"Dropbox needs to change permissions" message on startup

[Rachel R.2]

Lately, every time I start my Mac (OS 10.14.6) I get a message that reads (in full): 

"Dropbox needs to change permissions for the Folder: /Users/[name]/Dropbox

Enter your password to allow this"

(I would attach a screenshot here but I can't figure out how.)

I enter the password and all is well, but it happens Every. Single. Time. I start my computer. After checking here for ideas, I checked for symlinks (there are none) and reinstalled Dropbox (so I am now running the latest version), but that has not helped at all. What now?

[JosefC]

yes, of course (to both)

[Daphne]

Hey @JosefC, apologies for the delay in getting back to you here!

So we can look into this further with you, it would be best to continue to look into this through our Support channel.

If you haven't already, please reach out to our Support team from here. You'll receive a ticket number (eg. #1234567) which you can let me know here so that I can pass along the info you've provided here already.

Thanks!

[FreddoArgento]

Ignorant me, is $USER a "wildcard" or I need to type my user, with or without $ in front?

As it is, copy pasted line by line, did not work.....

[FreddoArgento]

I tried these too.

I am dragging the folder name from Finder into Dropbox to avoid typos. But its is the standatd location, anyhow. 

[Здравко]

Hi @FreddoArgento,

First when you comment something, clarify what exactly you have been comenthing, so to be more clear what you are talking about. Doesn't matter where you touch "Reply", your text will go at the end every time!

---

@FreddoArgento wrote:

... is $USER a "wildcard" or I need to type my user, ...

---

When you type a $ symbol on a command line the name, sticked next to this symbol, represent particular shell environment variable. This is NOT wildcard! There is a set of environment variables preset by the system which could be used in user commands or shell scripts, when convenient. You can see available preset variables using the "env" command, all together. 😉

The variable with name USER keeps inside the login name of your account. You can see what's inside using following:

echo $USER

The $ symbol is a special sign, for most environment shells, making a referral to the particular variable (i.e. $USER will get replaced with your login name). You can use your login name directly, of course. Here $USER is used as a convenience - different users have different login names - $USER always refers to them correctly ( if not explicitly changed! ). That's it.

Hope this clarifies matter.

If something goes wrong, despite of above, post in you next reply what you have typed on the command line and the corresponding result all together.

Good luck.

[mcarter]

Hi,

I have recently turned on Dropbox Backup (for home and desktop folders) and am now getting the permissions request message "Dropbox needs to change permiossions for the Folder: /Users/drmarkcarter/Dropbox" (twice) after each restart. I tried the following terminal commands:

sudo chflags -R noschg "/Users/$USER/Dropbox"
sudo chflags -R nouchg "/Users/$USER/Dropbox"
sudo chown -R "$USER" "/Users/$USER/Dropbox"
chmod -R u+rw "/Users/$USER/Dropbox"

The first two commands run fine but for the third and fourth I receive the following error messages:

chown: /Users/drmarkcart/Dropbox/My Mac (Mark-Carters-Macbook-Retina-3.local)/Desktop/Incompatible Software/qmasterd: Operation not permitted

chmod: Unable to change file mode on /Users/drmarkcart/Dropbox/My Mac (Mark-Carters-Macbook-Retina-3.local)/Desktop/Incompatible Software/qmasterd: Operation not permitted

Any suggestions?

[Здравко]

---

@mcarter wrote:

chown: /Users/drmarkcart/Dropbox/My Mac (Mark-Carters-Macbook-Retina-3.local)/Desktop/Incompatible Software/qmasterd: Operation not permitted

---

Hi @mcarter,

That's strange. Are you sure you have typed the command correctly? i.e. you haven't skipped the leading "sudo" and the command is:

sudo chown -R "$USER" "/Users/$USER/Dropbox"

but not something like:

chown -R "$USER" "/Users/$USER/Dropbox"

🤔

Can you post the result of following commands:

ls -ld "/Users/drmarkcart/Dropbox/My Mac (Mark-Carters-Macbook-Retina-3.local)/Desktop/Incompatible Software/qmasterd"
id

🧐 Hope result will shed some light.

PS: By the way, as the issue seems come from "backup" folders, you can try turn your "Computer Backup" feature off and (if you wish) turn on at the end. Take a look on part "Turn off computer backup" (near the topic end) and at point 6 select "Keep content in folders on this PC/Mac", not "Leave content in Dropbox".

Let's hope this twisting will do the trick for you. 😉

[mcarter]

That's strange. Are you sure you have typed the command correctly? i.e. you haven't skipped the leading "sudo" and the command is:

sudo chown -R "$USER" "/Users/$USER/Dropbox"

but not something like:

chown -R "$USER" "/Users/$USER/Dropbox"

🤔

Thanks for the response.

I have tried the commands a couple of times and have copied them into Terminal so sudo was included.

Can you post the result of following commands:

ls -ld "/Users/drmarkcart/Dropbox/My Mac (Mark-Carters-Macbook-Retina-3.local)/Desktop/Incompatible Software/qmasterd"
id

🧐 Hope result will shed some light.

The result was:

uid=501(drmarkcart) gid=20(staff) groups=20(staff),12(everyone),61(localaccounts),80(admin),98(_lpadmin),702(com.apple.sharepoint.group.2),701(com.apple.sharepoint.group.1),33(_appstore),100(_lpoperator),204(_developer),250(_analyticsusers),395(com.apple.access_ftp),398(com.apple.access_screensharing),399(com.apple.access_ssh),400(com.apple.access_remote_ae)
[192-168-1-152:~] drmarkcart%

PS: By the way, as the issue seems come from "backup" folders, you can try turn your "Computer Backup" feature off and (if you wish) turn on at the end. Take a look on part "Turn off computer backup" (near the topic end) and at point 6 select "Keep content in folders on this PC/Mac", not "Leave content in Dropbox".

Let's hope this twisting will do the trick for you. 😉

Turning off the Backup feature fixed the problem on the next boot.

I think I may have found the issue. I noticed that I had a OneDrive folder in my Documents folder, which was part of the Dropbox backup. Turning off OneDrive and deleting the OneDrive folder appeared to fix the issue - when I turned Dropbox backup on again and rebooted, I was not asked for my password. 

I have tried to delete the qmasterd file that resides in the Incompatible Software folder on my desktop. It can't be deleted via putting it in the trash (file in use error).

[mcarter]

I spoke too soon. Fix was only temporary. Back to requiring entry of password twice on each restart. 

[Здравко]

---

@mcarter wrote:
...

Can you post the result of following commands:

ls -ld "/Users/drmarkcart/Dropbox/My Mac (Mark-Carters-Macbook-Retina-3.local)/Desktop/Incompatible Software/qmasterd"
id

🧐 Hope result will shed some light.

The result was:

uid=501(drmarkcart) gid=20(staff) groups=20(staff),12(everyone),61(localaccounts),80(admin),98(_lpadmin),702(com.apple.sharepoint.group.2),701(com.apple.sharepoint.group.1),33(_appstore),100(_lpoperator),204(_developer),250(_analyticsusers),395(com.apple.access_ftp),398(com.apple.access_screensharing),399(com.apple.access_ssh),400(com.apple.access_remote_ae)
[192-168-1-152:~] drmarkcart%

...

---

Hi @mcarter,

You haven't posted results of both commands, but only the second command's result! Actual state (file's basic attributes) could be seen from the first command's result. So can you post the result of:

ls -ld "/Users/drmarkcart/Dropbox/My Mac (Mark-Carters-Macbook-Retina-3.local)/Desktop/Incompatible Software/qmasterd"

Could be useful to be known also the containing folder' attributes, i.e. result of:

ls -ld "/Users/drmarkcart/Dropbox/My Mac (Mark-Carters-Macbook-Retina-3.local)/Desktop/Incompatible Software"

---

@mcarter wrote:

... I noticed that I had a OneDrive folder in my Documents folder, which was part of the Dropbox backup. ...

---

It's never good idea to have 2 or more sync services operating on same place (directory/file)! Such a combination generally could work, but there are corner cases where unexpected and difficult to predict issues could rise up. So better avoid such a usage. Some more competitive services have features let them cooperate with their competitors (pCloud, for example) using a well defined manner. As far as I know neither OneDrive nor Dropbox support any way of cooperation between them directly in a safe manner! Be careful.

---

@mcarter wrote:

...

I have tried to delete the qmasterd file that resides in the Incompatible Software folder on my desktop. It can't be deleted via putting it in the trash (file in use error).

---

Some info could comes up with mentioned commands' results above. If the "file in use error" is getting up, check whether you have opened the file in some way (either with handling program or loaded indirectly somehow).

---

@mcarter wrote:

I spoke too soon. Fix was only temporary. Back to requiring entry of password twice on each restart.

---

What you mean "Fix" here? 🧐 Is it the turning off of backup... and everything back when you turned it on, or something else? I can't figure out of your description, is the problem gets back while you have turned off the backup feature or after that (i.e. is everything stable in that time or not). Can you clarify (repeat the "exercise", if needed)?