You might see that the Dropbox Community team have been busy working on some major updates to the Community itself! So, here is some info on what’s changed, what’s staying the same and what you can expect from the Dropbox Community overall.

Forum Discussion

paulpeterson's avatar
paulpeterson
Explorer | Level 3
4 years ago

Alias Folders

I had to re-sync Dropbox recently and when I sync the app on my iMac Dropbox creates locked alias folders for Desktop, Downloads and Documents. Do I have to wait for the files to sync and the localiz...
Computer Backup
desktop
Download
sync
Hannah's avatar
Hannah
Icon for Dropbox Staff rankDropbox Staff
4 years ago
Hey paulpeterson, thanks for posting on our Community today!

It seems that when you re-synced the Dropbox application, you enabled the computer backup feature.

If you don't want these desktop folders to be backed up to Dropbox, you can disable it by following the steps here.

Just make sure that syncing is finished before you disable the feature.

Let me know if you have any questions.
  • paulpeterson's avatar
    paulpeterson
    Explorer | Level 3
    4 years ago

    Thanks for your response @hannah 

     

    I definitely do want these backed up to Dropbox but not sure like with other Dropbox folders that are backed up they are alias folders and not local folders?

    • Hannah's avatar
      Hannah
      Icon for Dropbox Staff rankDropbox Staff
      4 years ago
      Oh, it's great that you'd like the desktop folders to be backed up!

      And that's kind of how the backup feature works. 

      Your actual desktop folders are in your Dropbox folder and the original folders serve as shortcuts to the folders in the Dropbox folder. 

      If you ever want to disable the feature and move the folders back to their original locations, you can follow the steps in the article I gave you above. 
      • paulpeterson's avatar
        paulpeterson
        Explorer | Level 3
        4 years ago

        Thanks 🙂

         

        I am still confused by this - that u can't have the OG files and still update to Dropbox. 

        If I logout of Dropbox or am not online where are the files to these folders - they should display on the computer not as alias folders

         

         

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