Dropbox overwrites new & local files with older versions and generates "conflicted files"-copy

[davidboxer]

I am a dropbox client for many years and have recommended it many many times, but now I'm a bit "irritated" to say least,... please help:

for unfortunate technical reasons i could'nt sync my huge dropbox (256 GB+) for more than 6 mths

but i had a copy on my harddrive, wher ei worked and where, by the time, files were updated, of course, sinc i worked with them... 

i just didn't/couldn't sync

now i m syncing, BUT: ( im terrified: )

dropbox does not realize that it should NOT overwrite newer files on my computer!

It overwrites the current files i had been working on during the last 6 mths, and generates a "...conflicted file..." copy.

i do understand the purpose, but this is totally wrong!!
Now I d be forced to manually rename all the file which dropbox has mistakingly "exchanged",... ??!

I just didnt imagine before, that dropbox would not realize, that aybe a file that was worked on recently should not be overwritten!? I dont get it. 
It should be that the newer file should be kept and the older file (on the dropbox should be aded as a copy (older version file) - it has thus "deleted" 900 files!!!!! on my current system and thus totally kiled my system on which i WORK - i am a webdeveloper and have thousands of files...

Do u have any suggestions?

Also, now i need to find a way to recover the overwritten files (900+) !? Geez

I mean: What in the programmers minds makes them think i would like to replace a newer file with an older version!!? 

This is crazy? Or is there something I don't understand? 
Dropbox should be able to read the timestamp of the newer file on my local drive and realize that it should not overwrite the newer file OR AT LEAST ASK ME BEFORE! 
But instead the "...conflicted file..." - copy should be a copy of the old file, so my current work dont get overwritten. etc. 

Please help 🙂 Thanx!!

[Yubie96]

I just had this same thing happen to me and lost a ton of data and files.  Yikes!  I'm going to have to system restore and hope this fixes it.  No matter what though, I'm going to lose very valuable data as my system restore point is over a week ago.  I cannot "Restore" or "Revert" the linking event on my account's event page.

Dropbox team, please make a change to the application so that it will at least ask you if you want to overwrite files.  This clearly appears to be a rare issue that has simply fallen between the cracks in the development.  The scenario that we all appear to be experiencing is this:

-Dropbox is linked to computer and a local folder is created (mine was C:\Users\Name\Dropbox)

-Dropbox is unlinked (logged out), but files within that local folder continue to be modified and updated

-Dropbox is relinked (logged back in) and the same local folder is chosen (again C:\Users\Name\Dropbox).  The user anticipates his local files will either be uploaded or the program will ask him what to do.

-The Dropbox program then completely wipes out that local folder and its files, replacing it with whatever is still within your account.  Absolutely no warning that it is about to completely delete and replace everything.  There was a mere request to rename a folder, to which I agreed because it didn't mention any deletions.

Please pass this on.

EDIT: Upon further inspection, what happened is the program just renamed the old local folder to "Dropbox (old)" and my files were kept there.  PHEW!  I see that this has been addressed after all, but nonetheless, the program probably ought to giver some notification to the user that it is doing this.  I had no idea this had happened and was scrambling through the regular dropbox folder looking for my files.

[Vic9948]

Hi, I think am having exactly the same problem. I noticed that my Dropbox App was not synchronising because the files I had in my phone and in my PC were different, and those I could see in the dropbox on line were also different (all three were). So I realized that somehow -don't know why- the DB application in my PC was not working or was not installed, not sure what happened. So I downloaded it again and when it started synchronising it, it started overwriting all the local files I had in my PC (I mantained the same local Dropbox folder I was using and that I have used for the past 9 years since I installed DB for the first time), and downloading or "copying" the folders and files as seen when I enter DB online from Chrome. When I started noticing this, I panicked and paused the synchronization, but sadly the majority of folders are empty and its files, gone. I am afraid of resuming the process and losing all the files that were in my Dropbox folder of my PC, which are the files I always work with and thus the most updated ones. 

What I want in my local Dropbox folder are the ones that were in my PC, not the ones I have online in the DB cloud, I wanted the online DB website to update and "reflect" what I had in my PC, not the other way around.  What shall I do to keep the ones I still have in my local folder and revert the process and get all my files back? I am quite desperate 😞 Thank you

[Vic9948]

Hi 

---

@Yubie96 wrote:

I just had this same thing happen to me and lost a ton of data and files.  Yikes!  I'm going to have to system restore and hope this fixes it.  No matter what though, I'm going to lose very valuable data as my system restore point is over a week ago.  I cannot "Restore" or "Revert" the linking event on my account's event page.

Dropbox team, please make a change to the application so that it will at least ask you if you want to overwrite files.  This clearly appears to be a rare issue that has simply fallen between the cracks in the development.  The scenario that we all appear to be experiencing is this:

-Dropbox is linked to computer and a local folder is created (mine was C:\Users\Name\Dropbox)

-Dropbox is unlinked (logged out), but files within that local folder continue to be modified and updated

-Dropbox is relinked (logged back in) and the same local folder is chosen (again C:\Users\Name\Dropbox).  The user anticipates his local files will either be uploaded or the program will ask him what to do.

-The Dropbox program then completely wipes out that local folder and its files, replacing it with whatever is still within your account.  Absolutely no warning that it is about to completely delete and replace everything.  There was a mere request to rename a folder, to which I agreed because it didn't mention any deletions.

Please pass this on.

EDIT: Upon further inspection, what happened is the program just renamed the old local folder to "Dropbox (old)" and my files were kept there.  PHEW!  I see that this has been addressed after all, but nonetheless, the program probably ought to giver some notification to the user that it is doing this.  I had no idea this had happened and was scrambling through the regular dropbox folder looking for my files.

---

Did you find the "old" DB folder once the syncronization was completed? I have paused mine because I am afraid it will continue to delete my local files, for the moment it has not created an "old" DB folder... I am really really starting to panic...

[Yubie96]

---

@Vic9948 wrote:

Hi 

Did you find the "old" DB folder once the syncronization was completed? I have paused mine because I am afraid it will continue to delete my local files, for the moment it has not created an "old" DB folder... I am really really starting to panic...

---

All I can tell you is that in my case, my Dropbox folder was located in C:\Users\name\

There, my Dropbox folder with the newly synced files was visible and then there was also a "Dropbox (old)" folder that had all the stuff I was afraid I lost.

Mine had completely finished syncing and I was about to do a Windows system restore to retrieve the files I thought I had lost.  I just didn't get any warning that the application was going to do that, so as far as I could tell, I simply lost all my files.  But no, it kept them all in a copy.

[Vic9948]

---

@Yubie96 wrote:

---

@Vic9948 wrote:

Hi 

Did you find the "old" DB folder once the syncronization was completed? I have paused mine because I am afraid it will continue to delete my local files, for the moment it has not created an "old" DB folder... I am really really starting to panic...

---

All I can tell you is that in my case, my Dropbox folder was located in C:\Users\name\

There, my Dropbox folder with the newly synced files was visible and then there was also a "Dropbox (old)" folder that had all the stuff I was afraid I lost.

Mine had completely finished syncing and I was about to do a Windows system restore to retrieve the files I thought I had lost.  I just didn't get any warning that the application was going to do that, so as far as I could tell, I simply lost all my files.  But no, it kept them all in a copy.

---

Thank you for answering! I was thinking of a Windows system restore as well, but I am not sure I have any "previous versions" saved to go back to, I can't find any. So I guess this is it. We should definitely get a warning from DB that this might happen, I see there are various cases with this problem, si it is not something so obvious. Thanks again! 

[tannerg3]

Thank you. After lots of tears and desperately searching the internet archives, you finally have helped me recover two years of work. 

[mevsme]

I have exactly the same situation and I use updated Drpobox!

My case:

- I edit files. Then I upload them. Then I pause Dropbox.

- my friend edits files and save at 3 pm

- I edit files (and I don't have his edits, i don't care). I save mine at 7 pm.

- I start DropBox and it overwites my file with his, my newer file with his OLDER!

WTF Dropbox???

I don't even get "conflicting copy"

and there is no my file in file's history, file's hitory get truncated to his date, e.g. 3 pm

I have just lost 4 hours of work because of this dumb behaviour

and now I need to spam with file versions to not lost my edits again.

But I have a solution - I move to Google Drive

jeez

[Henri999]

I have been terrified of this happening since starting with dropbox a decade ago and have so far protected myself using a very basic "workaround" on every machine I have used.

Step A: Make sure on installation that the DROPBOX folder is not situated inside your "documents" hierarchy.

Step B: Create a folder called "FORDROPBOX" with all your documents as sub-folders of this folder.

Step C: Use a regular auto-run of a copying routine to copy the FORDROPBOX folder into the DROPBOX folder.

Believe it or not I am still using Karen's Replicator to auto-run this daily routine. So there exists a kind of firebreak between the WEB dropbox and my own working documents. Perhaps this helps someone - it is no solution after the disaster has happened.