Link to files/folder - not sharing

Unfortunately, we don't have a way to hotlink to a file on dropbox.com, but we'll consider this as a feature request.

Things to watch out for if you try to just do "/home/..." is that Dropbox for Business users may have different paths, depending on whether they've linked a work and personal account (and then the path depends on which account is being used).

Steve, thanks for your response.

The scenario you describe between linked work and personal accounts is one I hadn't considered, I will look further into this.

Is there a way to detect the correct path today?

Additionally, I would ask if this is something I should do?

eg: if this is not currently a supported use-case for dropbox.com then I can't really build an app that relies on this, right?

Thanks again

I can't think of a reliable way to figure out the path today. Agreed that it's probably not a great idea to build an app that relies on this (since you're unlikely to be able to get it 100% correct today, and we may end up breaking things later).

Thanks Steve, I appreciate your openness.

Please do consider deep linking into both files and folders on dropbox.com a feature request :-)

Yes, accessing file/folder with direct link is need. As my web hosting has limited storage for me and now looking for other storage solution, if it works, I think Dropbox will be alternative web storage with a web hosting.

Best regards,

Kelvin.

I would like to second this request for linking. This is something our app would benefit from!

Best regards,

Dag.

I am also looking for a method to deep link to a file.  Just not on the website - but on the desktop.

Scenario.

We are 3 users, and we use Wunderlist (and Gmail, and other apps)

I would love to attach files to an Task, Email etc that will open up the file or location in the Desktop Application.

The problem is our shared folders all live in different local path locations.

eg. 

User 1, has a Mac so the path is \usr\dropbox\sharedfoldersX\sharedfolder1\subfolder\file.txt

User 2, has a PC and the path is C:\Users\dropbox\sharedfoldersY\sharedfolder1\subfolder\file.txt

User 3, has a PC and the path is D:\dropbox\sharedfolder1\subfolder\file.txt

So there is no clean way to give a Local File Path easily.

We currently share it like this 

\sharedfolder1\subfolder\file.txt

But that is a pain to get, especially on a Mac.

If the App could work this out, like this.

file.txt has ID 44444

User 1 clicks dropbox.com\?openlocation=44444

It Either Opens the file on the local system (as it knows the location as per above)

OR dropbox.com\?openlocation=44444&dir=yes

Opens location in Finder/ File Explorer

\usr\dropbox\sharedfoldersX\sharedfolder1\subfolder\

So dropbox.com\openlocation= is a Webhook to open the Desktop Application, if it is not there, it opens the Web location.

That would be super helpful and maintain file integrity across applications like Task lists and Email :)

Kinda like a "Share with Colleague" button in the Context menu.

Any progress on this? Badly needed. Someone posted the recommendation to modify the link url by using "dl." instead of "www."  but I am not sure whether that is a reliable long term URL or things might break at some point?

Thank you Greg, actually what I need is not exactly that. I need the image to be loaded in the browser alone. If I replace the "www" with "dl" at the beginning of the shared URL and then remove anything following the file extension, it seems to work.

I was just wondering if it's going to be a good idea in the long term, because maybe things might change over time?