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Forum Discussion
Folder commands missing from "background" right click when I click on empty space next to folder
Hi there,
previously, one was able to right click in empty space on a folder and have the same commands show up that show when right clicking on a folder:
These are the options that show when right clicking ON the folder.
And as of a recent update, these are not available when right clicking in blank space:
I dug around in the registry to see if it was possible to link the command, but it shows in Directory/shellex as normal, so I imagine this is something that has changed on Dropbox side.
Is it possible to bring this back at all?
Thanks,
Luke
Hey Megan!
I am on Windows 11 21H2, Dropbox App version v159.4.5870, and I can't say exactly but I think it was from about last week. I know something happened as I regularly grab the dropbox link with a right click as I mentioned in the main post.
Thanks
- Rich
Super User II
lukevan wrote:
previously, one was able to right click in empty space on a folder and have the same commands show up that show when right clicking on a folder
Dropbox doesn't control this; your operating system does.
Dropbox has no control over how your clicks are interpreted. All Dropbox can do is register its options in the system registry so that Windows knows what to display in the context menu for various actions. The issue here is that a right-click in the white space doesn't first select the folder before Windows shows the available options on the context menu, so Windows presents the options for the parent folder, since that is what's selected when the context menu appears. Dropbox can't change that.
The following shows Windows 10 so it's not the same as your operating system, but it also shows that this likely hasn't changed. (Sorry for the speed. I had to keep it short to fit under the max size for the attachment.)
I'm in a folder called Test. Within it, I first right-click on the white space next to a folder called PowerPoint. You can see that the folder doesn't get selected in the process, so Windows treats this as though I'm right-clicking on the background of the Test folder; not the PowerPoint folder.
I then right-click on the name of the PowerPoint folder itself. You can see that the folder is selected and Windows gives me the appropriate Dropbox options for that folder.
And finally I first left-click the white space next to the Capture folder which selects the folder, and then I right-click the white space and get the expected Dropbox options.
All of this is controlled by the operating system.
Rich wrote:
lukevan wrote:previously, one was able to right click in empty space on a folder and have the same commands show up that show when right clicking on a folder
Dropbox doesn't control this; your operating system does.
Dropbox has no control over how your clicks are interpreted. All Dropbox can do is register its options in the system registry so that Windows knows what to display in the context menu for various actions. The issue here is that a right-click in the white space doesn't first select the folder before Windows shows the available options on the context menu, so Windows presents the options for the parent folder, since that is what's selected when the context menu appears. Dropbox can't change that.
The following shows Windows 10 so it's not the same as your operating system, but it also shows that this likely hasn't changed. (Sorry for the speed. I had to keep it short to fit under the max size for the attachment.)
I'm in a folder called Test. Within it, I first right-click on the white space next to a folder called PowerPoint. You can see that the folder doesn't get selected in the process, so Windows treats this as though I'm right-clicking on the background of the Test folder; not the PowerPoint folder.
I then right-click on the name of the PowerPoint folder itself. You can see that the folder is selected and Windows gives me the appropriate Dropbox options for that folder.
And finally I first left-click the white space next to the Capture folder which selects the folder, and then I right-click the white space and get the expected Dropbox options.
All of this is controlled by the operating system.
But how about if you want to Copy the dropbox link of the TEST folder? In Windows 10 you can just right click on an empty space and get the option "Copy Dropbox link" which on your example video is the dropbox link of the TEST folder. But in Windows 11, that is no longer possible. Any workaround for this? Thank you.
This is a duplicate of another bug, since it's being ignored by dropbox staff now.
I'll try to explain the problem again without referencing the prior issue, so that maybe I can find different words to describe it in a way that will be finally understood.
The problem is simple. On Windows 10, when right-clicking in the empty space in an explorer directory set to "Large Icons" view, no dropbox context menu appears. This is what most people would use to get the share URL for a directory they're working in. The context menu which should appear (and used to, and still does on Windows 7), is the one which is accessed by the following workaround:
1. Navigate up one directory
2. Rightclick on the entry for the directory you were just in.
To put it another way, the expected behavior is that the dropbox context menu for a directory be the same whether you right click on the directory item inside its parent directory, or in the empty space inside the directory itself
This is a duplicate of another bug, since it's being ignored by dropbox staff now.
https://www.dropboxforum.com/t5/Apps-and-Installations/Folder-commands-missing-from-quot-background-...
I'll try to explain the problem again without referencing the prior issue, so that maybe I can find different words to describe it in a way that will be finally understood.
The problem is simple. On Windows 10, when right-clicking in the empty space in an explorer directory set to "Large Icons" view, no dropbox context menu appears. This is what most people would use to get the share URL for a directory they're working in. The context menu which should appear (and used to, and still does on Windows 7), is the one which is accessed by the following workaround:
1. Navigate up one directory
2. Rightclick on the entry for the directory you were just in.
To put it another way, the expected behavior is that the dropbox context menu for a directory be the same whether you right click on the directory item inside its parent directory, or in the empty space inside the directory itself
- Rich
mgambrell wrote:
The problem is simple. On Windows 10, when right-clicking in the empty space in an explorer directory set to "Large Icons" view, no dropbox context menu appears.
Windows 10. Explorer set to show large icons. Dropbox context menu options are visible when right-clicking the empty space.
Please show me exactly where you clicked. Presumably it's at the bottom left of the context menu, where there's nothing at all, which would be the right place to repro the problem; however the context menu you got has "version history" which implies it's targeting a file. Then again, "Manage hard drive space" implies you targeted the directory. What would happen if you clicked "Version history" from here? What would it be the history of? I also don't have "Don't sync to Dropbox.com"; so in general I have a different menu from you in a number of different ways and any of the differences could be causing a problem. Is this due to it being a Business plan account?
Before I tested this just now, I uninstalled winrar, 7-zip, and open-shell to make sure none of those were causing incompatibilities. None of that helped, but I have other shell extensions that could still be conflicting.
