Setting up Hot Folder

Important: In order to use a transfer proxy or an HTTP proxy with Hot Folders, you must configure global proxy settings (Tools > Global Preferences) because Hot Folders does not use the proxy settings that are configured for a user in My Preferences. For more information about enabling a proxy server globally, see Enabling a transfer proxy or HTTP proxy.

Creating a Hot Folder

To create a new Hot Folder, start the Aspera application as an administrator. In the file browser, go to the folder you want to set up as the Hot Folder. Right-click the panel and select New > Hot Folder to open the New Hot Folder dialog. You can also open the New Hot Folder dialog by clicking File > New > Hot Folder.

The New Hot Folder window includes the following configuration tabs:

Tab	Description
Hot Folder	Set the source, the destination, and the synchronization interval.
Transfer	Set the transfer speed and transfer policy.
Tracking	Turn on and configure email notifications for transfer start, completion, and error.
Filters	Create filters to skip files that match certain patterns.
Security	Enable transfer encryption and content protection.
File Handling	Set up a resume rule, preserve transferred file attributes, and remove or move source files.

The following tables describe the options available on each configuration tab.

Hot Folder

Option	Description
Name	The name of the Hot Folder. Use the default name or enter your own. The default name is the name of the Windows™ folder. Click Generate to restore the default name.
Source	Specify the source for the Hot Folder. If the source is This Computer, then the Hot Folder is in push mode.
Destination	Specify the destination for the Hot Folder. If the destination is This Computer, then the Hot Folder is in pull mode.
Send Changes	Select when to synchronize. The options depend on whether the Hot Folder is in push or pull mode: Push and pull mode: Select Daily at to specify a time to synchronize daily. Note: When the specified time is reached, file transfers from the Hot Folder are allowed for 1 hour, including any new files added during that window. The one-hour window supports retries. Pull mode: Select Every to specify the interval at which to scan the source Hot Folder and receive updates. Push mode: Select Periodic scan to specify the interval at which to scan the source Hot Folder and send updates if changes are detected. Note: When file notification is not available, this feature must be activated to detect file changes in your Hot Folders. Push mode: Select Send immediately to synchronize whenever a file in the folder is changed.

Transfer

Option Description

Policy

Option	Description
Policy	Set the FASP® transfer policy. `high` - Adjust the transfer rate to fully use the available bandwidth up to the maximum rate. When congestion occurs, the transfer rate is twice as fast as a fair-policy transfer. The `high` policy requires maximum (target) and minimum transfer rates. `fair` - Adjust the transfer rate to fully use the available bandwidth up to the maximum rate. When congestion occurs, bandwidth is shared fairly by transferring at an even rate. The `fair` policy requires maximum (target) and minimum transfer rates. `low` - Adjust the transfer rate to use the available bandwidth up to the maximum rate. Similar to fair mode, but less aggressive when the bandwidth is shared with other network traffic. When congestion occurs, the transfer rate is reduced to the minimum rate until other traffic decreases. `fixed` - Attempt to transfer at the specified target rate, regardless of network or storage capacity. This can decrease transfer performance and cause problems on the target storage. Use the fixed policy only for specific contexts, such as bandwidth testing, otherwise, avoid the use of this policy. The `fixed` policy requires a maximum target rate. `aggressiveness` - The aggressiveness of transfers that are authorized by this access key in claiming available bandwidth. Value can be 0.00-1.00. For example, these values correspond to the policy option where a policy of high approximates to aggressiveness of 0.75, fair to 0.50 and low to 0.25. Aggressiveness can be used if you need to fine-tune the transfer policy. Note: If `--policy` is not set, ascp uses the server-side policy setting (`fair` by default).
Speed	Use this option to specify the target transfer rate and minimum transfer rate. (Files will still be transferred if the available transfer rate is below the minimum).

Set the FASP® transfer policy.

high - Adjust the transfer rate to fully use the available bandwidth up to the maximum rate. When congestion occurs, the transfer rate is twice as fast as a fair-policy transfer. The high policy requires maximum (target) and minimum transfer rates.
fair - Adjust the transfer rate to fully use the available bandwidth up to the maximum rate. When congestion occurs, bandwidth is shared fairly by transferring at an even rate. The fair policy requires maximum (target) and minimum transfer rates.
low - Adjust the transfer rate to use the available bandwidth up to the maximum rate. Similar to fair mode, but less aggressive when the bandwidth is shared with other network traffic. When congestion occurs, the transfer rate is reduced to the minimum rate until other traffic decreases.
fixed - Attempt to transfer at the specified target rate, regardless of network or storage capacity. This can decrease transfer performance and cause problems on the target storage. Use the fixed policy only for specific contexts, such as bandwidth testing, otherwise, avoid the use of this policy. The fixed policy requires a maximum target rate.
aggressiveness - The aggressiveness of transfers that are authorized by this access key in claiming available bandwidth. Value can be 0.00-1.00. For example, these values correspond to the policy option where a policy of high approximates to aggressiveness of 0.75, fair to 0.50 and low to 0.25. Aggressiveness can be used if you need to fine-tune the transfer policy.

Note: If --policy is not set, ascp uses the server-side policy setting (fair by default).

Speed Use this option to specify the target transfer rate and minimum transfer rate. (Files will still be transferred if the available transfer rate is below the minimum).

Tracking

Option	Description
Send Email Notifications	Select to enable email notifications and to display configuration options, however, notifications are not sent until they are enabled (click Preferences on the main screen of the application). For more information, see Configuring transfer notifications. Important: For Hot Folder email notifications to work, the GUI must remain open.
When ¹	Select one or more events that trigger the notification. Transfer Start, Complete, and Error.
Subject¹	Enter the subject of the notification.
To ¹	Enter the email addresses of the recipients.
Template ¹	Select a notification template from the drop-down list. Add, delete, edit, and preview templates by clicking Manage Templates. For more information on configuring templates, see Configuring transfer notifications.
Message¹	Include a custom message with the notification.

¹ Not displayed until notifications are enabled.

Filters

Click Add and enter the filter pattern to use to exclude files or directories from the transfer. The exclude pattern is compared with the whole path, not just the file name or directory name. As shown, the asterisk (*) can be used to represent zero to many characters in a string, for example *.tmp matches .tmpand abcde.tmp:

Filter Pattern	Excludes these files
*dirName	path/to/dirName, another/dirName
*1	a/b/file1, /anotherfile1
*filename	path/to/filename, /filename

Note: The temporary files that are used by to resume incomplete files are automatically ignored based on the resume suffix that was set by the sender.

Security

Option Description

Encryption

Select the encryption cipher. Aspera supports three sizes of AES cipher keys (128, 192, and 256 bits) and supports two encryption modes, Cipher Feedback mode (CFB) and Galois Counter Mode (GCM). The GCM mode encrypts data faster and increases transfer speeds compared to the CFB mode, but the server must support and permit it.

Cipher rules

The encryption cipher that you are allowed to use depends on the server configuration and the version of the client and server:

When you request a cipher key that is shorter than the cipher key that is configured on the server, the transfer is automatically upgraded to the server configuration. For example, when the server setting is AES-192 and you request AES-128, the server enforces AES-192.
When the server requires GCM, you must use GCM or the transfer fails.
When you request GCM and the server is older than 3.8.1 or explicitly requires CFB, the transfer fails.
When the server setting is any, you can use any encryption cipher. The only exception is when the server is 3.8.1 or older and does not support GCM mode; in this case, you cannot request GCM mode encryption.
When the server setting is none, you must use none. Transfer requests that specify an encryption cipher are refused by the server.

Cipher Values

Value	Description	Support
AES-128 AES-192 AES-256	Use the GCM or CFB encryption mode, depending on the server configuration and version (see cipher negotiation matrix).	All client and server versions.
AES-128-CFB AES-192-CFB AES-256-CFB	Use the CFB encryption mode.	Clients version 3.9.0 and newer, all server versions.
AES-128-GCM AES-192-GCM AES-256-GCM	Use the GCM encryption mode.	Clients and servers version 3.9.0 and newer.
NONE	Do not encrypt data in transit. Aspera strongly recommends against using this setting.	All client and server versions.

Client/Server Cipher negotiation

The following table shows which encryption mode is used depending on the server and client versions and settings:

	Server AES-XXX-GCM	Server AES-XXX-CFB	Server AES-XXX	Server AES-XXX
Client AES-XXX-GCM	GCM	Server refuses transfer	GCM	Server refuses transfer
Client AES-XXX-CFB	Server refuses transfer	CFB	CFB	CFB
Client AES-XXX	GCM	CFB	CFB	CFB
Client AES-XXX	Server refuses transfer	CFB	CFB	CFB

Content Protection

Enable client-side encryption at rest:

Push mode: Select Encrypt uploaded files with a password to encrypt the uploaded files with the specified password. The protected file has the extension .aspera-env appended to the file name.

Pull mode: Select Decrypt password-protected files downloaded to require entry of the decryption password when downloading encrypted files.

For more information about client-side encryption at rest, see Client-Side Encryption-at-Rest (EAR).

File handling

Option Description

Resume

Option	Description
Resume	Select Resume incomplete files to enable the resume feature. Select the file comparison method from the When checking files for differences drop-down menu: Compare file attributes - Compares the sizes of the existing and original file. If they are the same, then the transfer resumes, otherwise the original file is transferred again. Compare sparse file checksums - Performs a sparse checksum on the existing file and resumes the transfer if the file matches the original, otherwise the original file is transferred again. (Default) Compare full file checksums - Performs a full checksum on the existing file and resumes the transfer if the file matches the original, otherwise the original file is transferred again. Under When a complete file already exists at the destination, select an overwrite rule when the same file exists at the destination. By default, files on the destination are overwritten if different from the source.
File Attributes	Select Preserve Access Time to set the access time of the destination file to the same value as that of the source file. Select Preserve Modification Timeto set the modification time of the destination file to the same value as that of the source file. Select Preserve Source Access Time to keep the access time of the source file the same as its value before the transfer. Note: Access, modification, and source access times cannot be preserved for node and Shares connections that are using cloud storage.
Source Handling	Select Automatically delete source files after transfer to delete files that transferred successfully from the source. Push mode: Select Automatically move uploaded source files to a directory after transfer and specify the location on the source machine to which they must be moved. Only a path to an existing location on the client can be specified. Only files are moved, not the parent directory structure. To preserve the directory structure, enable the --src-base option after the Hot folder is created: Quit Aspera. Stop the Aspera Sync service by going to Search > Services, selecting Aspera Sync, and click Stop. Open C:\Program Files\Aspera\Client\etc\sync-conf.xml, locate the `<EXTRAOPTS>` entry, and edit it as follows: `<EXTRAOPTS>--src-base=ldir_path</EXTRAOPTS>` Where `ldir_path` is the source path for the Hot Folder and matches the setting for `<LDIR>`. Save your changes and restart the Aspera Sync service. Pull mode: Select Transfer source directory contents only to transfer only the contents of the directory and not the directory itself. If this option is enabled, for a source folder /folder1 containing file1 and file2 being pulled to the destination folder /destination, only file1 and file2 are transferred, not /folder1. If this option is not selected, the transfer produces /destination/folder1 (containing the two files) on the destination machine. Select Delete empty source subdirectories to remove empty subdirectories from the source once the files that they contain transfer successfully. This option is usually used to clean up the Hot Folder when source files are moved or deleted after transfer.

Select Resume incomplete files to enable the resume feature. Select the file comparison method from the When checking files for differences drop-down menu:

Compare file attributes - Compares the sizes of the existing and original file. If they are the same, then the transfer resumes, otherwise the original file is transferred again.
Compare sparse file checksums - Performs a sparse checksum on the existing file and resumes the transfer if the file matches the original, otherwise the original file is transferred again. (Default)
Compare full file checksums - Performs a full checksum on the existing file and resumes the transfer if the file matches the original, otherwise the original file is transferred again.

Under When a complete file already exists at the destination, select an overwrite rule when the same file exists at the destination. By default, files on the destination are overwritten if different from the source.

File Attributes

Select Preserve Access Time to set the access time of the destination file to the same value as that of the source file.
Select Preserve Modification Timeto set the modification time of the destination file to the same value as that of the source file.
Select Preserve Source Access Time to keep the access time of the source file the same as its value before the transfer.

Note: Access, modification, and source access times cannot be preserved for node and Shares connections that are using cloud storage.

Source Handling

Select Automatically delete source files after transfer to delete files that transferred successfully from the source.

Push mode: Select Automatically move uploaded source files to a directory after transfer and specify the location on the source machine to which they must be moved. Only a path to an existing location on the client can be specified. Only files are moved, not the parent directory structure. To preserve the directory structure, enable the --src-base option after the Hot folder is created:

Quit Aspera.
Stop the Aspera Sync service by going to Search > Services, selecting Aspera Sync, and click Stop.
Open C:\Program Files\Aspera\Client\etc\sync-conf.xml, locate the <EXTRAOPTS> entry, and edit it as follows:
```
<EXTRAOPTS>--src-base=ldir_path</EXTRAOPTS>
```
Where ldir_path is the source path for the Hot Folder and matches the setting for <LDIR>.
Save your changes and restart the Aspera Sync service.

Pull mode: Select Transfer source directory contents only to transfer only the contents of the directory and not the directory itself. If this option is enabled, for a source folder /folder1 containing file1 and file2 being pulled to the destination folder /destination, only file1 and file2 are transferred, not /folder1. If this option is not selected, the transfer produces /destination/folder1 (containing the two files) on the destination machine.

Select Delete empty source subdirectories to remove empty subdirectories from the source once the files that they contain transfer successfully. This option is usually used to clean up the Hot Folder when source files are moved or deleted after transfer.

Note: Empty folders within a Hot Folder are not pushed to the server. However, empty folders on the server are pulled to the local destination.