Dropbox Mojave hangs

[Myron G.2]

macOS 10.14    Dropbox 59.3.89

Dropbox hangs when syncing (or, sometimes, indexing).  It continues indefinitely with no progress, the computer fan cranking up and Activity Monitor reporting inaccurately high CPU use (often over 100%). 

If I tell Dropbox to pause Syncing, it takes about 2.5 minutes to pause, after which CPU usage drops to 0.1% or 0.3% and stays there.

When I start Dropbox, it asks for permission to access the local Dropbox folder, and then fully loads, with CPU usage jumping immediately to something between 90% and 110%.  Occasionally it will drop to something like 4% for 30 seconds or a minute, and then jump back up to 85% or above.   During this time Dropbox reports that it is syncing files.

Downloading and installing a new copy of Dropbox does not help.  This behaviour started at least a month ago (before the current Dropbox upgrade).

[Jay]

Hi Myron, it appears that you’re running the Dropbox beta version of the app. 

Could you install our latest stable version by first unchecking the box next to "Early releases". Then redownload the app. 

Also, try checking out the instructions on this page to see if it helps reduce the CPU load.

Keep me posted!

[Myron G.2]

Hmmm.   Turned off Early Releases and installed Dropbox 58.4.92.

It's still reporting ~100% CPU usage, and the Dropbox info (at the bottom of drop-down box) says "Syncing (296 files remaining)".  The revolving arrows continue to move, but the number of files remaining has not changed since starting the program 30 minutes ago.  (I do have some files over 1GB, but they have been in the cloud for months and have not changed locally.) 

I tried to change permissions following the online instructions, but I run into an error every time I try to use a SUDO terminal command (and enter my computer password):  

"myrongochnauer is not in the sudoers file.  This incident will be reported."

Perhaps I'm missing something, but I thought that the SUDO command allowed a non-administrator to run administrator-only commands. 

[Jay]

If you’re not able to even sudo certain instructions, then maybe there’s something more to this than just Dropbox. Have you tested using sudo in other situations, and get the same error?

Brief research found ways of resolving this sudo issue on the web. Perhaps did you change your username at some point? There are a few solutions out there, though I do recommend caution to prevent any damage to the system.

Once you’ve repaired it, try the commands again and let me know the progress.

[Myron G.2]

I'm just having a general problem with "sudo" commands on this computer. I'm pretty sure I have the problem a year or two ago, as well, and never solved it. And, of course, upgrading to 10.14 didn't change the problem, so it must be something in my settings, though I can't imagine what. I rarely work at that level of the OS.

"Sudo" commands work as expected on another, nearly identical MacBook Pro running macOS 10.14.

I'm not even sure how to do a clean install of macOS, since I don't have the recovery partition on the boot SSD, but that may be the direction to go. 

[Jay]

Yeah, it does sound to be a more OS-based issue, and a fairly serious one in that your sudo commands don’t work. 

This could later turn into an issue further down the line for various reasons.

While I can’t help you reinstall Mojave, naturally, I can try and point you in the right direction with this official page from Apple. There are multiple sites out there with steps on how to ‘reinstall mojave’ when searching for them.

Hopefully this should help a little!

[Myron G.2 · Accepted solution]

To complete the chain:

I did a clean install of macOS after reformatting the hard disk. A previous attempt to "freshen" the installation by installing over the existing version had not solved the problem.  With a clean install, Dropbox does not hang, and sudo command works (but was not necessary).   Of course (for me) getting Mail (specially named/organized) boxes back was/is tedious. Simply replacing the Mail directory with my backup version doesn't result in the same directory/mailbox structure so everything must be "imported" and then moved into place.  Grrrrr. I know I must be missing something. [...but that's for another forum.]

[Jay]

Thanks for keeping us in the loop, and I’m glad to hear that the app is working again, though I do understand that reinstalling the OS isn’t exactly the simplest of steps!

[hostos]

Hi.

Dropbox version 64.4.141

iMac 5k Latest 2017 on Mac OS Mojave 10.14.2

Iphone X iOS 12.1.2

Same problems as mentioned before......importing hangs....sometimes only some pics come through.....most times it does nothing.

Have tried everything on this thread except re-installing the OS (this is a work computer and I have too many things here to have to start over)

So the only way to TRY and fix this problem is to re-install the OS? Sorry but this solution seems absurd to me.

Have there been any other updates regarding this problem with importing photos??

Thanks!