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Unable to link dropbox desktop client in Ubuntu 22.04 LTS - "Invalid URL"

I've installed dropbox on my desktop from the .deb. On opening it, I click the drop down and firefox opens to a URL like

https://www.dropbox.com/cli_link_nonce?nonce=4217fadb61d996a55bdec9ec41eb48de

And shows the error:

Screenshot from 2023-08-04 14-35-04.png

I've tried all sorts, from rebooting to re-installing dropbox and wiping any remnants in my home directory, I get this every time.

How do I get this working?

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Accepted answers

Cheezykins

I solved it, it was spawning background firefox instances at the same time that were using the nonce before it was then opening it in the foreground and showing me the error. I killed the process spawning the background firefox instances and it suddenly worked

All comments

Walter

Hi there @Cheezykins, sorry to hear you're having issues with this.

Could you have a look at this discussion and let me know if any of the information there helps?

Thanks!

Cheezykins

Walter

Glad to hear it's sorted now @Cheezykins - thanks for keeping me in the loop too.

See you around the Community and have a lovely weekend!

jabowery

How did you identify the process. Was there a race condition you had to beat in order to accomplish this feat? Lots of people are running into this problem.

jabowery

USER
it turns out it is that i have one too many "linked devices" but one of them is the same computer i'm trying to reinstall dropbox on which only appears to be a new device to dropbox. i don't know where to look to find and delete the bad installation that dropbox thinks i still have
ASSISTANT
To address this issue, you would want to check your connected devices on Dropbox and remove the one you don't need. Here are the steps to do this:

1. Sign in to dropbox.com using your account credentials.
2. Click your profile picture (or grey circle) in the upper right corner.
3. Click settings.
4. Select the Security tab.
5. In the Devices section, you'll see the names of each computer, phone, or tablet linked to your account (and the app installed there).
6. Click the "X" next to the device you want to unlink/remove.

After you've unlinked your device from your Dropbox account, then you can link your computer again. You should be able to download files without any problem.

If you continue to have any issues, make sure to reach out to Dropbox Support for more direct assistance.

echoz

I didn't know about the linked devices. I appreciate your answer but even that did not help me. Deleting them all, I had not a single device connected and still I received a similar nonce error. I'd logged out and quit Firefox altogether and still the same error occurred. I find the "accepted" solution is bogus information as far as I'm concerned.

Running "dropbox update" prompted a "proprietary" installation which I agreed to and voila! Once that was done, logging in, I had no problem.

Thank you.

jabowery

Yeah the accepted solution is unacceptably vague even assuming one has the same cause. It looks like there are several independent causes of the same symptom. Really bad design.

billrobertson42

What process was spawing the links? What did you kill?

ajtowlson

Hello,

On a fresh install of kubuntu 22.04 I get the same invalid url. I have no devices linked. I have tried quitting firefox. I have updated Dropbox, reinstalled it. Nothing gets rid of the "nonce" url.

Something is broken.

Dropbox support - can you fix this?

unknown

Having this issue on Ubuntu 22.04 LTS, Fedora 38, Pop!OS, the list goes on and on.

I notice if I use the command line version of linking it gives a different link every five seconds. That doesn't seem right.

jaumetet

Same problem here with a fresh install of Linux Mint.

I use to install easily dropbox inlinux for the last years quite often so, PLEASE, dropbox technical service, tell us how to solve this issue. I'm a business customer.

Thanks

Megan

Hi all, thanks for bringing this to our attention!

We're aware of an issue with the sign in flow for certain devices - and our team is in the process of implementing a fix.

Hang tight, and we'll definitely update you once we have any more updates. Thanks!

ajtowlson

thanks for looking at this, however I've decided to switch to Mega which offers 25GB free.