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
Request: All files available offline by default
Moving the Mac to the new File Provider is great - very happy this is finally happening and support on the new M1 is much better. Kudos!
Feature request: Really miss the feature to have Dropbox...
Hi everyone, and thanks for your patience.
We're re-launching the option to choose the default status of synced files in the Dropbox desktop application (in the Preferences > Sync tab) for users of the newer File Provider version.
It should be available to you shortly. If you haven't received it yet, make sure to update your desktop app, and let us know if you have any questions!
Oh wow thanks for posting about this. I was wondering why I was having trouble accessing my own files on my own computer. Dropbox worked perfectly for me until this TERRIBLE change in the default WHICH I WAS NOT EVEN INFORMED ABOUT. I can't believe ALL MY DROPBOX FILES ARE NOW ONLINE-ONLY BY DEFAULT AND NOW I HAVE TO DOWNLOAD EVERYTHING FROM THE CLOUD. I absolutely HATE THIS and will cancel my account ASAP.
Edit. I'm sorry for the all caps, I'm just so upset. I can't believe Dropbox moved all my files to online-only without my consent. I live in a country where the internet is slow and expensive. Dropbox used to be my choice of sync provider because of its fast and reliable block level / differential sync function. Not anymore. Goodbye Dropbox, I'm downloading all my files then getting out.
I'm having the same issues. Now all of my files are online-only by default. Selective Sync used to be all we need to manage what was local or not. Now I'm looking for a dropbox alternative, but this completely broke the system. Random files in all my folders now go offline, for no reason it seems. How awful. Fix this **bleep**.
Navigate to the Dropbox folder (buried in user/Library/CloudStorage/Drobox), right click, and select 'Make available offline'.
I did that a couple of months back, then had to re-do it about a week ago as I noticed some files were not showing the 'green dot' indicating offline availability. Otherwise the functionality seems to be as in prior versions of Dropbox.
I solved the situation by clicking the Dropbox icon in my Menu Bar. Afterwards I clicked on my avatar (profile picture or initials) in the top-right corner. There I could select "Preferences" -> "Sync" -> "Default sync state for new files" -> "Available offline". This fixed my issue with re-enabling it for every folder all the time. 👍
same problem here! I am considering sync.com but not sure it would solve the problem...
it's hard to believe, it seems they want us to give up and allow them to move our files online as they wish
Odd that you are having the recurring problem. I am on the latest version of MacOS, and I did have to "make available offline" 1 other time after some OS or Dropbox upgrade along the way, it has otherwise "stuck" for me and worked perfectly as Dropbox had worked for years.
