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Share approval not working

I am having an issue with approving requests to share folders.
1. At our business (a photolab) we share folders of images of processed films with the customer who brought the film in for processing. We share anything between 20 and 50 folders per week.

2. Sometimes a user will want to share their folder with a friend, and we end up receiving a request to share the folder to a new email address.

3. It used to be that we would receive a Notification from Dropbox (or an email with a link) requesting access. We would click the "Approve Access" button - job done! Or if we got an email, we would click the link and a browser page would open with a dialog box and an "Approve Access" button, and again, click that button and job done.

4. This all has appears to have changed... for the worse! Now, the Notification "Approve Access" button no longer works, and for the email, when we click on the link, there is no "Approve Access" button at all, and instead, there is a create link button. This is not what the customer is wanting. They are wanting us to grant access to the folder.

5. Now, what we have to do is mess around copying the email address from the body of the email (there is no option to copy the email from the dialog box) and then search for the applicable folder on our computer, right click click it, paste in the email address and click share. This is more a cumbersome process that is much more prone to human error than the previous one.

6. Is this yet another example of developers changing stuff just because they can? If so, they need to change it back. The old way of doing it was much safer and far more convenient.

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Nancy

Hi @Photo O.! Thanks for bringing this to our attention.

Did this happen once, when you tried to grant access to a shared folder, or is it happening for all requests now?

Can you send me a screenshot of the email you receive now (while hiding any personal info), so that I can take a look?

Nudge me, when you’re ready.

Photo O.

It has happened for every request for access for a few days. It is about 9pm Wednesday here now so I will send some screenshots tomorrow morning when I get to work.

Photo O.

OK, here are a couple of screenshots

The first screenshot is the email we receive.

The top two links just open the page. The bottom one used to open the page as well, but on top of it was a dialog box with a rectangular blue "Approve Request" button. You click that, and the job was done.

The second screenshot is what we get now. No "Approve Request" button, and no amount of messing around with the box reveals one. As I said, we have to copy that email address in the email and go to where the folder to be shared is, and paste it into the existing share.

Untitled 0.png Untitled 1.png

Hannah

Thanks for the additional info and screenshots, @Photo O..

Can you please try to copy the "approve request" link and open it in a different browser and/or an incognito/private browsing window, to see if this behavior persists?

Photo O.

It makes no difference (Firefox, Brave, Chrome or Edge). Excatly the same dialog box pops up.

I now also have another problem. Dropbox is continually spamming us with pop-ups offering to upgrade. One of them popped up in front of the dialog box I was expecting, just as I was about to click it. I have now bloody well upgraded to Dropbox Essentials without meaning to. Is there any way to STOP these annoying spam popups?

Photo O.

I have at least made one step forward.

If I click the cross on the right hand end of the email address in the "Share by email" input box in the dialog box screenshot I posted earlier, then I can retype the email address into the same input box, and the dialog box changes to look like this...

Screenshot (111).png

I can then click the "Send" box and it shares fine.

Going back the original dialog box I posted earlier, when I hover the mouse pointer over the email address in the "Share by email" input box, the pointer turns into a hand, which makes me think this is supposed to be a clickable link, but when I click it. nothing happens. Right clicking it reveals no useful options.

Jay

HI @Photo O., this is the normal behavior for that window. When the pointer changes into a hand, it means that you can highlight the email address, and no further action can be done from there.

Regarding your earlier query, when a user receives the link (to confirm the access request), the email address of the person who requested is already populated on the ''share by email'' area.

Photo O.

Perhaps I have not made myself clear enough?

It used to be that when we received an email asking to approve a share, we clicked on the link therein, and it opened a box with an "Approve" button. We clicked the button and the job was done. THAT BUTTON DOES NOT EXIST NOW. Since the change, we now have to copy the requesting user's email address, then go to the shared folder and "right-click>share" and paste that address and then click share.

And no, having the requesting email populate the email area does not help - there are hundreds of emails in there (many of which are no longer valid, but which cannot be removed since Dropbox, despite repeated requests, has not given its users a way to edit or remove incorrect addresses!)

This is a backwards step, requiring more time and more clicks. Please go back to the way you were doing this before, it was better and more efficient. How hard can it be to make that window display a clickable button?

Hannah

Hey @Photo O., I understand where you're coming from.

We really do appreciate your feedback on this and our team will take your comments into consideration.

If you have any suggestions for new features, you can always use our ideas board.