You might see that the Dropbox Community team have been busy working on some major updates to the Community itself! So, here is some info on what’s changed, what’s staying the same and what you can expect from the Dropbox Community overall.
Forum Discussion
Request: All files available offline by default
Moving the Mac to the new File Provider is great - very happy this is finally happening and support on the new M1 is much better. Kudos!
Feature request: Really miss the feature to have Dropbox...
Hi everyone, and thanks for your patience.
We're re-launching the option to choose the default status of synced files in the Dropbox desktop application (in the Preferences > Sync tab) for users of the newer File Provider version.
It should be available to you shortly. If you haven't received it yet, make sure to update your desktop app, and let us know if you have any questions!
A quick message of support for this feature request.
The cool thing with Dropbox has been that I could leave it running on my computers, and anything added to Dropbox on the desktop would automatically appear on the laptop (M1 MacBook Pro). A colleague could also drop in some files, and when I connect my laptop in the morning to check mail, all the files would come to it. Then I could pick it up and work on-the-go, be it in a cafe or a plane, or anywhere without internet.
But this is now broken.
Now it is necessary to go into Dropbox in Finder, right click each folder where files may have been added, and then wait. And hope I’ve waited long enough for everything to download.
And in some cases, it is needed to wait for the whole folder to resync, as what was previously available offline is now back to cloud only.
Which really defeats the purpose of using Dropbox on a laptop for those of us who need to access files without internet.
Ok, a bit more info. I think I'm seeing this new File Provider experience (that no longer shows the green Finder icons, and doesn't offer the "Offline by default option) due to having opted into the betas a while ago. I thought it was because I was on M1 Macs.
I have since setup other M1 Macs, including a new Mac Studio, and installed the stable 146.x build for ARM. On this and other newly setup Macs, after I opted out of the beta, I get a version of Dropbox that 1) has all the old UX, Finder green badges, and Offline all files options, and 2) still appears to be Apple M1 native. Yay! Also, does not appear to be using the new File Provider stuff (e.g. the location in CloudStorage instead of ~/Dropbox.)
Didn't know this combination was possible! My existing Macs that had run the beta and I moved back to stable still have the File Provider experience, even though they have the same version of Dropbox.
Is there a way to opt into the old experience for all Macs, so I can get the Offline by default feature?
Maybe all this is explained in that forum thread that we all get Access Denied when clicking? 🙂
Hi Tim T.13 . The ability to install a version of Dropbox that doesn't use FileProvider is something I desperately need. The FileProvider API has been an absolute nightmare, and it frequently freezes my whole Finder while trying to open a file. Also as you mentioned, even if I click "make available offline", files in the folder are frequently stored online again and this causes all sorts of problems, and even frequently freezes my whole Finder. How did you manage to install an old version of Dropbox? I didn't opt into the experimental features as I checked my user preferences on Dropbox, but this didn't seem to help. I tried to uninstall Dropbox even with an app cleaner, but even if I use an installer for v145 it still uses FileProvider!
I was never able to install the non-File Provider version on a machine that already had the new version. Wiping and re-installing didn't work. The Macs that are on latest builds, but using the old model (with green check boxes, etc), are machines that had never switched in the first place. For whatever reason they keep updating to newer builds, but they stick with the old experience, even on M1 Macs, and report they are Apple silicon processes.
I really, really need the "Keep all files offline" feature back. The right-click to "Make available offline" simply does not do the same thing for all new files, and frankly doesn't work most of the time. For days I will see files are not available offline down the tree, and Dropbox reports it is done syncing, so it isn't even trying. I just keep re-clicking to make offline, one file at a time, to try to force it.
This setting should be an option (again) as that is the only way I want Dropbox to work. I *never* want to leave the house with a file I can't access due to limited network. I can live with the new File Provider (it is the future!) but need this feature back.
