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Brandonrowe14's avatar
Brandonrowe14
Explorer | Level 4
3 years ago

Macbook Pro Update Moved My Files and now I can't locate my Documents.

Hello,

 

I recently updated Dropbox on my MacBook Pro and instantly regretted it. For whatever reason, Dropbox decided all of my files needed to be moved upon the newest update. Unfortunately, not all of my files wound up where/how I expected. When the update was complete, my Documents folder appeared empty, and I was very confused. However, upon closer inspection, I looked in my Documents folder with Terminal, and my files are actually there, but they are not appearing in Finder. Unfortunately, I don't believe it's as simple as Hidden vs Not Hidden because I have Finder set to show Hidden Files, and they are still not appearing there.

 

Here's how my file structure works (I have a feeling this has something to do with it, and this may well be extremely suboptimal by Dropbox's new standards): Like most MacBook users, I work out of three main folders: Documents, Downloads, and Desktop. Right now, the Downloads and Desktop folders in my MacBook user folder are synced with folders of the same name located in "My Mac([Computer name].local)". I can make changes in the user folders and see them reflected in Dropbox folders. That's how I've worked with it for many years, and I suspect that the latest update doesn't like that very much because the update said something about separating Backups from Sync entirely. It's possible I've misinterpreted something here, so please let me know if you know better, but that was my understanding of the reason for moving files with the update.

 

So, here are my questions: How can I make these files/folders visible again? More importantly, is there a downside to working with Backups in this way? I'm not totally against changing the way these work (I can accomplish similar workflows with shortcuts after all), but I want to make sure my Backups are maintained. Please let me know if I can provide any further information to help diagnose this problem.

Thanks,

 

Brandon

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