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Re: macOS Spotlight can't search online-only files contents anymore?

Spotlight Search Doesn't Link to Files in Dropbox in macOS 13 Ventura

dsnidey
Helpful | Level 6
Go to solution

After upgrading to macOS Ventura, I was prompted to upgrade to "Dropbox for macOS 12". I proceeded with that, it moved my Dropbox folder to ~/Library/CloudStorage and confirmed all was successful. Now when using Spotlight to search (I often type something like 'drawings folder' to open a folder called Drawings) the results in Spotlight show the Dropbox app icon beside the name of the item I want (rather than a Finder icon for folder or file). Hitting Enter or clicking on the result switches to Finder and does nothing, or sometimes will open the Applications folder and show the Dropbox app. It's not linking me to the actual file in ~/Library/CloudStorage. 

 

I have done the following and the problem is not solved:

  • Restarted
  • Ensured all files are available for offline access
  • Rebuilt the spotlight index
  • Unlinked Dropbox from this Mac, did a complete clean install of dropbox, performed the upgrade to v159.4.5870 and synced just one folder to begin

Nothing works. Any suggestions??

398 Replies 398

Hannah
Dropbox Staff
Go to solution

Hey @minpi, we definitely appreciate your feedback here, and rest assured that it's passed along to our team.

 

Thanks for sharing what worked for you, @r2xman, hopefully this will help other users as well.

 

@ThePlanner, have you had a chance to try what worked for @r2xman?


Hannah
Community Moderator @ Dropbox
dropbox.com/support


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ThePlanner
Helpful | Level 6
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Thank you all. I have not yet had the opportunity to try the fixes. 

Rikymonty
Helpful | Level 6
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You are right,  this is the only solution. If you want spotlight to index Dropbox content you can’t update to last version. if you update to the last version, it will move all the files to the Library/Cloudstorage folder and spotlight will stop indexing the files properly. It’s like they are all the same type of file, and if you click them nothing append..

jbwarren
Explorer | Level 4
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The "fix" of "preventing" Spotlight from searching in ~/Library/CloudStorage/Dropbox/ worked for me.  Someone should mark this as the "proper" answer for now, rather than the suggestion to do the clean reinstall of Dropbox.

 

I'm posting here both to add weight against the other answers, but also in the hopes that when Dropbox gets around to fixing the problems, they'll make a post here so that we all will be notified about ending this "temporary" kludge.

 

And yes, I know I'm using double-quotes everywhere above - it's needed, unfortunately, to be accurate.  As in, Dropbox is a "quality software product" on Mac with "proper change control procedures".

kotobato
Helpful | Level 5
Go to solution

Hi,

Does anyone have same problem?

 

I upgraded to macOS Ventura 13.1 on December 2022 then I found that 

Spotlight can't search online-only files contents (ex. text, tags, comments, URLs).

Why? I'm in a lot of trouble about this.

Is this a technical specification change?

Is this related to Dropbox folder's location change to  ~/Library/CloudStrage/ directory on Apple Silicon Macs?

 

This happened only on Apple Silicon Mac.

I still can search online-only files contents on Intel iMac.

 

MacBook Air 13.3 inch M1 2020
macOS Ventura 13.1

Dropbox 166.3.2847

Walter
Dropbox Staff
Go to solution

Hi @kotobato, sorry to hear you're having issues with this. 

 

Could you let us know if you've tried re-indexing Spotlight as outlined here

 

Note that the help article mentions the Documents folder, but you need to use the Dropbox folder instead.

 

Let us know how of any updates!


Walter
Community Moderator @ Dropbox
dropbox.com/support


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kotobato
Helpful | Level 5
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Hi @Walter 

Thank you for your reply.

At the same time, I tried this Terminal.app command.

sudo mdutil -E /

 

I will share the result soon.

kotobato
Helpful | Level 5
Go to solution

After all, re-indexing Spotlight doesn’t work.

And I found this.  What a terrible change :’(

 

Expected changes with Dropbox for macOS - Dropbox Help

“Searching through Finder won’t find all content in your Dropbox folder.

- Only file names will display in these search results, not the file contents.”

martinottopaul
Helpful | Level 5
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Had the same problems.

 

The "fix" (preventing Spotlight from searching the new Dropbox "folder") works for me too.

 

For now.

 

I am just here to put some weight on this issue. After many years of everyday use without any problems this is just super annoying and I am thinking about moving on.

 

This needs to be fixed AND communicated properly (instead of marking this topic as solved).

minpi
Experienced | Level 11
Go to solution

Totally agree - it need to be communicated properly and it have to be unmarked as solved! Does any one knows -  is there a way to deactivate Dropbox Notifications about this new "update"? Terminal command etc?

Need more support?