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MS Word no long "likes" documents stored on external Dropbox locations (Mac OS 10.15 Sequoia)

So I recently updated from 10.14 to 10.15, and everything looks good except for MS Word. I keep my Dropbox file on an external drive (formatted as Mac OS Extended Journaled), and whenever I try to edit and save a Word document to the Dropbox location, I get a dialog box with "Check to make sure the removable drive containing this file is still available." It then renames the file to a temporary file name (e.g. .~WRD1234) and then brings up the File Save As dialog box.

The whole thing repeats if I try to give it a new name.

I've reindexed my Dropbox folder, removed the MS word cache, etc. etc. I'm on client build v212.4.5767.

I did not see this behaviour with previous versions of Mac OS, so I'm assuming something broke with the update.

Anyone with any ideas?

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OzManDad

SOLVED: This is NOT a Dropbox issue, it's a Microsoft issue.

Go to Settings -> Privacy & Security -> Full Disk Access and grant access to MS Word.

This has fixed my problem. If it hasn't for you, please add your comments here.

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Walter

Hey @OzManDad - thanks for bringing this to our attention.

Could you please send us a screenshot of the exact error you're getting so that we can have a visual too?

Also, does this happen with online-only files or files that are available offline on your computer?

Let us know more and we'll take it from there.

mr happy

I am having the exact same problem. Done everything as @OzManDad and it is still happening

Walter

Sorry to hear that @mr happy

Could you maybe attach a screenshot of the error?

OzManDad

Here you go. These files are offline i.e. they are accessible on my local drive, not internet connection required. I've just hit CMD-S to save and got the dialog you see above, then it brings up the Save As dialog, and changes the file name to temporary Word file.

When I type in a new name, it saves the file, but the whole process repeats - the same warning dialog, then it brings up the Save As dialog etc. etc.

Jay

Hi @OzManDad, thanks for the info, in order to look into this matter in more detail, I'd recommend contacting the support team directly for them to investigate further.

OzManDad

Umm, don't I need a premium subscription to contact Support directly? This seems to be a pretty core piece of functionality that is broken, irrespective of my plan.

OzManDad

And you've now got this reported by more than one user.

ext237

Exact same issue. Have to save it to my desktop and then drag it where it needs to be. Interested in anyone that finds a solution. My dropbox folder is on a USB RAID drive (Thunderbolt/iMac/Sequoia)

OzManDad

SOLVED: This is NOT a Dropbox issue, it's a Microsoft issue.

Go to Settings -> Privacy & Security -> Full Disk Access and grant access to MS Word.

This has fixed my problem. If it hasn't for you, please add your comments here.