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mike _.
8 years agoHelpful | Level 6
Linux - Unable to change Dropbox directory
I'm using Fedora Workstation 25 with GNOME.
Trying to change the Dropbox directory results in the utterly useless message "Unexpected errors occurred. Your Dropbox is ok!".
Steps to recre...
- 8 years ago
I was having this same issue. I found a fix in creating a Dropbox folder in my home directory prior to connecting my account. This caused the installer to throw an error about a Dropbox folder already existing that prompted me to either delete the Dropbox folder or select a different location. Eureka! (for me at least...)
- 7 years ago
Guys solved, and the solution was the easiest and logic.
I expose my situation:
sda1 300GB --> /
sda5 8TB --> /home
As I explained, I wanted to install Dropbox below /home directory, but playing as "root" user, by default, it forced the installation on /root
So I just installed the daemon using the user who owns the home directory I want and it works properly, just remember to add the "user" to the root group.
If you need more details, don't hesitate to ask.
- 7 years ago
wrote:I was having this same issue. I found a fix in creating a Dropbox folder in my home directory prior to connecting my account. This caused the installer to throw an error about a Dropbox folder already existing that prompted me to either delete the Dropbox folder or select a different location. Eureka! (for me at least...)
This didn't work for me, but I did find a similar solution! I created a "work" dropbox account and set up a fresh installation of dropbox with that account, which places the "work" Dropbox folder in the defaut ~/Dropbox. I then deleted everything in ~/.dropbox* (with rm -rf ~/.dropbox* ), reinstalled dropbox and set it up using my personal account. Now since the folder in ~/Dropbox already contains the dropbox for the work account, I got the prompt that allowed me to either delete the Dropbox folder or select a different location for my personal account. Somehow this worked when simply moving the folder within dropbox wouldn't... I hope this helps somebody! (using Fedora 27 btw)
pix365
Explorer | Level 4
100% match to my issue, Usng Fedora 26 - Followed all the permisson changes in this thread. However I can move the "~/Dropbox" directory in to a "~/subfolder?Dropbox" sync works. Unable to move Dropbox folder to another partion on same SSD or any HDD Drive. (internal or external).. Would you recommned I open a new ticket to raise the awareness to support?
mike _.
8 years agoHelpful | Level 6
pix365 wrote:
100% match to my issue, Usng Fedora 26 - Followed all the permisson changes in this thread. However I can move the "~/Dropbox" directory in to a "~/subfolder?Dropbox" sync works. Unable to move Dropbox folder to another partion on same SSD or any HDD Drive. (internal or external).. Would you recommned I open a new ticket to raise the awareness to support?
Yep, sounds like same issue I encoutered. Dropbox support told me earlier today that engineering are "not actively working on a solution for this problem". Which is disapointingbut not particularly surprising given the obscureness of the issue and the number of people who'd be affected by it.Someone else raising a ticket may make them more inclined to look at the issue. Tell them you think you're encounting the same issue as ticket 6168712.
It'd be interesting to know if the issue occurs on any distro other than Fedora. I can't replicate it on openSUSE. I've not tried any other distros. I've not yet had time/inclination to try other distros.
- pix3658 years agoExplorer | Level 4
Mike, I moved off Linuxmint 18.2 why? After the lastest upgrade I cannot fix low audio and distortion issues.
So in my efforts to track down the root cause over the past two weeks l've tried various flavours of Ununtu based distros, 16.04.04 & 17.04. this audio issue is common to all with kernel 4.6.xx. Back to your Dropbox question, in these distro tests (a real machine not inside a VM) the Dropbox app allowed me use any folder on my HDD (I'm adding +30GB of images per week to Dropbox, so I know for sure they worked.
As a workaround I'll try to setup LM 17.3 on a Virtualbox, I can sync up Dropbox to shared directory, thats is if i can fool the app to use it as drive and not a network share.
- pix3658 years agoExplorer | Level 4
Hi Mike new ticket raised. F YI : https://dropbox.zendesk.com/hc/fr/requests/6332540. let's hope this moves this issue up the food chain. .
I have a virtualbox running WIN7 , witha shared folder, sync is working.. Minor provlem of with file conflicts - but hey, I'll just wait until the sync is 100% and then sort the file duplications.
- LeviEE8 years agoExplorer | Level 3
Same problem... A possible workarround is to do it by a simlink :
- dropbox stop
- mv <old_path>/Dropbox <new_path>/Dropbox
- ln -s <new_path>/Dropbox <old_path>/Dropbox
- dropbox start
- tuannv07088 years agoExplorer | Level 4Good idea LeviEE. I'll try soon.
Thanks. - pix3658 years agoExplorer | Level 4
I'd already attempted this, both as a user & root
tried chmod 1777, to remove any risk of permissions restrictions.
Created new Group "dropbox" added root, sudo and users to group. linked
Created firewall rules,
Disabled the firewall.. +cold booted
Removed user install and reInstalled Dropbox as "Root" and even as root I cannot move Dbox folder to HDD
sadly nothing has worked : erm... YET...
- mike _.8 years agoHelpful | Level 6
pix365 wrote:
I'd already attempted this, both as a user & root
tried chmod 1777, to remove any risk of permissions restrictions.
Created new Group "dropbox" added root, sudo and users to group. linked
Created firewall rules,
Disabled the firewall.. +cold booted
chmod 1777 on what? 1777 on a directory means that any user can write to it but they can only delete things in it which they own. If you want to eliminate permissions as a problem it's not the most useful thing to set.
You may as well grab a couple fists full of straws as mess with the firewall and "Created firewall rules" doesn't convey anything of value about what you actually did.l
But whatever, it's clearly a bug in the Dropbox client.
Sadly the ticket I had open about this issue was closed by Drobox support without informing me or fixing the issue. I only found it it had been closed because I received a " tell us how we did" email, thought that was odd and then checked the status for the ticket. (The " tell us how we did" email didn't say that it was being sent as a result of ticket being closed, or mention a ticket number or anything useful like that.)
- pix3658 years agoExplorer | Level 4
my attempt at isolating the issue has clearly upset you. Sorry.
Yes - one could say my attemps are clutching at straws, But any diag - even a faiure is better than doing nothing. The Dropbox folder is created yet fails to use it.. so i'm thinking why? what could prevent it. and without the ability to read the log files = my straws
it could have been the firewall rules. but i wasn't.
It could have been file (user and or group)permissons, but i isn't.
What directory do your think i'm attempting the chmod on? It's the new Dropbox folder on the other HDD. (why change anything else)
I am not recommending folks do this chmod to their files sytem, as your 100% right it is a dangerous chmod, it was a simple diagnostic step that failed to make any difference.
- MJoergen8 years agoNew member | Level 2
Well, I seem to have a similar setup to "mike", and the same problem. I have just submitted a new support ticket (I think).
- Mark8 years agoSuper User II
mike _. wrote:Sadly the ticket I had open about this issue was closed by Drobox support without informing me or fixing the issue. I only found it it had been closed because I received a " tell us how we did" email, thought that was odd and then checked the status for the ticket. (The " tell us how we did" email didn't say that it was being sent as a result of ticket being closed, or mention a ticket number or anything useful like that.)Hi mike _., thats not helpful at all..... sorry.
I dont work for Dropbox, but, if you can get me a ticket number I'll see if I can escalate it for you.
- MJoergen8 years agoNew member | Level 2
The previous ticket number (issued by "mike") is 6168712. He wrote that earlier in the thread.
My ticket number is 6702220.
- pix3658 years agoExplorer | Level 4
I finally tracked down the access issues. Even though I had chosen "NOT" to install fedora 26 in LVM mode it did just that. Soon as realised my HDD was not part of the LV enviroment - Partioned a spare 2TB USB HDD into 2x1TB partions added 1xITB into the LV, Home then had +1TB of free space. .. ( Informed dropbox support of my testing and final solution, their reply was not a thank you, but a warning not to use a USB drive.... humm ) FYI, using a partition on an internal sata drive without any issues.
- Jane8 years agoDropbox StaffHey all,I'm just updating the thread here to sum-up the troubleshooting performed via the open tickets. It seems that a small subset of Linux users have hit an issue moving the attributes across, causing a home folder move to fail.Should you decide to go as per the re-partitioning option:
Partioned a spare 2TB USB HDD into 2x1TB partions added 1xITB into the LV,
this workaround may be the fix for you, though it’s outside Dropbox & our scope of support. If anyone resorts to this option, just bear in mind that it would be at your own peril.Moreover, let me add that, because our engineers are aware of the issue, we'll look into deploying a solution & we appreciate your patience on the matter.I hope this helps you clarify, I remain at your disposal if further assistance is needed. - mike _.8 years agoHelpful | Level 6
Jane wrote:
Should you decide to go as per the re-partitioning option:Partioned a spare 2TB USB HDD into 2x1TB partions added 1xITB into the LV,
this workaround may be the fix for you, though it’s outside Dropbox & our scope of support. If anyone resorts to this option, just bear in mind that it would be at your own peril.You don't know what that thing you've quoted even means, do you.Moreover, let me add that, because our engineers are aware of the issue, we'll look into deploying a solution & we appreciate your patience on the matter.Except support have told me, twice, that no one is working on the issue.
TIme to unsubscribe from this thread. Too much noise and nonsense in it now.
- ViciousMagician8 years agoNew member | Level 2I ran into the same issue as everyone but I was able to find a fix. I had a folder shared to me in Dropbox that I was only given read access to. Once I used selective sync to uncheck this folder I was able to move to an external USB then just went back in and checked that one folder again. You can see in the selective sync window a different icon on the folder if you don't have the proper permissions to it.
- pigg8 years agoHelpful | Level 5
I was having this same issue. I found a fix in creating a Dropbox folder in my home directory prior to connecting my account. This caused the installer to throw an error about a Dropbox folder already existing that prompted me to either delete the Dropbox folder or select a different location. Eureka! (for me at least...)
- crystal-butler8 years agoNew member | Level 2
That's the same workaround we had to implement at my job, where I help support many Linux users on a network file system. So far it's worked for everyone who has tried it.
- 6GeMiNi97 years agoHelpful | Level 5
wait please:D explain it better, every step!!
- turtlejuice7 years agoNew member | Level 2
wrote:I was having this same issue. I found a fix in creating a Dropbox folder in my home directory prior to connecting my account. This caused the installer to throw an error about a Dropbox folder already existing that prompted me to either delete the Dropbox folder or select a different location. Eureka! (for me at least...)
This didn't work for me, but I did find a similar solution! I created a "work" dropbox account and set up a fresh installation of dropbox with that account, which places the "work" Dropbox folder in the defaut ~/Dropbox. I then deleted everything in ~/.dropbox* (with rm -rf ~/.dropbox* ), reinstalled dropbox and set it up using my personal account. Now since the folder in ~/Dropbox already contains the dropbox for the work account, I got the prompt that allowed me to either delete the Dropbox folder or select a different location for my personal account. Somehow this worked when simply moving the folder within dropbox wouldn't... I hope this helps somebody! (using Fedora 27 btw)
- Lantzger7 years agoNew member | Level 2
I have this same problem on my F27. It's stupid but turtlejuice fix works :-)
Hey Dropbox developers, do something ;-) This is dirty fix...
- deltasoneca7 years agoNew member | Level 2
Wow, thanks a lot for this, turtlejuice! For years I've been trying to make it work!
Just to add a line between the steps:
"uninstall the fake/bogus/dummy 'work' account Dropbox client"
and
"install the Dropbox client again linking to your original account that you wanted to move folder",
Use this command to uninstall the Dropbox client linked to your bogus account:sudo apt-get remove dropbox; rm -rvf ~/.dropbox ~/.dropbox-dist
(use this also at the beginning of the process to uninstall your current Dropbox client linked to original account)
btw, I am on Fedora 25. - dumon7 years agoExplorer | Level 4
great, thank you much, I will give a try as I have time. I will let you know if it wroks for me) for now I have switched to another cloud ) Cheers, mate
- dumon7 years agoExplorer | Level 4
no it does not work for me (((
- 0x0000007 years agoNew member | Level 2
Hi dumon,
Mount any ext4 partition on ~/Dropbox/Then delete ~/.dropbox
Restart dropbox, it will give you option to select another location, later you can unmount new partition & completely delete ~/Dropbox folder.
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