Abstract: Changes can be synchronized in a distributed system with intermittent connectivity. A synchronization coordinator on a server and an application on mobile devices can be configured to synchronize a shared dataset using file transfers. By transferring files, the application on the mobile device can synchronize large, shared datasets via a long-running task without needing to remain active on the mobile device until the task is completed. The synchronization coordinator and applications can use unique identifiers to identify storage locations by which the files are transferred.