Re: I need to disable syncing in order to save changes in Photoshop.

Hi GPGS_PHOTOSHP - thanks for your report and welcome to our Community too!

I moved your post under this thread as it echoes the issue discussed here. Could you take a look when you get some spare time and let me know if u_kadru´s suggestion works for you too.

Thanks! 

HI, well there is nothing here that I have not already mentioned, and that is to disable Dropbox Syncing so I can work on my files, then re-enable - not a solution.

The problem is .. this was not a problem till a couple of weeks ago - my workflow has not changed at all, but all of a sudden Dropbox is interfering and locking the files, so why is this happening? Yes, I can do what @u_kadru does, but as I said, I don't want to be enabling and re-enabling all the time as a lot of files need to be shared and i need files from other colleagues too,

Thanks for your swift reply GPGS_PHOTOSHP.

Would you like me to reach out via your Dropbox email address to look further into this internally with all of my tools at my disposal? 

I'll make sure to update the thread with our findings too if you agree. 

Thanks Mattias3 - Seems we are in the boat.

Not sure about you but I changed nothing at all about my setup, as in my daily workflow/methods - the only thing I can think of is maybe the latest Adobe PS install is bad, or the latest Dropbox update is bad, - both of those are the only things that I can think have actually changed of late.

But saying that I was using both fine until a couple of weeks ago, 

One thing I do notice is that Dropbox estimates for upload speeds and times are massively out, and fluctuate madly between huge and small numbers.

Yes - Please do!

Yes - I am sure I answered yes to this already but I have heard noting - this is really becoming a pain in the A$$ 

Are you able to replicate the problem?
Do you need any more details from me?

The only thing that may change soon is I will have to updated to Windows 10 within next few days - if anything changes then I will report back

Not solved for me. Impossible to save a Photoshop file while the file is being synced by Dropbox.

Hi, This issue needs to be fixed. Walter you are welcome to make a test on my computer. In my case it is not Photoshop, but an app for flow analysis. If I try to compile a project with Dropbox active, it fails. But if I put Dropbox sync on "pause" it works smoothly. So Dropbox is interfering with something it shouldn't. During compilation a temp file is created, and I think Dropbox put a lock on this file, and thus interupting the process.

Hi All; apologies for the late reply.

I was just wondering if any of you are still seeing this behavior when editing files that are syncing via our desktop app through a 3rd party app. 

If you do, I'd like to put you in touch with our support team so let me know here and I'll create a ticket for you asap using the email address that's linked to your profile(s) here on our Community.

Thanks a bunch for your patience and cooperation and I'm sorry if this has caused any inconvenience so far. 

HI - many apologies, I swear I replied to this with an update - anyway, will try again.

After finally intalling Windoiws 10, the problem has 95% gone, I can now save files in photoshop without error and without having to pause sync.

The only error I see now, with regard to sync and Adobe, is when I am in Bridge and I am updating Metadata on my image sets. Some will fail and not save the changes, but, if I turn off Dropbox sync they will all update no problem.

So, in short, yes, seems sorted but I assume due to windows 10 update and nothing that Dropbox did, anyway, we should all be on Win 10 now anyway (yay!!!**###???), also, if you are on Win 7 - you can srtill get the free update, if thats what holding you back

Walter I now get issues with Microsoft Power BI as well. I cannot develop in the file as long as Dropbox is active. I need to put Dropbox sync on pause, then Power BI will be responsive again.

I do not like the development of Dropbox at all. You had a great service that I have paid for many many years. But I get very close to the point when I will take the troouble of finding another cloud service for backup and file sharing. Please remove this stupid feature of file locking, or whatevery you do, to interfere with files. I'm not interested in working many people on the same file at the same time. Let me disable that part completely. I'm NOT interested in that, but I AM interested in what Dropbox used to be...

I'm stuck with this same BIG issue since 2020. I used to be able to just save every few seconds in Photoshop without a problem, and now I get this message forcing me to wait for the sync to be done before I can save again. (it's that "file is locked" problem) I tried everything. 

Just like you I'm considering moving to other cloud saving options now. The whole reason why I used dropbox over other clouds is for how efficient it was to work on a Photoshop file directly from dropbox and have access to many saved states backups in case I screw up. Now we have to close the sync until we're done working, which makes us lose all of those backups. I've lost a whole print artwork because I was working without sync and I accidentally saved it in a lower res and it's screwed.

RIP

I'm in the same boat. Used to work with various enormous files, be it psd, tiff or avi or whatever and 1) Dropbox wasn't locking the files 2) upload pattern seemed to be different, syncing say 2GB file after each ctrl+S took seconds. Now Drobox seems to sync not chunks, but whole files, locks them and - as I learnt the painful way - on forcibly unlocking those files they simply *pooof* gone nothing no trace no sign RIP file.

I'm on Windows 7, so I understand my version of operating system might not be supported anymore, but on the other hand Dropbox still starts and syncs, so that's not the issue. Also I can understand changing the way app works, even if the change seems for the worse. But what I cannot understand is why the app takes full control of my file and removes it during interrupted sync process? File was to be synced local, like most of my files.

This problem persists for some time now, and try as I might I cannot easily change my workflow to accomodate those unexpected changes in Dropbox behavior. Why would I need restore file function anyways if you delete it beyond any chance of restoration? You are charging more $$$ and deliver sub-par product...

Signed: sorely disappointed long-time Dropbox user.

Hi! I'm seeing the same error still. In my case it's saves and build tasks in Visual Studio Code that fails while Dropbox is syncing recently changed files. It almost always fails, but sometimes Dropbox syncs quickly enough to unlock the files, and then it might work. If I pause Dropbox the issue goes away, and I started seeing this a few months ago, so it seems to be the same error that others in this thread are experiencing. I'm on Windows 10 Home x64.

Edit: I forgot to mention, no 3rd party apps, and my Dropbox desktop app is on version 99.3.488 at the moment.

We are having the same issue with protools files. Dropbox gives the same error mentioned by other users here. 

Is a real pain in the a$$.

We've already contacted dropbox about this issue months ago but no solution was found.

Walter Please, if not for anyone but your own company, take this seriously. I have now started the transfer of my file away from Dropbox. You have had lots of time to solve this. But I cannot wait for you MAYBE solve it.

Thank you for all these years. I have enjoyed your service since 2007, so I do not take this lightly. I do really have liked Drobox, but since this issue is not solved, I am now actively testing other solutions. If they do not fail this test period, I will now say goodbye.

I'm having this issue with Unity 3D in June 2020. It was not happening a few months ago. If support could open a ticket that would be great.

Hey everyone, thanks for your ongoing reports. 

When you're done with a file associated with the third party apps you are using that result in this error, the best way to resolve this is to save the file and exit the application you were using. Dropbox should then sync the file right away. 

I hope this helps to some extent, but let us know if you have any other questions. Thank you!

This doesn't address files that are not user created, like temp files. In my case, Unity attempts to copy files from one directory to another but fails because Dropbox takes exclusive access.

What's really strange is that I have excluded both directories from sync but Dropbox continues to lock the files.

Set-Content -Path 'C:\Users\<USER\Dropbox\Temp' -Stream com.dropbox.ignored -Value 1

Set-Content -Path 'C:\Users\<USER\Dropbox\Library' -Stream com.dropbox.ignored -Value 1

@Lusil

im sorry but that is an abysmal answer and you have obviously not read the thread,

I am getting the same problems with after effects and cinema 4d- I used to be able to save a project anytime I wanted, 

but now I cant save a file, make a change and then save again- I have to pause the sync to do it. when you're working on large files- this becomes pointless to have dropbox, and just might aswell use the free wetransfer to send myself the file at the end of the day.

what has happened to dropox?

Sorry Lusil Lusil but I can't save and exit every other minute just because drobox stopped working like it used to for years.

I struck a cmd+S every time I make a step forward in my work (mixing audio) wich can be every 30 seconds or every minute. Your proposed solution is not a solution at all.

Almost every time I save the Protools session I get a message like this

Could not save "" because The process cannot access the file because it is being used by another process. (32) d:\Dropbox\XXXXXX\YYYYYY\bsbyQTVQyvbpZSBB\.

I have to hit ok and cmd+s again to have the session saved.

Then in the session folder most of the times I'll find an ampty folder named bsbyQTVQyvbpZSBB

I don't know why, but my post was deleted, I believe by accident.

My questions:

- is partial sync feature still part of a Dropbox offering? (it may be for example .psd file format specification change)

- is file locking expected Dropbox behavior?

- is removing file from drive during sync and restoring it once the sync is finished expected Dropbox behavior?

Thanks!

Hey lllama, most likely it got caught up in our spam filter by mistake, apologies for that!

I'm curious what you might be referring to in terms of partial sync, would you mind clarifying that for me a little? Are you referring to only the changes of the file being synced rather than the whole file perhaps?

If that case, this is still how files are synced, where only the edited parts of the files are synced.

For your second question, I can suggest having a look at a previous post of mine here and that thread in general. It seems to be that this issue occurs only when editing within certain apps like Photoshop due to the way the files are saving.

When editing in these apps, you can pause the syncing of the app while the file is open within the app and then resume once you're finished editing.

For your last question, many apps create temp files when editing. Usually this is to help with freeing up memory for other processes on the device. 

If an app creates a temp file during editing, once the file is saved and closed, the app would remove this temporary file and then save these changes to the actual file.

Rather than it being Dropbox, it should be the app you're using that's replacing the file with a temp file, and then deleting the temp file and saving the changes back to the original file once you've finished working on it.

I hope this info helps, let me know if you have any further questions on this!