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aprilafternoon's avatar
aprilafternoon
Helpful | Level 5
6 years ago

Share links don't work on Android

For a while now, I've been sharing Dropbox documents in PDF format via email. Once in a while people tell me they "can't open the links." I always just assumed they didn't know what they were doing, ...
Error Messages
Mobile
Share
Shared Links
  • Lusil's avatar
    Lusil
    6 years ago
    Hi virtue, in general, this error message seems to be a generic error message related to a third party app. 
     
    For this reason, I’d recommend attempting to opening the link with a mobile browser and, if you’re still having issues, you can always contact our Support team for a more in-depth look on the matter using our internal tools. 
     
    Thanks in advance!
     
     
    This thread is closed due to inactivity. Please feel free to create a new topic here. 
Lusil's avatar
Lusil
Icon for Dropbox Staff rankDropbox Staff
Hi there, aprilafternoon. 
 
As a first step, could you please send me a screenshot of the error message you’re seeing (excluding personal info)? You can do this by selecting one of the following options:

Thanks in advance!

aprilafternoon's avatar
aprilafternoon
Helpful | Level 5
6 years ago

Absolutely! Here you go.

  • Lusil's avatar
    Lusil
    Icon for Dropbox Staff rankDropbox Staff
    6 years ago

    Thanks for the screenshot, aprilafternoon!

    Hmm. :thinking: The first thought that comes to mind is that the device doesn't have the relevant third party app to support the file in question so as to preview. 

    However, I just wanted to ask, if you change the shared link's dl=0 into dl=1 (so as to force the file to download), are you then able to preview the file directly from your mobile phone by any chance? 

    Let me know what you find!

    • aprilafternoon's avatar
      aprilafternoon
      Helpful | Level 5
      6 years ago

      I actually did try the dl=1 argument before I wrote this post! It makes no difference. Shouldn't the links open in the browser instead of trying to download the file?

      • Lusil's avatar
        Lusil
        Icon for Dropbox Staff rankDropbox Staff
        6 years ago
        Thanks for trying this out for me, aprilafternoon. 
         
        Could you please try manually copy-pasting the shared link you have into a browser and see if that does the trick?
         
        Let me know of any updates! 

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