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Forum Discussion
Sharing folders without space
I want to accept an invitation to share a folder but dropbox won't let me without buying more space.
what's the deal here? If the owner has the space why can't I accept the invitation, look at it and also send a file to it?
If you have read/write access to a folder then it is also part of your Dropbox and so uses your quota. So yes, regardless of how big the other persons quota is if its a read/write folder you will need to upgrade to view it if you do not have enough space in your account.
If you just need read only access they can use shared links via https://help.dropbox.com/files-folders/view-only-access which will not use your quota.
Can't I just view the folders in his space?
This is happening because the content of the folder/file you're invited to combined with what you already have in your Dropbox exceeds your space. When invited to a shared folder Dropbox essentially "copies" the files to your Dropbox - this way you can have access to the files offline, etc.
You have few options;
a) you delete some of your files from Dropbox to make space.
a) owner of the shared folder reduces the amount of files/space in the shared folder to fit what you have available on your Dropbox.
c) instead of being invited to a share have the owner send you a link where you can just download the file(s) without adding to Dropbox (but this will not let you easily collaborate if that was the intended purpose of the share)Hey, I had a simple beginner's question I have a hard time time figuring out before pulling the trigger on a pro subscription.
Say I have a folder of family photos that I want other people to have full access to via their dropbox account. I set up this massive folder of high quality photos about a gig in size, and share the folder with a couple relatives who have a dropbox account.
With a regular account, having accepted the invitation that photo folder would eat into their storage quota. But with a Dropbox Pro account, I think I read somewhere that only the host takes the hit to their quota.
Is this the case or was that belief just a fevered dream?
Hello, Brian...
I'd recommend sending a shared file link to the people you want to be able to see your family photos folder instead of sharing a collaborative folder. That method won't use any of their storage space quota and it will work for non-Dropbox members as well.
Of course, for you... upgrading to a Plus account will give you added benefits (no, I'm not a Dropbox employee):
-
1 TB of storage (plenty of room for all of your photos and files).
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Set view only permissions on your collaborative folders.
-
Allows you to use passwords and expiration dates on your folders/file links.
-
Higher sharing limits (additional bandwidth allowed to download your shared links).
If you'd like to see how a shared folder link with a password is used, then look at my example folder.
- Password =
share
You can see or download everything in my example folder without it utilizing any of your storage space quota.
Good luck.
-
Ha, thank you Mark MC for the straight to the point direct answer, and thanks 310EI for the VERY detailed answer!
Unfortunately it looks like Dropbox Pro isn't the ultimate collaborative storage I was hoping it would be, but far be it from me to look a gift horse in the mouth when it comes to that much storage at that price.
Thanks everyone!
- Mark
Super User II
It was a dream I'm afraid - or you've misread the Business promo.
For Pro users everybody takes the hit, for Business users it is done only once.
- Mark
If the owner has the space why can't I accept the invitation
Because it would then be in your account and so use your space.
- Mark
You can have read only access via https://help.dropbox.com/syncing-uploads/selective-sync-overview but then you can upload any of your changes
- So I'm pretty new to Dropbox. My family went on vacation and I would like to get everyone's photos in one place. I had everyone get the Dropbox app and shared a folder to them. Then as space started filling up I purchased the Dropbox plus for extra space however I still have people unable to upload because of storage being full. I checked mine and it says 0.2% full of my 1 tb limit. Am I missing something? I assumed space was determined against the owner of a shared folders limits. Please help
- Jane
Dropbox Staff
Hey
Please keep in mind that, when it comes to personal accounts, the Dropbox storage quota is calculated by adding up the total amount of data in your Dropbox folder, including all shared folders and files collected from file requests.
Because an upgrade to one account cannot be transferred, in order to avoid affecting other users' quota, you could send them a link to the uploads folder to grant them access to the files inside.
Hope this is helpful! If you need further assistance, just let me know in your reply.
- Thank you for the speedy reply.
I'm not sure I understand though. If it's calculated by the total amount of data in my Dropbox folder, since I'm a Dropbox plus member, I should have 1 tb. There is only 1 folder in my Dropbox and it's a shared folder with about 200 photos that I shared with about 15 people to load their pictures into. A friend is trying to add more pictures to my shared folder and it tells him I need to upgrade my account. I would like to have everyone able to have access to this folder so they could see eachothers pictures that have been uploaded.
- Rich
Bishop wrote:
I assumed space was determined against the owner of a shared folders limits.That's an incorrect assumption. For personal accounts, that is to say, non-Business accounts, data in a shared folder is counted against any member of that shared folder. If you have a 1TB account and invite someone with a 2GB account to join a shared folder, they would only be able to have 2GB of data in the shared folder before their account reported as full and stopped syncing.
Simply put, the files exist in everyone's account, not just yours, so they need to have an account large enough to hold all of the files.
- I received an email that informed me that someone I know shared a file with me that contained pictures. I clicked on the link in the email to look at the file, but received a message that said I did not have enough space in my dropbox. Am I forced to upgrade my dropbox to view a folder on someone else's dropbox? Similarly, if I share a folder with someone, must they download dropbox to view it? If the folder I am sharing is bigger than the 2 GB that comes with the free version, is that person I tried to share the folder with required to subscribe to dropbox?
- Mark
If you have read/write access to a folder then it is also part of your Dropbox and so uses your quota. So yes, regardless of how big the other persons quota is if its a read/write folder you will need to upgrade to view it if you do not have enough space in your account.
If you just need read only access they can use shared links via https://help.dropbox.com/files-folders/view-only-access which will not use your quota.
