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Spotlight Search Doesn't Link to Files in Dropbox in macOS 13 Ventura
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. No...
- That’s the same problem I had. I solved it by doing a complete clean install of dropbox. You may not need to do all of this, but to be safe, in Dropbox settings Selective Sync uncheck all of your folders and wait for them to be removed from your Mac. Once that’s done, unlink your Mac from Dropbox preferences. You should see the Dropbox getting started screen. Quit Dropbox and move the app to the Trash. Remove all dropbox files from ~/Library being careful to look at the path name. Only remove things that are within a Dropbox parent folder. Look in library application support, and library preferences. Empty the Trash. Restart your Mac. Reinstall Dropbox from dropbox.com. Once reinstalled, to make things faster sync only one small folder and wait for the prompt that new Dropbox for macOS 12 is available. You should see the message within a few minutes of reinstalling Dropbox. Allow it to upgrade and migrate your files to the new location. Once that’s done you can then sync all your folders. Let your Mac index itself and the problem should be solved.
That’s the same problem I had. I solved it by doing a complete clean install of dropbox. You may not need to do all of this, but to be safe, in Dropbox settings Selective Sync uncheck all of your folders and wait for them to be removed from your Mac. Once that’s done, unlink your Mac from Dropbox preferences. You should see the Dropbox getting started screen. Quit Dropbox and move the app to the Trash. Remove all dropbox files from ~/Library being careful to look at the path name. Only remove things that are within a Dropbox parent folder. Look in library application support, and library preferences. Empty the Trash. Restart your Mac. Reinstall Dropbox from dropbox.com. Once reinstalled, to make things faster sync only one small folder and wait for the prompt that new Dropbox for macOS 12 is available. You should see the message within a few minutes of reinstalling Dropbox. Allow it to upgrade and migrate your files to the new location. Once that’s done you can then sync all your folders. Let your Mac index itself and the problem should be solved.
Approach dsnidey's suggested fix with caution!! While I appreciated the suggestion, dsnidey's proposed fix not only burned many hours of my time but made my Dropbox situation much worse, at least with build v166.4.2920, resulting in the following additional issues (on top of the Spotlight Search problem):
- Many "Conflicted" copies of empty folders and files
- Getting stuck in sync that never resolved
- Subfolders of Selective Sync folders not syncing
- "Cannot communicate with helper" error messages
I'd recommend NOT following this procedure proposed by dsnidey, although it's partially helpful. After speaking with Dropbox customer service, they suggested instead simply installing the latest stable version.
I followed this slightly revised sequence of these steps, which fixed everything for me:
- Click on your Dropbox MacOS app menu bar (not Dock) icon-->click on your profile icon-->go to Preferences.
- Under Sync, go to "Select folders" then uncheck all folders synced to your Mac. Doing this will remove them from your Mac and leave them online ONLY. You'll need to wait a while (potentially hours) for this removal to finish.
- Go to your former /Users/Username/Library/CloudStorage/Dropbox folder to make sure all files have been removed
- Go to Dropbox MacOS app Preferences-->Account-->Sign out of account. This unlinks your Mac from your Dropbox account. You should see the Dropbox getting started screen.
- Quit Dropbox and move the app to Trash.
- I used a 3rd party AppCleaner removal tool to clear out all the Dropbox files from my root and user /Library folders, but you can also do this manually.
- Delete Dropbox folder & files from the /Users/Username/Library/ folder
- Delete Dropbox folder & files from the /Library/ folder
- I used a 3rd party AppCleaner removal tool to clear out all the Dropbox files from my root and user /Library folders, but you can also do this manually.
- Restart your Mac.
- Reinstall Dropbox by going to the Latest Stable Builds page, finding the latest version released by clientreleases and directly downloading the appropriate offline Installer for your MacOS.
- After you reinstall and log in with your account, you can go back to and recheck your folders under Sync that you want to have both offline & online. The sync process could take a very long time depending on the size of your files and internet speed.
I struggled with Spotlight issues after updating to the latest Dropbox MacOS release, but following these steps made Spotlight search work again for me, and all files synced as they should, including all subfolders. Although it took many hours for all my files to resync, everything was 100% back up and running. I hope this works for you too. Good luck!
IMPORTANT- if you get a prompt saying Dropbox is going to migrate your files to a new folder, the Dropbox advisor I spoke with advised NOT to do this. Otherwise, you may be back to square one.
I confirm - this is THE only solution right now until Dropbox fix this
discovered prity interesting option today:)
You can use it with Dropbox as well without using Dropbox software at all.
