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 is now too hard to use.
Congratulations Dropbox,
You have lost sight of your core value added, and ruined your offering. You have layered so much unwanted additional functionality on top of simple file sharing, the the in...
Yes, I just got so angry today trying to use their new way of doing things. In the past, I right-clicked a file, got the link, and pasted the link in an email to send to people with an explanation. But thanks to their ridiculously new complex procedure, I have no idea of how to get the link of a file. This is absurd. Did DropBox even bother to run this through a UX team before they unloaded it. Thank god, my subscription is coming to an end. I signed up for a simple easy-to-use interface, not some ridiculous piece of hard-to-understand intrusive bloat that wants me to jump through hoops.
And I never did discover how to get the link. I copied one from an old file and hope it still works.
- Walter
Dropbox Staff
Hi KeepItSimple; thanks for joining our Community.
I'm sorry to ask, but are you following the steps from the relevant Help Center article and not working for you?
https://help.dropbox.com/files-folders/share/view-only-access
Could you give them a go and let us know if you're still having issues with this?
Thanks!
Walter:
Thank you for the reply. Unfortunately the indicated document shows exactly what everyone is complaining about. DropBox clearly didn't use anyone with even the most basic user experience expertise to design or check the interface for ease of use. It was clearly developed by programmers who never considered things from the user perspective. I suspect the programmers just got told, "We want users to do stuff that we can charge more for. So just force them to do it that way."
Case in point, how to share a file. Which procedure do you think is more intuitive and easier to user?
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DROPBOX'S OLD WAY
1. Right click the file in the DropBox folder on your PC, and select "Copy DropBox Link".
2. Paste that link into an email and send it.
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DROPBOX'S NEW WAY (DIRECT QUOTE FROM DOCBOX)
1. Sign in to dropbox.com.
2. Click All files in the left sidebar.
3. Hover over the name of the file or folder you'd like to share and click Share.
4. If a link hasn't been created, click Create a link.
- If a link was already created, click Copy link.
5. The link will be copied to your clipboard. You can then paste it to an email, message, or wherever people can access it.
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(Actually, the new procedure is even worse, because the first step is actually a jump that leads to another procedure.)
DropBox is generally more expensive than competitors, but it used to be so easy to use it wasn't worth changing. Now you've just given everyone an incentive to seriously look at cheaper competitors. I have serious doubts about the future of any software company that doesn't regard the user experience as important.- Daphne
Thanks for getting back to us here KeepItSimple!
In the article that Walter linked for you previously, the first steps there show how to do this from the website.
However, since you mentioned doing this from the Dropbox folder on your computer, you would need to use the second steps listed under "How to share with a link from the Dropbox folder on your computer".
These steps are the same as what you mentioned that you used previously.
Can you let me know what kind of issues you're running into when trying to take this action now from your local Dropbox folder on your computer?
If you're not seeing any relevant Dropbox options when right clicking the file, can you check if the desktop app is running on your computer?
Let me know!
