I've been using Linux for a few months and the Linux version of Dropbox has been great. Recently, though, I wiped Linux, installed Windows, and then installed Linux again so I can dual-boot. I didn't have this problem on Linux before. All the folders and sub-folders are showing up, and some are synced perfectly, but others will have some files in them and not others. All the folders in question are checked on selective sync and should be syncing. Al the files are showing up correctly in Windows. The files are also present on my online Dropbox. Since setting up the dual-boot, I've added files on Windows, and those have all synced properly to the Linux folder. All of the missing files I've noticed have been Photoshop files, but there might be other kinds I just haven't noticed yet. Other Photoshop files are there, though! A lot of the new files I added in Windows are Photoshop files, and again, those are all showing up on Linux perfectly. Dropbox on Linux says that everything is synced. How can I get all the files to show up on Linux again? I don't know if I explained this very clearly, let me know and I can clarify anything that didn't make sense.

Hi sleepysloth,Some more information would be helpful. Can you provide additional information about currently running application and environment? Post the following commands results (executed one by one):dropbox version dropbox status sysctl fs.inotify.max_user_watchesHow many files/folders reside in your Dropbox folder? As an alternative, you can post the result of following command:db_path=`jq -r '.personal.path' ~/.dropbox/info.json`; echo -n "Your Dropbox folder $db_path entries approximate count is "; tree -a "$db_path" | wc -lYou may need install 'jq' and/or 'tree' if some of them are missing on your system.Let's hope the above results will clarify what's going on. 🤔

For the first one, my results were: dropbox versionDropbox daemon version: 112.4.321Dropbox command-line interface version: 2020.03.04 dropbox statusUp to date sysctl fs.inotify.max_user_watchesfs.inotify.max_user_watches = 65536 For the last one, I did have to install jq and tree but after that I got confused. I couldn't figure out where my .dropbox directory should be. My Dropbox folder is in /mnt/sdc1. I found a .dropbox in there, but when I tried ~/mnt/sdc1/Dropbox/.dropbox/info.json, like sodb_path=`jq -r '.personal.path' ~/mnt/sdc1/Dropbox/.dropbox/info.json`; echo -n "Your Dropbox folder $db_path entries approximate count is "; tree -a "$db_path" | wc -ljq gave a "No such file or directory" error. I also tried ~/.dropbox/info.json and ~/mnt/sdc1/.dropbox/info.json and got the same results. What am I doing wrong? Do I need to change another part of the command? I don't know if this is the same info you're looking for but I do know that there are over 200,000 files and folders in my Dropbox. I sync the whole 800GB of it on Linux because I have the space (the sdc1 partition is 6TB) and I like to have all my files somewhere other than the cloud.

sleepysloth wrote:...sysctl fs.inotify.max_user_watchesfs.inotify.max_user_watches = 65536 For the last one, I did have to install jq and tree but after that I got confused. I couldn't figure out where my .dropbox directory should be. My Dropbox folder is in /mnt/sdc1. I found a .dropbox in there, but when I tried ~/mnt/sdc1/Dropbox/.dropbox/info.json, like sodb_path=`jq -r '.personal.path' ~/mnt/sdc1/Dropbox/.dropbox/info.json`; echo -n "Your Dropbox folder $db_path entries approximate count is "; tree -a "$db_path" | wc -ljq gave a "No such file or directory" error. I also tried ~/.dropbox/info.json and ~/mnt/sdc1/.dropbox/info.json and got the same results. What am I doing wrong? Do I need to change another part of the command? I don't know if this is the same info you're looking for but I do know that there are over 200,000 files and folders in my Dropbox. I sync the whole 800GB of it on Linux because I have the space (the sdc1 partition is 6TB) and I like to have all my files somewhere other than the cloud. Hi sleepysloth,I haven't mentioned that you need to change anything in the command and you should avoid such change! ☝️Just copy/paste it. 😉 That's it.The number of files/folders in your account should be less than maximum number of watches allowed. Since in your case that isn't true ( 65536 < 200000 ), you have to change this system setting. Figure out exact number of files and folders in your Dropbox folder (together), so be able decide exact value for fs.inotify.max_user_watches update (with some reserve of course). PS: Take a look here, so we can avoid repeat something already discussed.Hope this gives right direction.

Hmm, I tried that first and I thought I got the same error, which is why I tried the others, but now when I try it I get it says it can't open the file, permission denied. However I followed the instructions on the other page, made the watchable entries number 300,000, and now my Dropbox is syncing. I'm pretty sure that worked. The folders that I noticed had files missing are all updating. I'll double-check when it's done. Thank you!

Darn. Didn't work! Dropbox spent awhile indexing all the files, then syncing, and after it finished the missing files still weren't there. I restarted and it started syncing again, but now it's finished and the missing files are still gone.

files missing in synced folders on Linux, but not online or on Windows

30 Replies

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sleepysloth
Explorer | Level 3
5 years ago
For the first one, I got:

Dropbox isn't responding!
Dropbox isn't responding!
Dropbox is already running!

For the second one, it listed all my main folders followed by "unwatched," then started listing the files inside with the same result, but then it started saying "Dropbox isn't running!" after each file instead. It was doing this for every file in my entire Dropbox, so I ended the process, started Dropbox, and tried again. I waited over 10 minutes and it didn't produce any visible results, or stop running, so finally I killed the process again.
Здравко
Legendary | Level 20
5 years ago
🤔🧐 Strange! Maybe your computer is too slow!? Anyway... Let's try in smaller steps. Try stop the daemon at first, using following:
dropbox stop
dropbox status
Execute above commands one by one. Repeat "dropbox status", if needed, till result "Dropbox isn't running!".
Once the status shows that daemon gets completely stopped, execute following:
rm -rf /mnt/sdc1/Dropbox/.dropbox*
After that, run the daemon back, using following:
dropbox start
Wait for some time to daemon gets running back. Can pass a while. Once prompt comes up, post the result - everything from the last command to the end (the end could be after the prompt).

sleepysloth

Explorer | Level 3

4 years ago

Here's what I got:

Starting Dropbox...dropbox: locating interpreter
dropbox: logging to /tmp/dropbox-antifreeze-GzHJDj
dropbox: initializing
dropbox: initializing python 3.7.9
dropbox: setting program path '/home/naomi/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-116.4.368/dropbox'
dropbox: setting python path '/home/naomi/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-116.4.368:/home/naomi/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-116.4.368/python-packages.zip'
dropbox: python initialized
dropbox: running dropbox
dropbox: setting args
dropbox: enabling allocator metrics
dropbox: applying overrides
dropbox: running main script
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/naomi/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-116.4.368/cryptography.hazmat.bindings._openssl.cpython-37m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/naomi/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-116.4.368/cryptography.hazmat.bindings._padding.cpython-37m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/naomi/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-116.4.368/psutil._psutil_linux.cpython-37m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/naomi/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-116.4.368/psutil._psutil_posix.cpython-37m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/naomi/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-116.4.368/apex._apex.cpython-37m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/naomi/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-116.4.368/tornado.speedups.cpython-37m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/naomi/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-116.4.368/wrapt._wrappers.cpython-37m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/naomi/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-116.4.368/PyQt5.QtWidgets.cpython-37m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/naomi/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-116.4.368/PyQt5.QtCore.cpython-37m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/naomi/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-116.4.368/PyQt5.QtGui.cpython-37m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/naomi/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-116.4.368/PyQt5.QtDBus.cpython-37m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
Dropbox isn't running!
Done!

Then it said:

(dropbox:8651): LIBDBUSMENU-GLIB-WARNING **: 16:02:29.903: About to Show called on an item wihtout submenus.  We're ignoring it.

Здравко
Legendary | Level 20
4 years ago
Ok, all seems fine. Let's see the last steps. Check the current status using following:
dropbox status
Post the result and try again the following:
(IFS=$'\n'; for a in `find /mnt/sdc1/Dropbox -type d -print`; do if [[ "$a" =~ "/.dropbox" ]]; then echo "<empty>"; else cd $a; echo "In directory $a:"; dropbox filestatus; fi; done) | grep -vE "<empty>|up to date|\.dropbox|infinite" | grep -B 1 -vE "In directory .+:"
... to see if there is something wrong. Is there something received as a troublesome? 🤔 Hope if there is, the troubles to be less than before. Post such results, if there are some.
sleepysloth
Explorer | Level 3
4 years ago
For the first one, it said "Up to date."

The second one took quite awhile. Eventually it produced "bash: cd: too many arguments."
Здравко
Legendary | Level 20
4 years ago
sleepysloth wrote:
...
The second one took quite awhile. Eventually it produced "bash: cd: too many arguments."
🤔 I confess, can't be sure what this means. If your folders/files count is big, the time for enumerating and evaluating every one is proportional, so it's normal to "took quite awhile". There is single "cd" command that in all calls takes single argument only. Can do you post the part where Eventually it produced "bash: cd: too many arguments."? 🧐
sleepysloth
Explorer | Level 3
4 years ago
That's the only thing it displayed. I did it again and it still just displayed "bash: cd: too many arguments" and nothing else.
Здравко
Legendary | Level 20
4 years ago
sleepysloth wrote:
That's the only thing it displayed. I did it again and it still just displayed "bash: cd: too many arguments" and nothing else.
🤔Hm... The only chance such things to happen is using within file/folder name some unusual symbol, like semicolon, and some very old bash interpreter version. For actual versions this shouldn't be an issue, but... Let's try a bit patched variant of the command:
(IFS=$'\n'; for a in `find /mnt/sdc1/Dropbox -type d -print`; do if [[ "$a" =~ "/.dropbox" ]]; then echo "<empty>"; else echo "In directory $a:"; cd "$a"; dropbox filestatus; fi; done) 2>&1 | grep -vE "<empty>|up to date|\.dropbox|infinite" | grep -B 1 -vE "In directory .+:"
Now even for an old and buggy bash interpreter this should work (no chance the only argument be interpreted as multiple) and even when there is such or other error gonna be clear where exactly (in which directory) it happens. Let's see... 🧐
sleepysloth
Explorer | Level 3
4 years ago
This just didn't produce anything for me. I tried it a couple times. It took awhile each time and then just displayed a blank command prompt.
Здравко
Legendary | Level 20
4 years ago
sleepysloth wrote:
This just didn't produce anything for me. ...
That's a good news generally. 🤷 If there is some result produced, it would be error and the result would direct where particular error comes up. In your case you haven't issues related to OS permission, for example, or similar able to prevent sync. I can't say anything more about your missing entries. Try trace what exactly you are syncing actually and where the discrepancy lies on exactly to fix it by hand. That's it.

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files missing in synced folders on Linux, but not online or on Windows

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