We’re Still Here to Help (Even Over the Holidays!) - find out more here.
Forum Discussion
Solved
Dropbox removing external disk support for Mac users
In case anyone's unaware... if you're a Mac user storing your Dropbox on an external drive, you'll shortly lose that ability.
https://talk.tidbits.com/t/dropbox-drops-support-for-storing-files-...
Fortunately I am not in as deep trouble as some of these users bc I do store my dropbox folder on my main drive. But I am confused by this error message and I don't want my Dropbox to disappear into the system folder. I use it constantly. I don't want all the fancy bells and whistles, I have enjoyed the consistency and simplicity pf Dropbox for many years. So when I accept this change what will happen? My dropbox folder currently resides on my desktop. I use it to keep special files that I want to be sure are backed up in two places and also occasionally to share. I would like to continue that familiar scenario.
Furthermore, I certainly feel the other users pain. Someday I might need to store my Dropbox folder on an external drive.
As a matter of fact we also have subscription to another company that I assume is a competitor to Dropbox. My partner likes using them for file transfers, and it's true they have a good experience for those sending and receiving files, but I find Dropbox' simple integration with my system perfect and hope they remember that further complication is not necessarily good.
However to give credit due . . . I have not clicked the update button and everything seems to be working as usual for now.
Hi, one solution is: Go to the original (new) location of the Dropbox folder, then highlight the folder, then right click (two fingers on the touchpad) and select "make alias". Drag the alias to your desktop wherever you want it, and voila!
The alias doesn't solve the problem.. the problem is many people who are concerned have terabytes of data on their external drives and not enough space on their internal drives. The alias link doesn't solve that.
Crap, I responded to the wrong guy. Sorry about that. I was trying to respond to the guy who was concerned about it being moved from users, to the library; all on the internal drive. He thought he had to go looking for it every time in the new location.
An 'alias' has never worked properly. For years I have used a sym link (symbolic link). For those who don't know, it's like a smarter alias.
The tiny original lives where Dropbox wants it and the real stuff is on an external.
Years ago I was using a free sym link maker but it seemingly became unsupported with a later Mac OS. I then just bought a cheap one off the App Store for a couple of bucks and it's been great. I'm not sure that will solve this upcoming issue, but apart from this thread, I've heard nothing else about this change.
Appalling. I really don't know what to say.
I have been using Dropbox for as long as I can remember, I have files in there from 2009 so let's say I started using it around then. Over 13 years
Sure it is not perfect, but I don't need to think about it, I just use it.
It is integral to my work and play. I have so many apps that use Dropbox to sync their preferences, watch folders with various rules and automations, other cloud services like Epsonconnect, various Wordpress sites backing up daily to it, the more I think about it the more the I worry.
I physically feel sick thinking about how much this is going to affect and break.
It doesn't make a difference, as there is no going back, we are being told what we have used for years is going to be taken away whether we like it or not.
And I do not believe for a second that such disruption and regression was unavoidable. Work it out, develop your own API or encryption, or do stuff behind the scenes that pushes stuff around, but do what it takes to not have to tell your customers what you are telling us now.
We should not get a popup saying "we are going to upgrade you now and that upgrade is going to break this this and this, and won't be able to do this this or this ever again"
Something as big as this should be apologetically announced, with ample time (at least 12 months) to sort things out to work with the changes, with the options to export all your data to another service.
Given the amount of work it will take to make Dropbox usable for me again, I will probably kludge something together myself that will perform the basics rather than continue to give you money
I know I probably don't make much sense with what I have written, but I am fuming, absolutely livid.
