Child Item

Must I sync all my Dropbox folders locally before I can tell it to be "online only" ?

Application Affected
dropbox
Device
Mac
Operating System/Browser (if using the web)
Mac OS sequoia/tahoe
Dropbox App Version (if using the app)
latest

Question or Issue
ok so Im hoping this is just me not understanding dropbox but I've asked support who couldn't seem to work it out either so here goes.

I have 1TB of dropbox files

I have a mac with a 512GB internal drive

with other solutions, I select Online-Only mode during setup and only placeholder files are synced to the internal drive which takes next to no space. The actual files are then downloaded as and when I use them. All good.

With dropbox, when I install the app, it wants to sync everything. Then I could go through each folder saying "online only" which should free up the space but a) that's a waste of time waiting for it to download and b) I dont have the space to do sync it all locally.

Sure, I can choose which folders to sync during setup, but then the other folders & files don't show at all versus what I expected, placeholder files.

I asked support who said well that's just how it works, you have to sync everything before you can tell it only store certain files/folders online. They suggested external drives large enough to sync everything etc

Is that really how it works or am I missing something stupidly obvious (very possible ;-) )

Really hoping someone has some magical solution here because of all the cloud storage solutions, dropbox has always felt fast and reliable to me but it's a non-starter if I have to do an initial huge sync on every new device.

Thanks in advance , Keith

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Comments

Megan

Hey there, @KeithOP let's see what we can find about this together!

Is the app installed on your device as we speak, or do you consider installing it for the first time, and you need to know the best approach?

Now, keep in mind that upon the initial installation and set-up process, you should see the "How you want your files to sync" option. If you don't see this, please click on the advanced settings while setting up the app, and you can then choose online-only for your folders and files.

Another alternative is to locally remove your folders using our selective sync feature and then gradually sync them to the device in smaller batches. Once that's done, you should be able to change their status to online-only as they sync. Can you give it a go, and let me know of the results?

Thanks!

KeithOP

HI Megan, thanks for your reply

The second option isn't doable. Every time someone joins the team with a new laptop, we'd need to sync down files in small batches just so that we can then say "change to online only) once theyve downloaded that's time consuming and pointless given we don't want them all downloaded in the first place.

Looking at option 1. There is no advanced settings whilst setting up the app. Once installed there is the option Online-only but that only applies to new files added to the main dropbox folder not existing files and folders. So it's not possible to say "everything in dropbox already should be online only until I use it"

selective sync IS Available during setup, so I can say "dont sync any folders" then it shows all the files in root as cloud files (perfect!) but none of the folders show at all. If all the folders and all the files showed up as cloud-only that would be exactly right.

In terms of if the app is installed or not.... no, these are new machines so I'm installing dropbox on them for the first time and am trying to do that 1. without syncing the whole 1TB of cloud data to them whilst 2. allowing them to see placeholders for all the files/folder in dropbox so they can just click on them to use them.

Hannah

Hey @KeithOP, thanks for the update here.

In this case, if you don't see an option during the app's setup, I'd suggest using our selective sync feature and choose not to sync any folders at first.

Once the app is set up, you can then go to the settings, ensure that the online-only by default setting is enabled and then re-select the folders through the selective sync settings, so that they can sync as online-only.

It might not be ideal, but it's a doable workaround, so I hope it helps.