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Forum Discussion
Best practices for using symlinks (symbolic links)
Hi there,
I use dropbox on linux with symlinks, but am not sure which is the best/preferred way to use them. Is there a best practice for using this type of configuration?
Currently I use symlink...
Daphne
Dropbox Staff
Dropbox StaffHi there,
I've had this setup (linking my Desktop to the a ~/Dropbox/Desktop for years now. However, I just bought a new Macbook Pro running OS X catalina. Everytime I create the symlink to the Dropbox, it initially works, but then the OS restores what seems like a default folder and deletes the link.
Any ideas?
I have found a workaround that may help you guys at Dropbox provide us with a more elegant solution. After creating the symlink to my Dropbox desktop folder, I locked the link file by displaying its info and checking the 'Locked' checkbox. That seems to do the trick. I checked that I can still write and save to my desktop. I have also restarted my machine (this step previously resulted in my link deleted and a new Desktop folder created) and everything is intact.
Thanks niazy would like some guidance on how you removed the existing desktop folder from the Mac Catalina home directory. I don't seem able to. Did you create a new desktop folder in Dropbox folder and move that locked symlink to the Mac home folder? After a restart would that delete the original desktop folder in the home folder? I'm nervous to experiment too much!
Terminal didn’t allow me to create a symlink from the newly created Desktop folder in Dropbox to the home folder saying Desktop exists. So I created a link to my desktop and tried to drag it to home folder. It didn't allow me saying - “Desktop” can’t be modified or deleted because it’s required by macOS.
Dear Niazy,
I am trying to implement your suggestion, but I find that upon creating Desktop as a symbolic link, when I bring up "Get Info" the "Locked" box, as well as everything else, is greyed out and not modofieable. Have you experienced that? I have Catalina too.
Thank you,
Marcelo
Dear Marcelo4,
I had the same issue with the greyed check box. I solved it by locking the folder where the symlink is inside. In my case, I locked my user folder. So far it's working. After restarting the system it stoped deleting my symlink and messing things up. I just hope I won't have problems by locking my own user folder on Mac. lol
Hope it works for you too.
- Rich
Super User II
niazy wrote:
Everytime I create the symlink to the Dropbox, it initially works, but then the OS restores what seems like a default folder and deletes the link.
I can't comment on why Catalina is replacing the symlink with a new folder, but I can say it doesn't matter much anymore. Dropbox has never supported symlinks and recently changed how they sync.
Dropbox will no longer sync the content at the other end of a symlink when the target folder is located outside of the Dropbox folder. i.e., You can no longer use symlinks to sync external folders like your Desktop.
Thanks Rich,
From reading about the changes, I shouldn't be affected. My link is created in my home directory and links a regular folder in Dropbox. The changes seem to only apply to symlinks created within dropbox.
