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Forum Discussion
PDF preview using Windows EXplorer
This is for my work account. We use smart sync at work.
Using Windows Explorer if I open a folder I have never been to and there are PDFs present. I will then click on said PDF. A preview pops up in the preview pane within windows explorer. However, once i click on another file, if I click back on the initial PDF the preview pane remains empty. The previews do not come back by restarting windows explorer, or pdf, or PC. The only way for me to get them back is to open and save the document, which is not an option.
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I can confirm I've seen the same issue on two separate machines the past week.
All files are online-only and when I click one, it previews normally.
It downloads the file and changes the file to a green tick (locally stored, selective sync).
After the file has been stored locally with the green tick, it will no longer be previewable.
The preview pane is blank.
If I copy-paste it to a different folder however (documents, downloads, etc), it previews fine.
The only workaround I've found is to right-click the file/folder, select Smart Sync and change it back to an online-only file.
This however only works once as once you click it again it will download itself again and store it locally, cycling the problem.
Is there anything else we can try here?
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I use Nitro PDF Reader as my default PDF viewer/editor. It took quite a bit of communication with Nitro's support team to fix this issue and it's still not perfect, but pdf previews do work for me most of the time now. If I find it's suddenly not working, I simply close and re-open the Windows Explorer window. It would still be great if this issue could be solved so that previews work reliably, but I'm not sure if it's a Dropbox software bug or a pdf viewer software issue.
FWIW, I'm using Nitro Pro 13.42.3.855.
I've experienced this same problem and it is very annoying: I use the preview a lot to quickly find documents I need (naming conventions are not a thing where I currently work).
The workaround suggested by MarcASI works: first set the folder to Online only to remove all local copies of the files. Then change SmartSync to Local to download all documents. Preview now works as intended, not just the first time or only on files that I have saved myself. Marc, you were a lifesaver, thank you!
Taking troubleshooting one step further: my current thoughts. When you request a preview of an online document, the file gets downloaded to a (temporary?) location. The preview shows fine. Then when you click away from that file, something happens that makes the Explorer preview not able to find the file a second time. I'm thinking that maybe the file is removed from the temporary download location once you click away and the preview process is stopped for that particular file. Then when you open it a second time, the preview process cannot find the file in that temporary location. Preview: "That's odd, I was sure it was here the last time I looked!"
Or maybe when the preview process is called again for a file that has a Smart Sync marker "Local", it starts looking in the normal local location where it can't find the file until it has been 'properly' downloaded or saved by the user. Preview: "That's odd, it says it's a local file but there's nothing there to show!"
I also have this issue. Please fix this ASAP. It is enough of a problem that I will switch to Microsoft OneDrive soon, assuming this problem does not happen with its service.
Agree with the last post. Fix the issue, or we are gone, too...
Agree with last post. It doesn't work today again !
