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Conflicted copies that don't show up locally with Mac .rtfd files created with TextEdit.

I can create a .rtfd file with TextEdit by simply adding a graphic to a text file. TextEdit changes the extension to .rtfd. I have no trouble saving and opening these files in a DropBox folder in the Mac Finder. These files are actually packages, folders with contents inside. The .rtfd extension causes the Mac to present them as files as opposed to folders.

Trouble happens when the DropBox folder that contains my .rtfd file is shared with a friend who also uses a Mac. When the friend edits the .rtfd file and moves the .rtfd file to another shared location, the .rtfd file is no longer visible in my Mac Finder. However, I can locate and download the file from DropBox on the web. In other words, the file still exists and its contents are correct, but I cannot see it in the shared folder on my Mac.

When I download the .rtfd file from DropBox on the web, I receive a .tar file. In order to use it, I must decompress it. In the decompression process, the file name is changed to dropbox_download.rtfd.

If I rename the file to its original name and place it in the shared DropBox folder on my Mac, DropBox realizes that there is another (invisible) file in that folder with the same name, and DropBox renames the restored file as a conflicted copy. The conflicted copy no longer has a .rtfd extension and now appears as a folder.

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Megan

Hey @PianoBench, let's jump right into this!

You mentioned that your friend edits the .rtfd file and moves it to another shared location. Do you mean that the file is moved in a different shared folder, or the same one just a different hierarchy?

Do you notice this behavior only when it comes to .rtfd files?

If you have any step-by-step screenshots that you can send us, feel free to attach them.

Keep me posted, and we'll take it from there!

PianoBench

I will start by confirming that I am experiencing this problem on:

Mac Studio

MacBook Air

MacMini

all of which are running macOS Sonoma.

Here is a full description with screenshots of each step:

(1) I created a sample RTFD file in TextEdit on the Mac and saved it to a DropBox subfolder. This is how the file is viewed in my Finder:

As you can see, the file is both visible in the Mac Finder and the Finder preview feature shows the contents of the file which consists of a small amount of text plus a graphic.

(2) I have a colleague who shares a DropBox folder with me that contains the directory shown above. At my request, he opened the RTFD file on his Mac and added some text in pink below the graphic. After he had done so, I asked him to copy the folder to another location at the same directory level in DropBox. Here are screenshots of both the original location and the location of the copied folder as show in my Mac Finder following his edits:

Both directories shown above appear to be empty in the Mac Finder. The first of these directories is the very same directory shown in Step 1 above.

(3) Next, I checked the DropBox menu item in the Finder to make sure that DropBox was fully synchronized. This screenshot confirms that it is:

(4) Next, I checked my DropBox account on the web. The following 2 screenshots show that both directories contain the RTFD file:

and

(5) To confirm that the edited RTFD file is in my DropBox account, I downloaded the file from the web. This is what I get in the Mac Finder in my Downloads folder:

(6) I proceeded to open the downloaded .tar file. The Mac then decompressed the .tar file thus providing an RTFD file that includes the edits from my colleague:

In other words, the edited file is intact.

Note that neither the .tar file nor the decompressed .rtfd file have the original file name.

(7) As a final step, I changed the name of the newly downloaded .rtfd file to the original name and copied it back to one of the original DropBox directories. After I did so, the Mac Finder showed the following, a renamed, conflicted file:

Clearly DropBox is renaming the file because there is already a file by that name in directory. However, the original file is not visible in the Finder. In the process of renaming the file, DropBox failed to put .rtfd at the end of the file name. Thus, the file appears as a folder rather than a file.

George

Hannah

Thanks for the very detailed update on this, @PianoBench.

Can I ask you to check something? If you close the Dropbox app completely and try to reproduce the issue, does it persist?

PianoBench

I don't understand what you are asking. If I quit DropBox from it's persistent menu in my Mac menubar, a file that I create will obviously not be synchronized to DropBox.

Hannah

I know what you mean, but the file that your colleague edits and adds to the folder, which theoretically syncs, but doesn't appear in the folder, what happens to that, if the Dropbox app is closed?

Is it still hidden?

PianoBench

I turned off DropBox. It made no difference. The file is still hidden.

Walter

This would mean that the issue is not caused by Dropbox, but most likely by your device's OS or a 3rd party app perhaps @PianoBench

When you say the file is hidden, are you able to locate it if you enabled hidden files to show on your computer?

Also, do you get the same results if you pause syncing when you edit the file?

PianoBench

On the Mac, I can show/hide hidden files by pressing Command + Shift + . in the Finder. Doing so does not reveal the hidden RTFD file.

I have no other problem files or directories in the Mac Finder. What I have described above is a case of DropBox not showing a RTFD file in the Mac Finder under certain circumstances. The file exists in DropBox in the cloud; it is simply a matter that DropBox is not syncing the file back to the Mac Finder.

DropBox clearly has a problem with a file that consists of a Mac package, such an RTFD file. As illustrated above, if I download the RTFD file from the cloud, it comes in as a .rar file that must be decompressed and the decompressed file does not have the correct name.

Nancy

Hey @PianoBench. I had a look into our system and I can see you’ve been in touch with our support team.

Since they have account visibility that we don’t here on the forum, I’ve left them an internal note on your behalf and they’ll continue assisting you there. Keep an eye out for their next email.