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
New named Dropbox structure
I am a user of DropBox Business, on Windows 10.
Last week, I suddenly realized that the shortcuts to some of my Dropbox folders were broken.
A quick look learned me that the structure had changed.
While I used to access my folder through:
C:/User/{username}/Dropbox (COMPANY NAME)/, I can now find them at:
C:/User/{username}/{COMPANY NAME} Dropbox/MyFirstName LASTNAME/
Now, both structures seem to remain while the first one is now a hidden shortcut (although I can't seem to see where it links to).
So that I don't really know where my files actually are.
Is this change documented anywhere?
Thanks
After a couple of days, I realized this happened to all of this Dropbox Business users across the company, Mac and Windows, and that it messes up with backup strategies.
I didn't find anything about this new structure in DropBox's changelog.
My company received the recent announcement about "Upcoming changes to your Dropbox team account". Quite frankly, it has me terrified, starting with the very first bullet item related to naming convention. This is going to cause major problems within our organization, and I can't believe we're alone.
We have thousands of files that are linked to our DB repository. Revising all of those links throughout our products and documentation is not an option. I'm being told by our management to find an option within DB, or they will be moving away from DB. It's that much of a hardship on us.
Is there truly no method to opt out of this change in naming convention? We cannot let this happen.
Thanks in advance for any thoughts anyone can share.
hi all!
I've come back to work today, after dropbox upgraded the team's system over the weekend, and my guys couldn't open any of their work yesterday. We think that it links back to the main folder having been renamed during the upgrade process (by Dropbox) - and therefore all links broke. This is on smart synch - and on mac's finder system. Was everyone else having this issue? Is there a way to solve this - should I get them to scrape Dropbox off their macs and re-synch it? I was having a lot of trouble before the upgrade, and realised it's because we were on a beta program. I ended up removing the smart synch system completely, and haven't reinstalled as I couldn't afford lose anymore time to issues at that point. Now it has effected my team and we have missed deadlines etc, so I need to work out what to do about it. The temporary fix that we have in place is to just download the folder being worked on from the browser/app dropbox, and ignore the smart synch folders, but the smart synch folders were the whole reason dropbox was so good. Does anyone have any advice, and if it is about de-installing and reinstalling the smart synch - I searched and couldn't find instructions for how to do it, could someone link me to that? Thank you!
Well I got this email today:
"On October 29, your account was scheduled to be upgraded to the latest version of Dropbox at no additional cost to you. However, due to unexpected demand for this time slot, we need to postpone the migration and will contact you once the reschedule date is determined."
I previously kept postponing since August. Earlier this week I pushed to 10/29 since that was the furthest out Saturday I could do.
Now under my admin console where I could postpone it says: "We will contact you once you're eligible for the upgrade again"
In my app and on the webpage banner it notes the upgrade is scheduled for 12/1/22. I will probably postpone again!
I wonder if this is delayed due to the issues DB has or if it is really an "unexpected demand."
I find totally irresponsible from Dropbox to suddenly decide to change the structure of the business folders that forces a total resync of your data.
In my case I have 2 TB in dropbox and 3 computers at home syncing, and the internet provider charges when data goes beyond 1 TB... I have to reload 6TB therefore pay for 5 TB of data... data that is already on the 3 computers!
This is beyond absurdity, irresponsibility, and lack of respect with users time and money.
Who is making these decisions at Dropbox?
As a longtime Dropbox Business Advanced customer, I recently received an email saying my plan would be "upgraded" in 7 days that included numerous changes that will be incredibly disruptive to our business operations. The changes include:
- Forcing the rename of the root Dropbox folder, breaking bookmarks and other integrations.
- Creating a new "team space" folder where all existing folders will be moved, creating yet another break in existing links and an even longer file path name.
- Forcing all folders that are available offline to "online only", requiring all users + admins to go back through all folders and mark respective folders offline again. This may result in some users having to re-download large amounts of data, stressing their bandwidth connections (especially remote workers). They may also lose access to critical files after the migration.
- Forcing the team admin to become the owner of the existing team folders, even if they don't actively use or manage those folders personally (e.g. the IT admin personally becomes the owner of the HR and Finance department folders).
- Downtime overnight while the entire change happens without any preview or testing phase.
Naturally, this is terribly disruptive to our business operations as it requires making everyone go through a downtime without any way to know the impacts or prepare for them. This will then cause disruptions to our delivery to services to our customers. I contacted Dropbox support and was told there is no way to opt out permanently and that they are willing to offer me a refund of my annual fees (several thousand dollars) if I wanted to leave and go to another platform.
Furthermore, while you can postpone the upgrade up to 30 days, you cannot permanently opt out of the change. And, you will have to re-postpone within 7 days of the new date, for up to another 30 days. I was told this could go on indefinitely, but of course if you miss it, the upgrade will be forced upon your entire company and there is no way to go back.
Frankly, all of this sounds like an ongoing nightmare that benefits no one, and would serve to only drive customers away to other platforms like Microsoft's OneDrive or Google Drive. What's even more remarkable is that most business customers likely already pay for either Microsoft365 for Office apps, or Google's services for their apps, both of which come with online storage that the customer chooses not to use but do pay Dropbox for separately. Most business customers using Dropbox choose Dropbox because it's different and administration has been friendly and easier. This change is in the complete opposite direction, and what's worse is the way in which Dropbox is forcing customers into the rollout with very little notice is insensitive to how their customers actually use their product.
I'm posting this message to see if anyone else is being affected by the same issue and if so, to please comment and let Dropbox know this change is not welcome. Or at the least, to allow us to opt out permanently, or provide some smoother way to make the transition that just an overnight change without any migration or test process.
What's worse is that during the first few hours/days after the "Upgrade" I was able to move folders from [Your Name Here] up one level so they were back where they used to be. It seems that Dropbox did a "bug fix" to close this loophole so it isn't possible any more. But the folders I did drag are left in a weird state, some of them deny access to me, and tell me I must be an Admin. I *am* the Admin.
So it wasn't just a bad design decision to pull the architectural rug out from all their paying Business customers -- their implementation was faulty, as well.
Make you/me/us realize that "cloud-based storage" is delicate and we are at the whim of these companies. For a company like Dropbox to delete all local copies of OUR files and move them to the cloud WITHOUT PERMISSION sounds borderline criminal to me. You can market it with "we've moved you from Sync to Cloud-based with optional 'offline storage' but that is a fundamental change that is not what anybody signed up for. At least not us.
I get that sync is expensive and they want to save money, but fundamentally yanking it without warning is not okay. It will not play out well, I predict, because a lot of their paying Business customers will jump ship. I see that they already barred one door by not offering a refund if you downgrade but paid yearly. Interesting timing that this change came a week or two after we paid for a yearly upgrade, which they will not refund (not without class action, anyway).
Check out sync.com, who will be experiencing quite a growth spurt soon. Let's just hope they don't do similarly stupid things.
Can anyone from Dropbox please acknowledge the issues we are all facing and update us on what is being done to resolve this before you start losing your customers!
We are all very frustrated, your support teams are ignoring our questions and following a script that is completely off topic and sending us round in circles, moving the goalposts at every opportunity and being actually quite rude in how they are dealing with our VERY legitimate complaints about how Dropbox has treated their paying customers.We haven't been able to administer our account for well over a week, HR folders are accessible to the entire organisation (yes files are private but it's still dangerous to have confidential information somewhat accessible to the wider staff base). This may result in GDPR compliance issues for both us & Dropbox.
None of your support teams are taking the brevity of this seriously.
Why is anyone paying for this service when it's obviously broken and unfit for purpose!
For the love of god can someone please communicate with us!
DropBox recently changed their business acounts in a number of ways. Notably, my previous settings of everything being local are not screwed up, and I am having to RE-download EVERYTHING after going back and forcing everything to local. What a bloody mess.
But the bigger issue are the changes to Team Folders.
Team Folders used to appear within my user-folder. I.E. /pacergh/TEAM-FOLDER-HERE
Now all organizational team folders are in an organizational DropBox Folder (which replaced my business DropBox folder) as a top-level folder.
And my individual user-folder is within this top-level folder as well, next to all the team folders.
Okay, so it's not that I can't understand this change in default behavior. The problem is that a number of syncing services sync per DropBox ACCOUNT, and do not sync to DropBox TEAMS or ORGANIZATIONS like my business.
This was not a problem when team folders showed up within my individual business DropBox folder, with that folder being the top-level one. I could create a team folder in my folder, and it would go across all the other team members within my organization. The upside is that anytime someone joined the team, they would have the folder automatically. Fantastic. Leaving the organization? It would be removed automatically. Fantastic.
NOW? Ugh. So, the same functionality CAN be done with shared folders that are shared with EVERYONE. But Team Folders have (or had, maybe everything has changed since I last dived into this) different feature sets that are helpful that a simple shared folder does not. (In fact, I DO have multiple Shared Folders shared with everyone that DropBox recommends I make into Team Folders . . . yeah, no, not how this transition has gone!)
Anyhow, long story short, because Team Folders have been YANKED out of DropBox Business individual folders and moved to a new Top Level organizational folder, and we cannot place them back in there, all my bloody Team Folder syncing systems have become broken.
So, thanks DropBox. Thanks for all your ham-fisted transitions.
Has anyone found a way around this? Anyone see integration partners be able to sync with Team Folders now? (I assume DropBox will provide new integration tools for this they did not have back when Team Folders first came out?)
Or am I just stuck making a bunch of Shared Folders shared with everyone (or finally migrating to Google Drive, which my business already pays for, or MS OneDrive, which my business already pays for, or going with an alternative like Box, which would probably have other idiosyncratic madness).
I very much miss when DropBox was a cloud-storage and syncing solution, and wasn't trying to be some do-it-all Business platform. It was a great, easy-to-use file storage and syncing solution that didn't require a lot of time to manage. Now I'm spending more and more time trying to manage my DropBox setup than doing my bloody work, and their other solutions frankly are not competitive with other companies' offerings.
- Walter
Dropbox Staff
Hey pacergh, thanks for your feedback about this change.
As you outlined, during the migration the structure of your Dropbox changed and it is possible that this change has disrupted the functionality of some apps you are using.
If simply relinking these apps again is not enough to restore functionality, we would recommend reaching out to the developer of these 3rd party apps. They should be able to assist with setting up the apps again or modifying the settings of existing apps to allow them to function as before.
The 3rd party app developers can find everything they need to update their app here and are welcome to reach out to our developer support.
Let us know if you have anything else to add.
The issue is this—the third party app developer does not support DropBox for business team folders at this time (and never really did).
However, one could let it sync and create it's App folder, then temporarily rename it, followed by creating a new Team Folder by the same App folder name with the proper permissions, then move the contents of the App's renamed folder into the newly-created Team folder with the App's folder name.
Voila! Team folder synced by the App.
Except, that doesn't work with the new structure.
Also, your moving everything to the cloud resulted in my Operating System's meta databases for searching for file names and file contents using it's file systems built-in search mechanisms is now all broken.
So, also, thanks for that!!!
Please incorperate the ability to disable the new personal folders you created in the latest update. We have a business account with you and have no need for that folder to be on our computers. It just causes confusion and files being placed in the wrong folders.
Thank you
The private folder for each user is a serious file management problem.
We understand that administrators can view the contents of these "private" folders, but we think that's problematic from a privacy standpoint (even if notified). Also, that workflow creates work for our administrators and doesn't build trust with our users.
Our business account is for business files. We don't want users storing private or personal files in our business account. We have a hard enough time preventing people from storing files on their desktops; we don't want another location where files can become disassociated from workflows.
We understand this might work for other organizations, but there should be an option to disable this "feature" for all users.
First post... but today, I received my "Important changes to your Dropbox account" e-mail.
We have a ton of client files, organized by client, with access restricted by team groupings. The first thing I did was postpone the 'upgrade' until Oct 14th, to give me time to find a new solution.
Honestly, I am having a hard time (a) understanding the e-mail's contents, as well as the "upcoming business team changes" help document, and (b) I am struggling to see what problem this is solving for me or anyone else.
One thing is for sure: this looks like a great time to move our agency off of Dropbox. I've been considering this for some time for the following reasons:
- The whole 'off-line/on-line' files things has been a real headache, as Dropbox seems to quietly change the setting back to online only, from time-to-time, which makes syncing with a local copy for editing difficult.
- Some of my teammates have had sync issues with M1 macs, resulting in automatically generated conflict copies being created.
- Sharing a folder with people outside of the organization is difficult, unless you purchase a Dropbox for Business seat for the recipient.
- For working files, you really need TWO copies of your files on your hard drive, which means my teammates are all lugging around external drives for Dropbox to hold the complete copies of their client files, as most new laptops don't have a ton of free space.
- Dropbox recently changed the restore feature from 'forever' to 'one year', unless you pay an upgrade fee.
And now, this forced re-organization of content that looks to a ton of work on our side to get back to where we are, today.
I was an early adopter of Dropbox, but I think we are moving our content elsewhere.
We too rely on the local sync as being the primary reason for using Dropbox. If you find a solid alternative, let us know; we are looking, too.
I'm not sure why Dropbox is pushing so hard to move everybody to the cloud, other than resources (pushing files back out to sync to clients). But when they charge hundreds of dollars per year, that's what we're paying for. There are lots of cheaper cloud storage solutions that are as good or better than Dropbox if all you want is cloud storage.
I had written:
We too rely on the local sync as being the primary reason for using Dropbox. If you find a solid alternative, let us know; we are looking, too.
I'm not sure why Dropbox is pushing so hard to move everybody to the cloud, other than resources (pushing files back out to sync to clients). But when they charge hundreds of dollars per year, that's what we're paying for. There are lots of cheaper cloud storage solutions that are as good or better than Dropbox if all you want is cloud storage.
We will see if the forum moderator deletes this comment, but sync.com looks like a very direct competitor, and worth a look. If Dropbox is sufficiently worried about them that they delete this comment, then it significantly increases the likelihood that I will check them out. Or find an independent community discussion forum for this topic; I'm sure there is one somewhere.
I am glad to hear you got the email before the "mandatory Upgrade".
We were not so lucky and are looking elsewhere to store our files since we have to do all our setup again anyways.
I just wanted to make sure I wasn't the only one caught off guard/surprised they were doing this.
Good Luck on your endeavors.
Before, the folder structure was:
User Folder A
User Folder B
Team Folder C
User Folder DBut now it's all of a sudden:
User/Folder A
User/Folder B
User/Folder D
Team Folder CSeriously,? People depend on files being in certain locations! Don't break stuff!
I got a notification that the file paths for drop box is going to change tomorrow morning with a new update as follows
Notes:
- The naming convention of the Dropbox folder will change from “Dropbox [team name]” to “[Team name] Dropbox”.
- Existing team folders will move to the team space:
- /[team name] Dropbox/[Team-name]’s shared workspace
- Each team member will now have their own personal folder called a team member folder:
- /[team name] Dropbox/[Team member’s name]
- All other content, including shared folders, will be moved to each member’s team member folder.
Regardless of your decision to opt into or postpone the upgrade, all of your folder and file permissions will remain unchanged. We won’t remove any files from your Dropbox account.
Link to article - https://help.dropbox.com/accounts-billing/plans-upgrades/upcoming-business-team-changes?_camp=14108&_tk=prompt_top
This update is going to break all of the file paths that we have tied into different things. Does anyone know if there is a way to completely opt-out of this update, or a solution so this update won't break our file paths? Thanks.
I just got that notice as well. This is a horrible change and has me looking for an alternative service. It is going to cost our company thousands in staff time and project interruptions, and the move to having personal folders for our employees is going to be a major headache. Really wish Dropbox had done some consultation or advanced notification about these changes.
Will also have to re-sync the 5.5TB of data that is on my computer due to this change!
yes this is a desaster!
it breaks thousands of 3d files that rely on linked texture data. it is near impossible to change them, even more not in 30days!
i was very happy with dropbox over the years, but this is very very unusual in industry for a file hoster.
we will worst case have issue an refund and have to search for other more reliable services.
what is the sense to rename the main folder, in just switching the order of the 2 name parts?
it seems to make no sense at all beside this breaks all file paths, destroying years of work here.
please note that not only the file content but also the file structure is part of the data we own, that you change them, also on our pcs , we do not see as an ok intervention.
- Mark
Super User II
Brandon9 wrote:
This update is going to break all of the file paths that we have tied into different things. Does anyone know if there is a way to completely opt-out of this update, or a solution so this update won't break our file paths? Thanks.
Unfortunately not - you can postpone for 30 days but not opt out.
