can only start a built-in
version of Syncthing or connect to an externally started Syncthing instance. It will set a custom config/data
directory for Syncthing so any Syncthing instance launched via the mobile UI will not interfere with existing setups.
Installation and deinstallation
Check out the website for obtaining the executable
or package. This README also lists more options and instructions for building from sources.
If you are using a package manager, you should follow its usual workflow.
Otherwise, you have to extract the archive and launch the contained executable. Especially on Windows, please
read the notes on the website before filing any issues. To uninstall, delete the executable again.
Notifications about updates can be enabled in the settings which also allow upgrading to a new version if available.
This simply replaces the executable at its location, which needs to be writable. The old
executable is renamed/preserved as a backup and you can simply rename it back if you need to go back to the previous
version.
For further cleanup, you may want to ensure that autostart is disabled (to avoid a dangling autostart entry). You may also
delete the configuration files (see "Location of the configuration file"
section below).
Configuration
You need to configure how Syncthing Tray should connect to Syncthing itself. The previous
section, "Does this launch or bundle Syncthing itself…", describes available options. Additionally,
a wizard is shown on the first launch, which can guide you through the configuration for common
setups. If you have dismissed the wizard, you can still open it at any time via a button on the
top-right corner of the settings dialog.
It may be worthwhile to browse through the pages of the configuration dialog to tweak Syncthing
Tray to your needs, e.g., to turn off notifications you may find annoying.
Location of the configuration file
The configuration file is usually located under ~/.config/syncthingtray.ini on GNU/Linux and
under %appdata%\syncthingtray.ini on Windows. For other platforms and further details,
check out the
Qt documentation
(Syncthing Tray uses the "IniFormat"). For portable installations, it is also possible to create
an empty file called syncthingtray.ini directly next to the executable.
You can remove the configuration file from the mentioned location to start from scratch.
Note that this only applies to Syncthing Tray. For Syncthing itself, check out
its own documentation.
The Plasmoid uses the same configuration file but also uses Plasma's configuration
management for settings specific to a concrete instance of the Plasmoid.
The experimental UI tailored for mobile devices uses a distinct configuration which is
located under ~/.config/Martchus/Syncthing Tray on GNU/Linux and
/storage/emulated/0/Android/data/io.github.martchus.syncthingtray on Android and
%appdata%\Martchus\Syncthing Tray on Windows. The configuration and database of Syncthing
itself are also located within this directory when Syncthing is launched via the mobile UI.
Connect to Syncthing via Unix domain socket
When using a Unix domain socket as the Syncthing GUI address (e.g., by starting Syncthing with
parameters such as --gui-address=unix://%t/syncthing.socket --no-port-probing), you need to
specify the path to the socket as "Local path" in the advanced connection settings. This
setting requires Qt 6.8 or higher. You still need to provide the "Syncthing URL" using the
unix+http as scheme (e.g. unix+http://127.0.0.1:8080 where the host and port are not
actually used). However, the web view will not work with this.
Syncthing Tray is a single-instance application. So, if you try to start a second instance, the
second process will only pass arguments to the process that is already running and then exit. This
is useful as it prevents one from accidentally launching two Syncthing instances at the same
time via the built-in Syncthing launcher. It also allows triggering certain actions via launch
options, see "Configuring hotkeys" for details.
There are a few other notable launch options:
--connection [config name] …:
Shows tray icons for the specified connection configurations (instead of a single tray
icon for the primary connection configuration). Syncthing Tray will still behave as a
single-instance application, so a single process will handle all those tray icons and the
built-in Syncthing launcher will launch Syncthing only once.
--replace:
Changes the single-instance behavior so that the already running process is exited and
the second process continues to run. This is useful to restart Syncthing Tray after
an update.
--new-instance:
Disables the single-instance behavior. This can be useful to run two instances of
Syncthing via the built-in launcher. This only makes sense if these
two Syncthing instances use a different configuration/database which can be achieved with
a portable configuration.
--single-instance:
Prevents the creation of a second tray icon if Syncthing Tray is already running. (Without
this option, Syncthing Tray will still show another tray icon regardless of its single-instance
behavior.)
--help:
Prints all launch options.
Those were the options of the tray application. Check out
"Using the command-line interface" for an
overview of available tooling for the command-line.
Configuring Plasmoid
The Plasmoid requires Syncthing Tray to be installed via distribution-specific packaging. It is
not available via the generic GNU/Linux download or the Flatpak. Check out the relevant notes
on the downloads page for
available options and details on package names. For further information about supported versions
of Plasma, check out the "Supported platforms" section.
The built-in Syncthing launcher is not available in the Plasmoid because it is recommended to rely on
the systemd integration instead.
Once installed, Plasma might need to be restarted for the Plasmoid to be available.
The Plasmoid can be added/shown in two different ways:
It can be shown as part of the system tray Plasmoid.
Whether the Plasmoid is shown as part of the system tray Plasmoid can be configured
in the settings of the system tray Plasmoid. You can access the settings of the
system tray Plasmoid from its context-menu which can be opened by right-clicking on
the arrow for expanding/collapsing.
This is likely the preferred way of showing it and may also be the default.
This way, it is also possible to show the icon only in certain states by choosing to
show it only when important and selecting the states in the Plasmoid's settings.
Configuring the size has no effect when the Plasmoid is displayed as part of the
system tray Plasmoid.
It can be added to a panel or the desktop like any other Plasmoid.
This allows you to add multiple instances of the Plasmoid, but it is recommended to choose
only one place. For that, it also makes most sense to ensure the autostart of the
stand-alone tray application is disabled. Otherwise you would end up having two icons
at the same time (one of the Plasmoid and one of the stand-alone application).
The Plasmoid cannot be closed via its context menu, unlike the stand-alone application.
Instead, you have to disable it in the settings of the system tray Plasmoid as explained
before. If you have added the Plasmoid to a panel or the desktop you can delete it like
any other Plasmoid.
The Dolphin integration can be enabled/disabled in Dolphin's context-menu settings. It will
read Syncthing's API key automatically from its configuration file. If your Syncthing configuration file is
not in the default location, you need to select it via the corresponding menu action.
Configuring systemd integration
The next section explains what it is for and how to use it. If it doesn't work on your
system, please read the subsequent sections as well before filing an issue.
Using the systemd integration
With the system configured correctly and systemd support enabled at build-time, the following
features are available:
Starting and stopping the systemd unit of Syncthing
Consider the unit status when connecting to the local instance to prevent connection attempts
when Syncthing isn't running anyway
Detect when the system has just been resumed from standby to avoid the "Disconnect"
notification in that case
However, these features are optional. To use them, they must be enabled in the settings dialog
first.
It is recommended to enable "Consider unit status …". Note that Syncthing might not be immediately
ready to serve API requests when the systemd unit becomes active. Therefore, it is still required to configure
a re-connect interval. The re-connect interval will only be in effect while the systemd unit is active.
So despite the re-connect interval, there will be no connection attempts while the systemd unit is
inactive. That is all the systemd integration can optimize in that regard.
By default, Syncthing Tray assumes that the systemd unit is a
user unit. If you are using
a regular system-wide unit (including ones ending with …@username), you need to enable the
"System unit" checkbox in the settings. Note that starting and stopping the system-wide Syncthing
unit requires authorization (systemd can request it through PolicyKit).
Required system configuration
The communication between Syncthing Tray and systemd is done via systemd's D-Bus service.
That means systemd's D-Bus service (which is called org.freedesktop.systemd1) must be running on
your D-Bus. For user units, the session D-Bus is
used, and for regular units (including ones ending with …@username), the system D-Bus is used.
Systemd's D-Bus service is only available when D-Bus itself is started via systemd. That
is the default under Arch Linux and openSUSE and likely most other modern distributions, where
it is usually started via "socket activation" (e.g. /usr/lib/systemd/user/dbus.socket for the session
D-Bus).
All of this applies to both the session D-Bus and for the system D-Bus, although the startup of the session
D-Bus can be particularly easy to disrupt. One easy way to disrupt it is to start a second instance of
the session D-Bus manually, e.g. via dbus-run-session. When starting the session D-Bus this way, the
systemd integration will not work, and you will likely end up with two session D-Bus processes. It is
also worth noting that you do not need to set the DBUS_SESSION_BUS_ADDRESS variable manually
because the systemd file dbus.socket should take care of this.
The built-in launcher can be accessed and configured in the settings dialog. It is not available
in the Plasmoid. It allows you to launch Syncthing
as an external process by leaving "Use built-in Syncthing library" unchecked.
When launching Syncthing this way, you have to specify the path to an executable, e.g., one you
have downloaded from the upstream Syncthing website. It is also
possible to use the Syncthing version built into Syncthing Tray by pointing it to the Syncthing Tray
executable and specifying the arguments syncthing serve.
as part of the Syncthing Tray UI process by checking "Use built-in Syncthing library".
This will always use the Syncthing version built into Syncthing Tray.
Launching Syncthing as part of the UI process will interfere with
Syncthing's configuration for lowering the priority.
You should therefore avoid using this configuration option or start Syncthing as an external process
instead. Otherwise, the configuration option might have no effect or will affect the UI of Syncthing
Tray, causing it to become slow/unresponsive.
This option might not be available on your build of Syncthing Tray, e.g., it is disabled on the
packages I provide for GNU/Linux distributions as it makes the most sense to use the
distribution-provided version of Syncthing there.
It is recommended to enable "Consider process status …". Note that Syncthing might not be immediately
ready to serve API requests when started. Therefore, it is still required to configure a re-connect interval.
The re-connect interval will only be active while the Syncthing process is running. So despite the
re-connect interval, there will be no connection attempts while the Syncthing process is not running.
Configuring hotkeys
Use the same approach as for launching an application via a hotkey in your graphical
environment. Have it invoke
syncthingtray --trigger to show the Qt Widgets based tray menu.
syncthingtray --webui to show the web UI.
syncthingctl [...] to trigger a particular action. See syncthingctl -h for details.
The Plasmoid can also be shown via a hotkey by configuring one in the Plasmoid settings.
Using the command-line interface
Check out syncthingctl --help and syncthingtray --help for available options. More details
can be found in the CLI documentation.
RPM *.spec files and binaries are available via openSUSE Build Service
remarks
Be sure to add the repository that matches the version of your OS and to keep it
in sync when upgrading.
The linked download pages might be incomplete, use the repositories URL for a full
list.
Old packages might remain as leftovers when upgrading and need to be cleaned up
manually, e.g. zypper rm libsyncthingconnector1_1_20 libsyncthingmodel1_1_20 libsyncthingwidgets1_1_20.
openSUSE Leap 15, Fedora 27, Debian 10 and Ubuntu 18.04 are recent enough (be sure
the packages libglx0, libopengl0 and libegl1 are installed on Debian/Ubuntu)
Supports X11 and Wayland (set the environment variable QT_QPA_PLATFORM=xcb to disable
native Wayland support if it does not work on your system)
This build of Syncthing Tray bundles OpenSSL because different GNU/Linux distributions come with different incompatible
versions of that library. It will use your OpenSSL configuration, though. In case that config is not compatible with the
bundled version of OpenSSL, preventing TLS support from working, you need to set the environment variable OPENSSL_CONF=.
The built-in web view is not available in these builts as it would require shipping a full web browser engine.
Syncthing Tray can still show the official web-based UI in a dedicated window via a Chromium-based browser you have
already installed using its "app mode". Alternatively, use the distribution-specific builds provided for Arch Linux,
openSUSE and Fedora which come with the built-in web view enabled.
The executable is signed in addition using ECDSA for verification by the updater. The public key can be found
in the source code and verification
is possible with stsigtool or OpenSSL.
Windows SmartScreen will likely block the execution (you'll get a window saying "Windows protected your PC");
right click on the executable, select properties and tick the checkbox to allow the execution
Antivirus software often wrongly considers the executable harmful. This is a known problem. Please don't create
issues about it.
The default version is using Qt 6 and hence preferred on modern versions of Windows. The oldest version of Windows it
supports is 64-bit Windows 10 version 1809.
The Qt 5 based version should still work on older versions down to Windows 7 although this is not regularly checked.
On Windows 7 the bundled Go/Syncthing will nevertheless be too new; use a version of Go/Syncthing that is older
than 1.21/1.27.0 instead.
The built-in web view is not available in these builts as it would require shipping a full web browser engine.
Syncthing Tray can still show the official web-based UI in a dedicated window via a Chromium-based browser you have
already installed (e.g. Edge or Chrome) using its "app mode".
The executable is signed in addition using ECDSA for verification by the updater. The public key can be found
in the source code and verification
is possible with stsigtool or OpenSSL.
or, using Winget, type winget install Martchus.syncthingtray in a Command Prompt window.
or, using Scoop, type scoop bucket add extras & scoop install extras/syncthingtray.
All code - unless stated otherwise in a comment on top of the file - is licensed under GPL-2-or-later. This does not apply
to code contained in Git repositories included as Git submodule (which contain their own README and licensing information).
Attribution for 3rd party content
Syncthing Tray contains icons from various sources:
All other icons found in this repository are taken from the KDE/Breeze project.
None of these icons have been (intentionally) modified so no copyright for modifications is asserted.
Some of the code is based on code from other open source projects:
Code in syncthingwidgets/quick/quickicon.cpp and the corresponding header file originates from
Kirigami. The comments at the beginning of those files state the original
authors/contributors.