Abstract: Lightweight information management operations described herein enable information management operations to be performed while, e.g., network bandwidth is limited and/or while network bandwidth use is costly. In some implementations, an information management system assigns priority to files/folders/data objects on a client device based on a user's interactions with the device. The information management system then performs backup operations on higher priority files/folders/data objects prior to lower priority files/folders/data objects, so that if network bandwidth decreases or is interrupted, the more important data objects are preserved. In some implementations, an information management system synchronizes versions of a data object by sending the difference between two versions of a data object from a client to a server. The server uses the received difference to update one or more copies or instances of the data object.