What is caching?

When you access a network file from a remote location, RNA places a copy of the file in a folder on your local hard disk. As you make changes to the file, the changes are made to the cached copy. When you save the file, both copies are updated. The next time you open the file, RNA compares the network copy with the cached copy. If the cached copy is the same, RNA opens this file. If the cached file is older, the cache is updated and then opened.

The performance benefits of caching are displayed on the General tab of the Properties dialog.

The cache can be managed and configured using the Cache tab.

The size of the cache is dynamic, based on the amount of free space on your hard drive.

The location of the cache is in the RNA program folder. You can change the location of this cache to any local hard drive.

If the security of your network files is of concern to you, RNA can encrypt the cache.

How does SpeedSync work?

SpeedSync is LapLink Software Inc's patented delta technology.

As a file is updated (saved) to the network, SpeedSync shortens transfer times by sending only the parts of the file from the cache that changed since the last update. The same thing happens when you open (download) a network file that changed since the last time you accessed it.

The performance benefits of SpeedSync are shown on the General tab of the Properties dialog.

Note: The file must be in your cache for SpeedSync to work. Performance benefits will appear after the file is updated the first time.

What is compression?

Many files have empty space that can be safely removed during a transfer. Compression speeds the transmission of data by shrinking this empty space before they are sent and restoring them to their original sizes on arrival. RNA uses ZLIB compression.

The performance benefits of compression are shown on the General tab of the Properties dialog.

RNA always uses compression during a transfer.

How are the transfers more efficient?

Windows TCP/IP communications are inherently inefficient. RNA improves the efficiency by grouping and compressing similar requests and responses before transmitting. Learning from your previous file requests, RNA also sends a little more data in each packet than is actually requested (predictive read-ahead). For example, if you are viewing page 1 of a document, RNA will send that page, plus part of page 2. The extra data is stored in the cache until you actually scroll the page 2.

The performance benefits of predictive read-ahead are best seen while editing a file. No statistics are captured.

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