Creating and maintaining a duplicate copy of a database or file system on a different computer, typically a server. The term usually implies the intelligent copying of parts of the source database which have changed since the last replication with the destination.

Replication may be one-way or two-way. Two-way replication is much more complicated because of the possibility that a replicated object may have been updated differently in the two locations in which case some method is needed to reconcile the different versions.

For example, Lotus Notes can automatically distribute document databases across telecommunications networks. Notes supports a wide range of network protocols including X25 and Internet TCP/IP.

Compare mirror. See also rdist.