Smart Sync: Option for files I "make available offline" to remain available offline

[DV87]

I used to love Dropbox's Smart Sync feature, but it's gotten very frustrating since it started automatically removing files that it thinks I haven't accessed in a while. I find that it regularly purges files that I use ALL the time (like our company's main art library folder that contains frequently used digital assets). It may be doing this because I usually access the files indirectly... For example, an After Effects project may have hundreds of "links" to those art library files — so if Dropbox decides to automatically purge those files, I can't work on the After Effects project until I go through the tedious work of redownloading everything — and then repairing whatever broken links remain.

If I've selected files to "make available offline," it would be great to have the option to KEEP those files on my hard drive indefinitely. I realize this was probably intended to be a feature (not a bug)... But Smart Sync hasn't always done this. I used to be able to choose "make online only" or "make available offline" without Dropbox making those decisions for me at some unknown time interval. Hopefully my example above helps illustrate why this is very bad for our productivity.

[Jay]

Hi @DV87, thanks for messaging the Community.

Are you on a Mac device, and are you on the newer version of the Mac OS Dropbox desktop application?

This will help me to assist further!

[DV87]

I'm running Dropbox v182.4.6427 and MacOS 13.5.2 (Ventura) on a 2023 Mac Studio (M2 Ultra).

I see from the link you provided that upgrading my Dropbox means that my main Dropbox folder will be moved to ~/Library/CloudStorage. Unfortunately, this prohibits me from upgrading Dropbox, as my Mac's internal hard drive is only 2TB, and the amount of Dropbox data that I need to always be accessible offline exceeds that... 

While I realize Dropbox has never supported it officially, my solution has always been to use a large, external Thunderbolt drive to store my Dropbox data. This has generally worked well, but it appears this may no longer be possible for Mac users due to restrictions with Apple's File Provider API. So yeah... I see that Apple is the primary source of this issue, and that it also impacts most other cloud storage services.

So, since I need offline access to a lot of my Dropbox data and am unwilling to have that data filling up my computer's internal hard drive, I wonder if staying on Dropbox v182.4.6427 and disabling Smart Sync altogether might help resolve the issue (at least for the short term). Any thoughts on this would be much appreciated. Thank you. 

[Jay]

It might be possible to downgrade to the previous version of the Dropbox desktop application, though we wouldn't be able to guarantee if you do so on that device. 

Bear in mind that all Mac users running Mac OS 12.3 or greater will be migrated to the new version at some point in the future, so it wouldn't be possible at that time to remain on the previous version.

[DV87]

I hate that I'm even having to consider this kind of thing... But what if I was able to downgrade my Mac Studio to run MacOS 11.7.4 (Big Sur) and also run an older version of Dropbox on it? Would that keep me going, or would I still eventually be forced to upgrade and move my Dropbox files to my Mac's main hard drive? Thank again.

[Jay]

Technically, since only 12.3 or above would be required to use the new File Provider version of the Dropbox desktop application, it could work if you do it that way. 

Of course, we would never recommend a user purposely downgrade their OS drastically in order to make these changes. There could be a lot of issues when doing such a massive change, such as app compatibility, unrelated to Dropbox and so on. Personally, I couldn't recommend going this far to make it work. 

[DV87]

I agree it would be far from ideal, but I’m just trying to figure out what the boundaries are. So in that spirit… What if I were to replace my Mac with a Windows 11 PC? Do you think I’d eventually have similar problems? Is this ultimately an industry-wide change, or is it likely to remain an Apple-only limitation? 

[Jay]

While we don't have any information on how (or if) Microsoft is going to be making such fundamental changes to their OS, and to enforce a similar change to Apple, as of yet, the app functions as normal on Windows.

[DV87]

Thanks so much for the insight, Jay. I’m not likely to switch to Windows anytime soon… So in the meantime, I think I’d like to downgrade only Dropbox to see if I can get the old functionality back. Three questions for you: (1) Can you recommend an old installer I should use to do the downgrade? (2) Once I’ve downgraded, are there any steps I can take to prevent Dropbox from auto-updating to a version that’s going to give me the same problems? (3) Would you agree that avoiding the use of Smart Sync after the downgrade would be in my best interest given my situation? Thanks again for all your help, Jay. Very much appreciated! 

[Jay]

You won't need to downgrade the app necessarily. Try following these steps to unlink and relink your computer to see if they help.

1) Click the Dropbox icon in the system tray, or menu bar, by the clock.
2) Click on your profile picture or initials to the right of the search bar, and select "Preferences".
3) Select the Account tab.
4) Click the "Sign Out" button in the Account tab.
5) Your Dropbox will then prompt you to re-enter your account information.
 

Now, sign in again in the app, and it should revert you to the older version of the app.