Why did the location of my Dropbox folder change?

[Alex A.]

Today I noticed that right clicking on files in my Dropbox folder (the ones pinned to my Finder sidebar) did not bring up the Dropbox menu options.

After further investigation I realized that Dropbox had moved my entire directory into /Users/library and displays this message, buried within preferences:

This version of macOS requires Dropbox folders to be stored here:

/Users/alex/Library/CloudStorage/Dropbox

I received no notice that this was happening. I have no idea when it happened and I have no way to know what version the files in the new directory are. What a mess!

Any advice on how to ensure my files are up to date and if it's safe to delete the old dropbox directory?

Thanks everyone

I'm on v147.2.4724 of the Mac client on a M1 Macbook with Monterey 12.3.1

[Rich]

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@Gerald B.5 wrote:

Rebooted and did a full and detailed reinstall setting my old location ...  and voila, back in operation.

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Keep in mind that doing the full reinstall likely isn't a final solution. Someone else tried that and it worked, but a short time later, Dropbox was prompting them to go through the update again.

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I just don't understand why Dropbox never asked if I wanted to move my files!!

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You likely missed the notification which included a link to the FAQ about the changes. The short version is that this isn't an option. Dropbox for macOS is being updated to use Apple's File Provider API, which forces the use of the Library/CloudStorage location.

• https://help.dropbox.com/installs/macos-support-for-expected-changes
• https://help.dropbox.com/installs/macos-faqs

[Metasteve]

When is someone from Dropbox going to get on this thread and tell us how to reverse this? Drop is going to lose a massive number of customers. Why is that ok? All of my dropbox files are now being managed also mt iCloud. I cannot get rid of the iCloud download icons and some files won't even open.

Release a patch for this ASAP or I will go to Box to there are many other competitors who would never do something like this.

[johannes_b]

If this is the price for having on demand sync, I'd rather not have it.

I'm perfectly fine with choosing In my preferences which folders to manually sync.

I've started to use a Synology and there you still have the option to opt out of the selective sync.

Since the selective sync doesn't play well with apps that reference other files it's useless to me anyway.

best regards

Johannes

[EvModder]

For anyone else finding this thread, one potentially workable solution is to create a symlink from `/User/Name/Dropbox` -> `/User/Name/Library/CloudSupport/Dropbox`

I had already given up out of frustration and moved to using OneDrive (we already had a family plan through her, so I can make use of the "free" 1TB), but as previous comments have mentioned this problem is not unique to Dropbox, so I had to set up the symlink for OneDrive as well.  Fortunately, my code/buildpaths/etc. don't seem to mind the symlink, and while I was at it I symlinked Mac's Documents, Music, and Pictures photos into OneDrive as well, which has been very helpful.

Note: having tried both OneDrive & Dropbox, I can attest Dropbox is still better from a feature/usability standpoint.  If I wasn't on a shared family plan already for OneDrive, I probably wouldn't have switched.