Forum Discussion

manfred91's avatar
manfred91
Explorer | Level 3
2 years ago

Number of files syncing keeps changing

When I click on my mac the dropbox icon on the top menu bar, I can see a message saying "Syncing xxx files" and Size and time.   What does that mean? It is constantly changing. Saying 8000 files ...
desktop
Mac
sync
Mark's avatar
Mark
Icon for Super User II rankSuper User II
2 years ago

They are what is in Dropbox - so that is a count of the files that it is syncing and changing. If you dont recognise the number my guess is that you've set up Backup or something and so its syncing files from other directories. 

  • manfred91's avatar
    manfred91
    Explorer | Level 3
    2 years ago

    Hi Mark, thanks for coming back on the questions. But it doesn't really explain it. The number of files are going down and the size on the right of the message is going up and the time is jumping all over the place. No, I do not use the backup feature.

    • Nancy's avatar
      Nancy
      Icon for Dropbox Community Moderator rankDropbox Community Moderator
      2 years ago

      Hey manfred91. Do you mind sharing a screenshot of the number of files that seem to be syncing at the moment?

       

      Also, if you right click on your local Dropbox folder > select Get info, how many files seem to be syncing locally in total?

      • manfred91's avatar
        manfred91
        Explorer | Level 3
        2 years ago

        Hi, isn't there documentation about what dropbox is doing when it is syncing and a log file about which files have been touched, synced, deleted at which time ...

        Perfect would be a monitor of course. But somehow the situation is that it isn't easy explainable what this line in the pull down menu is saying. Why is the number of files going up and down, why is the size going up and down and the estimated time going up and down. And there wasn't any activity on the computer and I am only watching this behavior -   only for files in the Documents folder - no system files involved. This isn't something which is new this is a constant thing.

         

        So my questions are:

        - is there a monitor function showing what is going on?

        - is there a log file?

        - is there proper documentation?

         

        I do not want to post pictures of my screen and have some guesswork what could that mean.

         

        Since no one has pointed out to me where I could find answers to the simple questions above, I assume there isn't a chance to do a proper investigation.

         

        Thanks.

About Create, upload, and share

Find help to solve issues with creating, uploading, and sharing files and folders in Dropbox. Get support and advice from the Dropbox Community.

The Dropbox Community team is active from Monday to Friday. We try to respond to you as soon as we can, usually within 2 hours.

If you need more help you can view your support options (expected response time for an email or ticket is 24 hours), or contact us on X, Facebook or Instagram.

For more info on available support options for your Dropbox plan, see this article.

If you found the answer to your question in this Community thread, please 'like' the post to say thanks and to let us know it was useful!