Dropbox client warns me that it'll stop syncing in Nov, why?

[oleas]

I have a Mycloud Single Drive 8 GB (hw 2.30.196) where I have located my dropbox folder.  Now dropbox informs that they will stop synchronising my dropbox it I don´t upgrade my file system or change the location of the folder. The file system needs to support extended attributes.  Mycloud is running on linux ext4, but according to your info, this is a supported filesystem. Why am I then getting the message to change location of my dropbox folder?

Best regards Ole

[clockzhong]

Hi,

These days, I found my Dropbox Linux desktop client always report the following warning:

"Move Dropbox location

Dropbox will stop syncing in November"

What happened to my dropbox account or my Dropbox linux desktop client? 

Thanks in advance.

ClockZhong

[wedgehog]

I'm running the desktop application on Ubuntu, and this morning I got in Swedish the attached notification by the app, in English the message is as in the topic.

I can't find anything about this either on the official Help pages, here on the forums, or on the web.

The notification don't provide any additional details either.

Anyone who knows what this is about?

[Jay]

Hi everyone, on Nov. 7, 2018, we’re ending support for Dropbox syncing to drives with certain uncommon file systems. The supported file systems are NTFS for Windows, HFS+ or APFS for Mac, and Ext4 for Linux.

We’ve updated our desktop requirements accordingly here.

A supported file system is required as Dropbox relies on extended attributes (X-attrs) to identify files in the Dropbox folder and keep them in sync. We will keep supporting only the most common file systems that support X-attrs, so we can ensure stability and a consistent experience.

If you received a notification, but are running one of the supported file systems, it's possible that you may have recently had a computer linked that was running an unsupported file system but have been since upgraded, or that computer is no longer being used.

Hope this helps to clarify matters!

[wedgehog]

On my machine I'm running the BTRFS file system where the dropbox folder is stored - BTRFS is the standard default file system for ubuntu system partitions and supports the mentioned X-attrs attributes. On top of BTRFS there's an encryption layer running, ecryptfs, which also is Ubuntu default if home folder encryption is activated.

Will the new desktop client solely run on ext4, or will it check for if the file system where the dropbox folder is stored supports extended attributes?

[davemackintosh]

I use Ubuntu Gnome and my file system is Ext4 yet I still get this message?

[Jay]

Hi Dave, is it possible you have an old Linux machine that you never unlinked from your account, which is using a different file system?

If so, you can remove them from your account here, and that message should go away.

@wedgehog, I’m checking on this information for you.

[deekej]

I'm sorry, but this is NOT acceptable! Is Dropbox trying to get rid of the users from Linux community completely? There have been many bad decisions in the past, and this just top of the iceberg...

Why the f*ck only EXT4 is suddenly supported on Linux? Just because of extended attributes? That's a lot of horse BS:
https/en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extended_file_attributes#Linux

"In Linux, the ext2, ext3, ext4, JFS, Squashfs, Yaffs2, ReiserFS, Reiser4, XFS, Btrfs, OrangeFS, Lustre, OCFS2 1.6 and F2FS[8] filesystems support extended attributes (abbreviated xattr) when enabled in the kernel configuration"

Yes, I'm running LUKS encryption on top of my BTRFS partition, where I have my Dropbox folder. And I still don't see a valid and a proper reason why this configuration shouldn't work.

I'm definitely not gonna re-format my whole Linux just because of Dropbox - there are reasons why I'm on BTRFS. I'd like to hear some proper engineering explanation why suddenly xattr is required now and why only ext4 is supported. Because I really don't think there's any. This just seems like a lot of product/marketing  crap. There are reasons why VFS exists in Linux...

https/en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_file_system

From the xattr(7) man page:

       In the Btrfs, XFS, and Reiserfs filesystem implementations, there is
       no practical limit on the number of extended attributes associated
       with a file, and the algorithms used to store extended attribute
       information on disk are scalable. 

[tapeswhite]

No support for btrfs file system in the future?

---

@Jay

[philippeloctaux]

hi,

i've been using dropbox on linux on btrfs for years (since 2016), and i NEVER had any syncing issues whatsoever.

btrfs is being used more and more, and it's very sad to see Dropbox willing to drop support for btrfs.

i use dropbox daily to sync all my notes and personal files, and since i use linux for work, i can't live without any of these tools.

i agree with @deekej, i am not going to reformat my hard drives and reinstall all my systems just because of that issue.

i would have understood dropping the support if a lot of users had syncing issues, but i haven't seen a lot of complaing relating to the syncing issues because of the filesystem.

i hope that dropbox will do the right thing, and not keep support only for ext4. that would be a very dumb decision.

-phil