I'm using Dropbox Sync to write down small files to sync things in my iOS app. Because records and datastores are too limited in my case, I can't use Datastore. Unfortunately, these internal files are generating a lot of notifications on my desktop. It annoys the user. The solution is to disable sync of this folder on desktop computers, but it requires an additional step for the user (after having annoyed it). All of this is degrading user experience. By nature, what happens inside an app folder is less likely to be of interest for an human user. It would be great if we were able to set our app folders as "notifications free" if relevant. One can also imagine per subfolder filtering. For now, my apps are mobile only, but if I want to make a desktop version and use Dropbox to sync stuffs, disabling app's folder sync will be impossible and users would have to live with dozens of garbage notifications. It would be so awful that it would prevent me to use Dropbox at all to sync with a desktop version (even if user would like to use Dropbox).

Hi Steve M., I must admit this is one of the most frustrating threads I ever participated in. Please read the very original request from Thomas and if possible also the comments I posted throughout the last calendar year: This is all about the APPS folder - a folder you, DropBox, creates, on behalf of your final users, not them personally. What sense does it make to notify users about changes in the folder they never created? Isn't this absolutely obvious case? Independent on any API version, independent on API client requests or parameters sent... Simply NEVER notify about changes in the APPS folder and its subfolders! I guess this feature must be implemented in your Dropbox software - in your Windows and Mac clients as it is those clients who display those annoying notifications. There is hardly any other work-around. I am very sorry for using bold font and one or two exclamation marks but for the last 427 days of this ticket lifetime I do not sense any sincere interest from any 'Dropboxer' to address this issue. Maybe my view is too simplified but it is about one if statement in the related client code...

Thomas, the reason for the global mute request is for the sake of the user. While thoughtful devs like you will now code your app that way, most others haven't. So it'd be nice to be able to just mute that whole folder (and others selectively in the future) so that we don't have to wait for devs to include such functionality in their apps. That request is still important to users of Dropbox, but it just got mixed in with your original question because no one else had a topic for it at the time in the user forum.

Thanks for the feature request! I'm sending it along now.

Hello @Mads P., @Érico C. expressed that exactly, there is however one thing I'd like to emphasise: When he talks about 'specific folder' it might sound the user can select which folders he wants to get notified about. That is a thinkable scenario too but the very first step should be that by default all notification are disabled for EVERYTHING that is under the APPS folder. APPS folder is not anything the user has actively created it is crated for him to serve for any of the applications he installed. For that reason the user does not expect any notifications (very probably he does not even know there is any apps subfolder at all). And for that reason user gets naturally annoyed by these unexpected notifications. To say it shortly: The name of this thread is just perfect: "Disable desktop notifications for app's folder". Best regards, Jan

Hi @Joe C., thank you very much for putting you energy into this and also a clear separation of the 2 possible solutions. I am not on V2 yet and unfortunately have no capacity to move to it within the foreseeable short time. I totally agree with your last sentence saying that it is not the most efficient solution to wait for all the developers to discover this problem, update to v2 and add the mute parameter. Plus consider the scenario of 3rd party libraries released as NuGet packages. If their owners do not do the proper update then poor the final dev users who took the dependency... That is the other reason I plead for the more robust solution - the one that makes all the APPS folder notifications silent. I explained number of time why I think it totally makes sense and you seem to agree to it. Gregory claims it is not an easy change, I have a hard time believing so to be quite honest as I have used notification in number of products I have worked on. Is there any chance I can open this topic on a non-API related forum, so I get the chance to observe the progress? I would be very thankful if you point me to such a place. Thank you very much in advance, Jan

Disable desktop notifications for app's folder

37 Replies

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Greg-DB
Dropbox Community Moderator
11 years ago
Thanks for the feature request! I'm sending it along now.
Manuel K.2
New member | Level 1
11 years ago
I couldn't agree more! This has basically rendered the new Recent Files feature on the iOS app useless... It is filled with file changes unimportant to me!!
Jan_Zeman
Helpful | Level 6
11 years ago
Hello, the same here. Isn't this an extremely obvious case? Should not these desktop notifications be switched off BY DEFAULT? It seems this feature request is sitting there for 1/2 a year - any chance it will be possible to switch off the notifications on all the clients OS for the given DropBox app? It should be the given app (if installed on the given OS) that handles the updates but not the user - it would generate only his/her frustrations... Greg or anybody from DB, can you please give a status update on this? Thank you very much in advance, Jan
Greg-DB
Dropbox Community Moderator
11 years ago
Sorry, no update on this right now.
Jan_Zeman
Helpful | Level 6
11 years ago
Hi Gregory, may I ask what does "no update" mean? I guess DropBox has some internal tracking system of bugs and feature requests... Is this feature request originally introduced by Thomas anywhere in that system? Is there ANY chance it will get implemented? I have been living with these notifications for the last 2 months... As a feedback for me as a developer it is a useful side-effect... as a user, nothing can annoy me more. I am afraid many people will feel it the same way. Thanks and have a nice day, Jan
Greg-DB
Dropbox Community Moderator
11 years ago
Hi Jan, by "no update" I just meant that I didn't have any news to share yet. We do track all feature requests for the API, including the requests for this feature from the three different developers on this thread, including yourself.

Anyway, we generally try not to promise anything until it's delivered, in case plans change, but this is something we hope to release. In fact, it's currently in the new API v2 preview as the "mute" parameter, but I can't promise that it will remain part of the final release or work correctly, since it is just a preview right now.
Jan_Zeman
Helpful | Level 6
11 years ago
Hi Gregory, thank you, this post is much more informative. I understand completely your statement about non-promises - I usually keep exactly the same approach. Appreciated, thanks!
Joe C.56
Helpful | Level 7
11 years ago
As a user and a potential developer, this also annoys me. It seems like a simple use case. I use an app called ember and it's constantly writing files to my dropbox folder. That's awesome, but that also pushes actual files I'm working with out of my list in the menubar, and constantly shows me popups about files being added and deleted. So I guess I'd like to fourth this in the hopes of getting some traction on this.

It would also be generally helpful to hide notifications when I'm working on projects with other people who are rendering frame sequences so I don't see a notification for every little group of frames that come in.

I'm glad to see that you're working on it. I hope it's not just available in the API but also as a preference for the basic users as well—that way I don't have to wait for a developer to add mute functionality.
Érico C.
Explorer | Level 4
11 years ago
I'm surprised this still isn't a thing. It should have been added long ago already.

In my case, I have a shared folder with several people who keep adding stuff all the time to a certain folder, and it's really annoying. I'd like to disable notifications for that particular folder. The only current way to do this is disable it from syncing, but then it also deletes all the folder's contents from my computer, which makes no sense to me.
Mads P.1
New member | Level 1
11 years ago
Let me se if I get this right, it is not possible to turn of the notifications? Im being spamed with popups from dropbox every 10th second. Is my only option to mute my computer?