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Fowzie T.'s avatar
Fowzie T.
Helpful | Level 6
8 years ago

Smart Sync storage issue on macOS Sierra 10.12- macOS High Sierra 10.13.3.

I'm really confused, the premise of smart sync is to free up local storage. This is a screenshot of a folder which contains about 2GB of data.  Am I doing something wrong?   https://www.dropbox.c...
Mac
Sync
  • Jane's avatar
    Jane
    7 years ago
    Howdy folks,
     
    I’m , I’m working on the Community team at Dropbox & I’m posting here so as to stir this discussion towards a different route. Without further ado, I’m going to split this thread off into a number of different ones, as I’d like to avoid any confusion in regards to the topic or the status of this conversation. 
     
    Why are you splitting the thread?
    For context, this thread has been around since last February & a number of very separate (and now resolved) Smart Sync issues have been reported here. This separation was triggered as we like to group distinct issues together to better help users discover relevant content, advice and to help self-resolve.
     
    Don’t worry, no information is being removed, we are however moving some posts into other threads & for that reason, I’m going to include links to all the new threads at the bottom here. 
     
    As an example, this thread contains a lot of information & troubleshooting around an issue we experienced on Mac OS 10.13.3, something now resolved. We wouldn’t want people on 10.13.4 to attempt troubleshooting steps that weren’t relevant to their current state.
      
    But I still have my issue!
    We’ve moved all the open discussions into separate threads listed at the bottom. Apologies if we missed yours! Regardless, anyone who has opened a ticket with Support, that ticket will remain open and is unrelated to this split. 
     
    So, has this been solved forever? 
    The initial behavior reported here has been, however this thread has become a single point for a vast number of other Smart Sync posts,  some of which should have their own threads, some open, some now resolved.
     
    Where do I post Smart Sync comments now?
    Either in one of the below threads - or, if they don’t match the behavior you're getting, you may feel free to create a new one! :slight_smile: As this thread will remain public, you may also use it as a point of reference, so as to let us know of any troubleshooting steps you've followed from those mentioned above. 
     
    Thanks for your co-operation and please keep the discussion going in the below, or new, threads!
     
     
  • Jane's avatar
    Jane
    7 years ago
    For note, issues caught up in this thread, that should have had their own threads included:
     
    Issue 1: I can’t enable Smart Sync at all: 
    • Usually this was the result of an incorrect installation & in such cases, re-installing anew helped fix the issue. Alternatively, if you were running a Beta version of the Dropbox app on your desktop, you may need to check if this works on the most updated Stable version (Note: It's currently 48.4.58). 
    • Status: :white_check_mark:
    Issue 2: I’m on a Professional plan & I can’t get Smart Sync to work either: 
    • Some users on the Professional plan were experiencing an issue utilizing Smart Sync, as they had needed to enable System Extensions previously, which has been documented on this resource. 
    • Status:  :white_check_mark:
    Issue 3: I’ve made my files online-only, though they’re still using up my storage locally: 
    • In some cases, users reported that Smart Synced files might be locally stored in the cache folder a little longer, hence taking up space. Clearing the cache folder should resolve this issue. 
    • Status: :white_check_mark:
  • Jane's avatar
    Jane
    7 years ago
    Issue 4: I followed the instructions on your resources & set up my files as online-only, though I can see that they’re still taking up space on my pc/ Mac.
    • The Properties (Win) and Get Info (Mac OS) panel will indicate the actual file size instead of the size on disk, as you may expect. “Size on disk” is the space being taken up by a placeholder file and should be around 0kb.
    • Status: :white_check_mark:
    Issue 5: I can see that my Dropbox folder on my Mac OSX (v.42.4.114) reported file & folder size incorrectly, making it look like files were still residing on my hard disk.
    • After further investigation, we were able to determine that the Finder was showing the wrong size on disk for folders with compressed files.
    • Status: :white_check_mark:
    Issue 6: I can’t back-up my online-only files on the TimeMachine migration assistant & whenever it tries to access them, this action brings them back locally. 
    • This is related to the way TimeMachine reads file sizes and is an on-going issue, though this issue lies with Apple’s software. De-selecting the Dropbox folder when restoring if possible will work around this issue.
    • Status: :arrows_counterclockwise:
    Issue 7: Third-party disk management apps report Smart Synced files are present locally.
    • Some third-party app may read the nominal file size rather than the physical size. This is not a Dropbox issue, but down to the way some apps are built.
    • Status: :white_check_mark:

    That's all from me! As usual, I'll be around in case you'd need me to clarify matters in more detail, so feel free to ping me & I'll do my best to check back with you.

Rako's avatar
Rako
Explorer | Level 4
I just like the way it works when I need to recover a file last version it’s so much easier than Dropbox since it shows document preview and holds it for quite long time
akaraetteh's avatar
akaraetteh
Helpful | Level 5
7 years ago
Makes sense. Seems like we currently pay for that luxury by having strange MacOS size reporting...
  • fransg's avatar
    fransg
    Helpful | Level 6
    7 years ago

    That's a good one! 

    I have just now excluded Dropbox from Time Machine and the funny thing is that is also thinks DropBox (Online Only folders) takes up 156 GB on the HD and that there would be just a little less than 75GB in all remaining apps, music, mail etc on the disk.

     

     

  • JC-CS's avatar
    JC-CS
    New member | Level 2
    7 years ago
    That's correct, i had to find out the hard way that if you try to ever do a restore from Timemachine without excluding dropbox, it would fail 100% of the time. I had to do a clone from another machine to get through it. Learned the hard way. Dropbox should be putting an article out about this, definitely a problem with Finder thinking there is more than there is, and then time machine is also thinking there is too. This is the proper fix for now. Lesson Learned: EXCLUDE ALL YOUR DROPBOX FOLDERS FROM TIME MACHINE
  • JC-CS's avatar
    JC-CS
    New member | Level 2
    7 years ago
    Unless you exclude the dropbox folders from your TimeMachine backup, you will not be able to restore your Mac from Timemachine (from a full backup). Finder thinks there is more space taken then the hard drive will hold, proved this 100x, Dropbox engineering is working on it, its a known problem, the only work around is to make sure you exclude dropbox folder from timemachine backups.
  • fransg's avatar
    fransg
    Helpful | Level 6
    7 years ago

    But I do (mostly, not always) have preview of pictures that are "online only", see below.

    "online only" photo previewed in Finder

     

  • akaraetteh's avatar
    akaraetteh
    Helpful | Level 5
    7 years ago
    That’s pretty cool!
  • fransg's avatar
    fransg
    Helpful | Level 6
    7 years ago

    Thanks, yes it is very convenient.

     

    The space issue is not a problem here anymore. The Finder does seem to think there is 166 GB of the "online only" folder taking up space on the local HD but it really isn't, because I have 334 GB free space on the 500 GB HD. If I would delete 166 GB of "pictures" off that HD, I would essentially be working on a blank disk, so where would the OSX and all my apps, mail, music etc be? ;-)

     

    Finder seems to have a little 'bookkeeping' problen when reporting DropBox efficiency.

     

    334 GB free space156 GB of Dropbox files locally on HD? I don't think so

     

     

  • Tambe257's avatar
    Tambe257
    Explorer | Level 3
    7 years ago

    Thanks for the Time Machine tip! I'm still having this problem, and it prevents me from running Parallels, because it look like I have no HD space left. I just downgraded from Smart Sync and went back to Selective Sync. I don't see any difference yet, but I'm thinking maybe it takes a while to update the indexing of all of the files that it "thought" that it had stored. 

     

    Please fix this soon Dropbox!!! This feature never should have shipped. This must have come up in beta testing.

  • akaraetteh's avatar
    akaraetteh
    Helpful | Level 5
    7 years ago
    Very annoying! Just FYI you can use both selective and smart sync on the same account

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