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Forum Discussion
MacOS 13.0 Ventura, and Dropbox follows OneDrive in forcing the folder on the system drive
With Monterey, OneDrive implemented the new apis from Apple for online syncing that demanded its main location be a specific folder on the system drive. 8 months later, the MacOS community section of...
I have been trying to assuage the doubts of this group by pointing you to a solution, which people's disbelief or opinion, rather than empirical trial, has seemed to muddy.
I've written here a number of times that I am running a version of Dropbox which forced me to move all my dropbox data into the "Users" folder, which at 1.3 T was untenable. This occurred because I bought a new laptop in November, and Dropbox installed an unwanted upgrade which was irreversible.
I used the Advanced Installation, here (https://help.dropbox.com/installs/advanced-reinstall), and was able to bypass the requirement to keep my dropbox folder in \Users, and successfully installed it at the root level of a partitioned data drive. Not within \Users. This has continued to work to this day.
pollen didn't seem to believe it could be true.
Fluk3 replied to pollen with an "opinion" that my experience is "wrong." I am impressed by his/her confidence to contradict described experience with their own "opinion," without attempting a comparable maneuver themselves. I can only state that I continue to experience that the workaround continues to work for me just fine.
Some, e.g. TRO_Berlin, have worried that the difference between our two posts, eg. mine and Fluk3's opinion, is confusing.
nessus42 then opines that using the solution might somehow revert the installation. I have not observed any version downgrade. I am currently running v167.3.4684
Fluk3 then opines into the dark that "Now would be a Good Time for a Dropbox staff to clarify the conversation" but doesn't invite any to the thread.
So, please know that the solution was presented by Walter , a professional Dropboxer, in this thread https://www.dropboxforum.com/t5/Apps-and-Installations/Take-Dropbox-out-of-Mac-Library/td-p/633050/page/2. Later in that thread, Hannah , also a professional Dropboxer, also advises the advanced install. Hopefully either of them, having been flagged, will now Hear the Call by Fluk3.
Notably, further down the line on that thread, the OP ShanaC states in December that she was forced into a reinstall.
https://www.dropboxforum.com/t5/Apps-and-Installations/Take-Dropbox-out-of-Mac-Library/td-p/633050/page/4
I note, however, that her version at the time of posting was v162.4.5419. My current version (above in this post) seems to be more recent, and the Advanced Install continues to work. ShanaC are you still experiencing a problem, or were you able to resolve it?
I hope input by professional Dropboxers, and by the OP of the thread where I found my solution, is enough to convince people on this thread to call this problem "Solved," at least temporarily. It would allow so many people to stop wasting time and get on with their lives if this solution were spread more widely (which is my goal), because it is causing a lot of suffering and stress. It made me so grateful to find @Walter's solution, I hope others can experience the same sense of relief and satisfaction that they can continue with their orginal data architecture.
Wow Michael S.197 what performance! I must apologize for the dissent of myself and others! The audacity! To ask questions! Looking for help? My god, what were we thinking?
Thank you for the humiliation and shame. You are so right to go after users like me, personally, who dared to question your conclusions in any way shape or form. The best way to prove your argument is to admonish your dissenters. Good show.
And for me to ask questions not even remotely related to your external drive solution, like 3rd party syncing? I deserve 50 lashes for my impudence!
I've only been involved in managing servers and data while art directing massive multimedia projects for 35 years. How dare I have observations, needs and concerns that differ from yours, right? Blasphemy!
There's no possibility that I, or anyone else, might have seen different data from a different perspective and have a different experience and understanding and needs. Perish the thought!
You should totally continue ignore my actual questions, my alternate needs, my contrasting data and my version numbers in my appeal for help - in which I clearly asked where I may have been wrong in my assumptions (I'm a freaking monster!).
It's totally cool for you to ignore my questions about 3rd party links, because that's not your problem, so who cares? Case closed!
Please do continue to vilify us using whatever filter you choose to see through and shame us over not agreeing with you automatically, just because you said so. We completely deserve your infantilization and bile.
I can't wait to see the scores of happy, satisfied users who reply in agreement that the entire Dropbox on macOS problem is finally over, all thanks to you!
All hail Michael S! The S is for Solver!
Well, if you want help, then ask for it directly from Dropbox staff. Seems more practical.
I can't comment on your third-party syncing issue because I don't use that. If you want to find out about 3rd party applications, then why not trial the method? And report to the community?
You argued that I'm "wrong" to report that something currently works for me, on a later version than yours. I suspect what you meant to say was "Although it may currently work for him, this loophole may be reverted in the future." I made no claim about the future, simply about the present version that I'm using. Yes, what Dropbox plans is unclear, and whether they will close out this loophole is not clear.
