Desktop App - Selective Sync not showing all folders

[Contoured_TL]

We have a lot of files on our company Dropbox account.  So much that we absolutely can't have our entire library indexed let alone synced.  For this reason, the 'Selective Sync' tool in the desktop app is our primary means to add new project folders, and remove old ones from our local systems.  To be clear, we do not avoid indexing our library for space-saving reasons - we are fully aware that an indexed file (set to online-only) takes up no hard drive space.  We avoid indexing because we currently hold ~100TB of data and the indexing for this quantity of data is a multi-hour process every time the Dropbox app is restarted.  When the app is first installed this indexing process takes several days with 1GB download speeds.  As this posts Subject suggests, our selective sync window is now missing MANY folders that are visible in Dropbox web, and this is a major issue.  Dropbox support staff has provided the following steps for resolution, but the issue persists.

- Ensure the Dropbox Desktop application is running.

- Ensure the Dropbox Desktop application syncing status is 'up to date'.

- Ensure there are no special characters in the affected files.

- Quit the application and restart the device.

They provided one additional possible fix, which I'll include shortly...  But to reiterate, we have ~100TB of data, and to index our entire library takes several hours after restarting the Dropbox Desktop application, and SEVERAL DAYS from a fresh installation of the application.

Dropbox Support's final solution was to 'unlink', then 'relink' our Dropbox account to our computers.  This sounded like a solution that would have our team losing hours (if not days) of productivity due to indexing.  I expressed this concern to Dropbox Support staff, and the assured me (multiple times) that this would just be a quick process in which the Desktop Dropbox application would take a look at all the files in our Dropbox account and likely be able to find (and add) the missing folders to our selective sync list.  Dropbox Support staff said, "this will not affect any of your selective sync folders."

We had a single team member test this final possible solution, because I suspected the Dropbox Support staff was just reading a script and didn't have the experience dealing with this quantity of data that we've been maneuvering for years.  So it came as little shock that Dropbox Support staff in fact WAS NOT able to fix the problem, and in fact made it hundreds of times worse by suggesting a solution that (contrary to their assurances) essentially reinstalled the Dropbox Desktop application and has one of our team members in the midst of a multi-day index. 

Bravo Dropbox Support.  Some knowledgeable advice would be appreciated moving forward.

If any community members have found a viable solution to this, we would greatly appreciate advice.  If Dropbox Support is able to find a solution in the meantime, I will repost.

[Hannah]

Hey there, @Contoured_TL, and sorry to hear about this.

Can you please send us the ticket number of your communication with our support team, so we can investigate a bit?

Thanks in advance.

[Contoured_TL]

Ticket #23441006

[Hannah]

Thanks for the ticket number, @Contoured_TL, I just replied to you on that email thread, so we'll continue working on this together.

[mesch]

I am having a similar issue. All of a sudden  my selective sync window on Mac is not displaying all of the online dropbox folders. Dropbox > Preferences > Sync > Select Folders

Dropbox.com shows proper updating so Dropbox is correctly working back and forth with my Mac. The iPhone app shows correct updating of my files. The issue is with the missing folders in the Mac "selective sync" window. I've reinstalled, unlinked, relinked, indexed all files, synched again etc. "Your files are up to date". As soon as I make a change or add a new file to a folder it isn't reflected in the selective sync window (but it does show up properly on dropbox.com) so I cannot sync and remove it from my computer. Recently updated my Mac OS to 14.4

I've spent hours troubleshooting and can't find a solution. This is greatly impacting my workflow and I'm close to switching to another cloud based system.

[Walter]

Hey @mesch - thanks for your report. 

I just wanted to mention that our team is aware of this issue and working on a fix at the moment.

We'll let you know more as soon as we have an update.

[mesch]

Thank you! That is great to know it's not just me. Can you possibly respond when it is fixed? Or do you have a time estimate?

[Walter]

While we don't have an ETA to share at the moment, we'll make sure to keep you posted @mesch 

[RoniDMC]

Hi Walter,

Is there a work around currently available until the Desktop App is fixed. I'm having this issue as well across multiple computers and my work relies on me being able to locally sync certain folders not appearing in Selective Sync.

[Megan]

Hi there, @RoniDMC, thanks for posting here! 

The workaround we have at the moment, is to use the Dropbox website to access your files. 

Keep in mind that some users have reported the issue resolves after signing out and back into the Dropbox app, but this might not be applicable in every single device, or case. 

I hope this helps!