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
Dropbox files no longer inherit folder permissions
Within my Dropbox folder, I have sub-folders with different Windows ACL permissions. Up until recently, whenever Dropbox synced a file it inherited its folder permissions perfectly.
Now it no longe...
I can confirm, that setting the permissions on the (hidden) .dropbox.cache folder will reflect on synced files.
This works for me, since all my files needs one specific permissions. It will not work, if there are different permissions for different folders.
This is so stupid.
(But not as stupid as the change to selective sync, which did completly mess up our setting and forces us to use a new dropbox account.)
This is pathetic. I have the same issue on windows 10. I am working on web files which i am adding on one machine, but the other machine then loses permission for the web server to access the file.
This should not have changed as there is no explanation or valid reason for this behaviour. Windows specifically inherits all security setting for a file created in a folder. This is the way windows works!!
I will be using a competitor product.
All,
I've been in contact with Travis at Dropbox customer support, he confirmed it was a product change that went into effect in a recent Dropbox update, and affects all clients and operating systems. Presumably Dropbox was having problems with user permissions, so they took the nuclear option of forcing all files to replicate the root folder permissions.
While I can see the need for a "novice" user mode, they should have included an advanced option to maintain the existing ACL management, and told him as much. He has forwarded my feedback into the development team. Will they heed my input? Who knows?
When I asked if or when this might be fixed: "With regards to the time frame on when this will amended, unfortunately, I'm not able to provide you with one. I'm not a part of any decision making team, as such there isn't an estimate I can give, and I don't want to set any expectations for you."
When I asked how would I know about such a change: "If a decision is made to reverse the change or implement some sort of exception, I imagine this will be disseminated to our users via email."
He did add: "I can only advise that if you know other users, that are experiencing this, urge them that they voice their concern to us at Dropbox support. This way, the more feedback we send and our team receives, the stronger the case for them to take action on this as soon as possible."
His advice is the only way this is going to get changed... if enough of us raise our voice over this issue. If you have not already, I encourage you to contact Dropbox support and voice your frustration.I must say that Travis was very professional in his responses, and is only giving me the best information he can. Unfortunately, it also likely means I'll need to look into other options.
For those of you who have not yet contacted Dropbox support, below is a template email you can use to send in. Maybe if they get enough of them, they might listen.
pwc
=============================================================
To Dropbox Support:
Files sync'd to my Dropbox folder no longer inherit folder permissions, but instead have a fixed set of permissions. This is breaking our use of the product. This is a new bug that was introduced in the past week. We have been using Dropbox successfully for MANY years.
I believe the basic problem to be that files are being moved from the cache folder into the destination folder after download, which is moving the ACL (permissions) setting along with the file. This is a NEW behavior of Dropbox. Until a recent update (last week or so), files were likely copied, not moved (otherwise set to the permissions of the destination folder after the move using icals).
This is a deal-breaker for me… security permissions must be obeyed, as they have been for literally years. For some reason, the dev team changed how files are handled, and this has broken permissions control. This is happening on all operating systems, and is easily repeatable:
- Machine A:
- Create folder (call it ‘Test’) with permissions different from the root, make permissions inheritable
- Create a text file in folder. Verify that permissions match the Test subfolder, not the root Dropbox folder (it should or you setup the permissions wrong)
- Machine B:
- After sync, add a second text file in the Test folder.
- Machine A:
- After sync, second text file has the permissions of the root Dropbox folder, NOT the Test folder.
- Machine B:
- Modify the text file that was first created.
- Machine A:
- After sync, the initial text now also has the permissions of the root Dropbox folder, NOT the Test folder.
Prior to the update in the past week, Dropbox would maintain the permissions of the Test folder, not the root Dropbox folder.
I need this to be fixed ASAP.
======================
Then go to this link and post it to them: https://www.dropbox.com/support/email
pwcAppreciate your feedback and efforts to get to the bottom of this.
However, my own experience with Support was that, as soon as they suspected Windows Server in my setup, they shut me down as running an unsupported configuration. So I don't have the time to play their game any longer. I am moving my company on to another product - transition is nearly complete and busy resetting all the ACL permissions trashed by Dropbox!
rjwbAgree, and I'm also on that path, but this issue goes to all clients, not just Windows Server. In fact, my issue originated on Win 2012 R2, which I pointed out in the first email, but he basically dismissed that as not being a factor, as it applied to all clients. I'll probably have moved off Dropbox before (or if) they fix this, but even if you plan to bail on them, I'd still ping them, if only for those staying on the platform.
I have been using file sharing services since FolderShare was released in 2005. Keep in mind that every platform has it's own idiosyncrasies, and it can take quite a while to find and resolve them. Dropbox has it's share, but I know and can manage them. It generally works well, and I don't relish going through a qualification process for any new platform. To say you're going to bail and actually do it in a business environment where operation is critical are two different things.
If anyone has specific experience with file sharing services that they feel are as robust and cross platform as Dropbox, and do not suffer from this ACL issue, sound off... I'd like to know what you all might recommend.
Microsoft OneDrive is an obivous choice for us, as we use O365 and it's included in that service, but not sure it'll do what we need.
