We’re Still Here to Help (Even Over the Holidays!) - find out more here.
Forum Discussion
Windows app - did they remove most of the context menu?
Until very recently, the context menu in File Explorer included things like "Copy Dropbox Link", "View on Dropbox.com", and a couple more. Now those are all gone, and instead there is just one, which I think is new: "Send with Dropbox Transfer". I tried using it instead of my tried-and-true method of just copying the link, but although the resulting link is shorter, it's just more bother - more steps involved, and it expires in a week (which the old link doesn't). I don't need to "create a transfer" - I just want a read-only link to a file. The only way to get the simple link now is to open dropbox.com in a browser and navigate to the relevant folder (and since "View on Dropbox.com" is also gone from the context menu, I have to do that manually), and hover over the file to reveal a "Copy link" button. Did this change to the app's context menu items happen to other users, or just me? I'm on Windows 11, if that matters.
6 Replies
Replies have been turned off for this discussion
- Jay
Dropbox Community Moderator
I did as instructed, but the behavior is unchanged. To the right is a screenshot of the context menu.
However, I have a new piece of info I was overlooking: The screenshot to the right is in Directory Opus - I always use that rather than File Explorer. Normally it gives me everything File Explorer does (plus a ton of other wonderful features), but I just opened the original File Explorer and discovered that they are different in this regard.
In File Explorer, I first see this shortened menu, and the Dropbox submenu has the new Transfer thing plus all the old ones:
If I click on "Show more options", I get a menu that looks exactly like what I used to see in Directory Opus before the recent change:
Notice that the new "Send with Dropbox Transfer" is not on this expanded menu. So there are three different sets of Dropbox menu items, depending on whether I view it in Directory Opus, in File Explorer with Dropbox submenu, or in File Explorer with "Show more options".
- Jay
Since we don't support third party file explorers, and you're seeing the expected behavior in File Explorer (which can vary depending on the options you choose to display in Windows 11), there isn't much I can suggest apart from contacting the developers of the app.
Two followup questions that don't involve third-party software:
1. Does the expected behavior in File Explorer include having "Send with Dropbox Transfer" appear in the submenu but disappear when one clicks "Show more options"? That doesn't seem right. (I don't use Dropbox Transfer, but I thought I'd mention it since you said the behavior is correct but that difference seems wrong.)
2. Can you tell me when your context menu code was updated to include "Send with Dropbox Transfer"? That might have coincided with when I stopped seeing the other menu items in Directory Opus, so knowing the timing might help when I contact those folks.
- Jay
Depending on the settings used for Windows 11, the Dropbox context menu items can all appear or be included in a submenu.
There isn't an exact period when the Dropbox Transfer option first appeared, as these features are rolled out and can vary for different users and devices.
The point of my first question was that it seems strange that "Send with Dropbox Transfer" doesn't appear at all in the "Show more options" view. Are you saying that's normal and expected? It looks like a bug to me.
And an additional question: Twice you have mentioned Windows 11 settings that can affect the context menu. This time you specified said there is a setting that can control whether the Dropbox items are in a submenu or not. I would like mine to all appear, not in a submenu - can you tell me where that setting is? I looked in File Explorer's Options area as well as searching the overall Windows settings for "menu" - I didn't see anything applicable. I also looked in the Dropbox app's preferences area.
