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Smart Sync doesn't work for Logic Pro files

I'm experiencing an issue with smart sync.

It works perfectly for all my files, exept for Logic Pro X Files.

When I right-click and choose 'online only' it syncs, sets the icon to the grey online-only-icon, but within 5 seconds or so, the green 'local-icon' appears again and it's not synced anymore.

I tried to find which application is causing this, but I can't find it.

Do you have experience with this issue?

Thanks!

Jaap

I'm running High Sierra 10.13.1 and Dropbox 40.4.46

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Rich

@oliespink wrote:
... they have said an application is using the files so it’s not a problem with Dropbox, that’s not the case as far as I can tell and I am totally stuck, did you manage to get this sorted?

Yes, and it wasn't a Dropbox issue. It was the antivirus I was using. An update to the antivirus corrected the behavior.

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Rich

It's not just Logic Pro files, or Mac.

I have a Windows 10 laptop. I set the everything in Dropbox to be Online Only. After hours of indexing and syncing, the process completed but there was still more than 10GB of files stored locally (not counting the cache folder). These files and folders were clearly marked as Local, and not Online Only. So I attempted to set one of those folders to Online Only again. Like JWMJWM above, the folder started to sync, turned grey to signify that it was Online Only, then immediately syned again and was back to Local.

The next step was to uninstall Dropbox and remove the entire Dropbox folder. I then reinstalled Dropbox and when presented with the option during install, selected Online Only for the entire Dropbox. Again, after a couple hours of indexing and syncing, the majority of my Dropbox was Online Only but the same 10GB or so of files and folders mentioned above were Local once again.

When attempting to set any of the files within those folders to Online Only, this is what happens...

No matter what I do, I cannot set those files to be Online Only without them re-syncing back to Local. It's the same for any files or folders included in the 10GB.

Tagging @Ross_S

JWMJWM

I found what file triggers the continuous download. Since the Logic files are actually a package, I opened the package. In it, there's a .plist file, which keeps downloading itself.

So, that's another trigger, but no solution.

Screen Shot 2017-12-18 at 09.33.03.png

Mike_L

Hi everyone,

I generally like how Smart Sync works, but I've discovered that it is selective in its application. Mainly, JPEGs, PDFs, and a few other filetypes don't Smart-Sync even when the folder they're in is Smart-Synced. Randomly, Coreldraw files and several other formats DO Smart-Sync. I would like a way to ensure that, when folders are switched over to "Smart-Sync" mode, all files within each folder are also "Smart-Synced" so that I can save more space on my hard drive.

If anyone has been able to solve this, let me know; any help would be greatly appreciated.

-Mike

Mark

I have no answers I'm afraid, however, I'm merging it with another thread that I know the Dropbox team are aware of and working on.

oliespink

I am having this same problem, and not actually getting anywhere with there support, they have said an application is using the files so it’s not a problem with Dropbox, that’s not the case as far as I can tell and I am totally stuck, did you manage to get this sorted?

Rich

@oliespink wrote:
... they have said an application is using the files so it’s not a problem with Dropbox, that’s not the case as far as I can tell and I am totally stuck, did you manage to get this sorted?

Yes, and it wasn't a Dropbox issue. It was the antivirus I was using. An update to the antivirus corrected the behavior.

zanerk

I have the same problem... Did you find a solution?

Rich

If a file doesn't stay set to Online-only, then an application or some other process on your computer is accessing the file, causing Dropbox to download it again. In my case, it was my antivirus attempting to scan the files.

You'll need to figure out what application is accessing the files, then prevent it from doing so.

Brian L.30

I've been looking for a fix for a bit related to Logic X files not smart syncing correctly and the above is NOT the solution. Dropbox treats logic files (packaged files) as folders and inside there are several other folders. Seems something odd is happening in there.

The easiest way I found was:

Access your DB with a web browser
Navigate to the file (it will be a folder)
Inside the folder, go to Resources and look for ProjectInformation.plist.
Simply remove file name extension (.plist) and the file will now sync to online only. DO NOT DELETE THIS FILE OR YOUR PROJECT WILL BE LOST!
Note that if you want to open the project again, you'll need to add back .plist to the file name.

So, yeah, if you have a thousand logic files like me, it's not the best solution, but it works.

Another solution is to zip up the file before you sync.

oliespink

Thanks for this info, but like you there is no way i am doing this for each session, its crazy why dropbox wont reconise this as a problem and fix with an update, I mean we are paying for a sercice and at the moemnt its not working as intended.

pomp

Same problem here, also got a thousand logic project files that won't online sync correctly..

And to do that .plist thing doesn't feels like the best solution either.

well, let's zip old projects and then choose online sync, then you at least save a couple of minutes downloading when needed but still feels very unessessary.

oliespink

It’s ridiculous they won’t recognise and acknowledge this problem it’s been around for ages now, I pay for the pro account and very soon will need to upgrade to business, when I move up to the business account I will be putting more weight on to them about this bug, there support service has a lot to be desired.

oliespink

Forgot to say all they said was it’s nothing to do with Dropbox and that it’s probably a different program that’s causing the problem even tho I have sent them videos of the problem in real time and that every app and program is shut down, tried with files on system drive, tried with files on an external with the same problem each and every time, also tried on 3 different computer two Macs and a windows machine. For me zipping up the seasons is not an option, I have a long background in IT an no for certain it’s a bug in there software.

pomp

Yeah, totally agree it needs to be fixed.

Same here, not an option to unzip sessions for me either. Just saw that as the "best" solution so far..

Let's see what happens.

brokenmusic

Just signed up to Dropbox Business only to discover this problem... Hope a fix will be sorted soon, this is quite disastrous if zipping each Logic Pro X project file is the best option! Edit: Also, the solution didn't work for me as I'm not running any antivirus software and this is still happening.

zmdelariva

same thing here,

Logic files upload fine to Dropbox but when I apply Smart Syncing and Online only, they won't stay there at all, and will remain local.

It seems it has something to do with the plist file inside every logic Resource folder (which is inside the logic package), but it'll be a nightmare for me to delete the extension in all logic files or zip them all, as Brian L.30 suggested.

Has anyone found a solution?

oliespink

Nope I still have the same problem, I am very disappointed with drop box at not even acknowledging this bug.

JWMJWM

Well, 4 years after posting this issue, I tried to give it a lucky go today. And guess what; it seems to be fixed.

Logic files stay perfectly online-only as I can see now on both computers (Mac Mini & Macbook Pro, Catalina 10.15.17 and Dropbox version 113.4.507. Who would have thought.

I'm going to transfer all my music to the cloud now.

🎉

oliespink

That’s great news I shall do the same and hopefully it all works as intended. Thanks for letting us all no.

zmdelariva

hey @JWMJWM,

thanks so much for letting us know!

It's working here as well!

GuoYunshen72

This is wonderful news!!! Thanks for sharing.

Ben_B

Disagree.

Recently moved my Logic files from the local music folder into a Dropbox folder.

When double clicking a Logic cloud file, it opens the project without downloading all the assets, and appears empty.

I've tried trouble shooting, including exploring the package, and manually syncing subfolders.

This helped a little, but when the project opened, I had a warning that the assets were not compatible, and only 8-bit! (Which I knew was not true when it was created!).

In short, Dropbox is not playing nice with Package file formats like Logic. Microsoft Teams has the same problem, and was the only reason I hadn't moved across from Dropbox! I always zip GarageBand/Logic files before uploading to Teams...

I expected better from dropbox....

oliespink

I moved over to Backblaze for all my remote backups and just use Dropbox for live work projects. Backblaze is brilliant btw

GuoYunshen72

It works flawlessly here, but I don't use package, only project folders. For my workflow package are really inconvenient...

Ben_B

Same problem with Mindnode files - these are also package file format, and not all subfolders within the package are downloading, even if requested.