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Forum Discussion
robinwn
3 years agoHelpful | Level 6
Dropbox is not searchable in Mac OS Monterey 12.0.1
Dropbox files/folders are not searchable in spotlight on new MacBook Pro with M1 chip - Monterey OS 12.0.1. Have re-indexed spotlight. Have uninstalled and reinstalled Dropbox and rebooted. Have made...
- 3 years ago
I have found a solution, everyone! I hope everyone struggling with this will find this post. The problem isn't with dropbox, it's with Mac Spotlight. Which surprised me, as I always thought the finder search was separate from Spotlight, but apparently, on the back end, both are one-in-the-same. I've heard many times that re-indexing spotlight didn't work, but it does! You just have to do it a different way for everything to ACTUALLY 100% reindex.
Tutorial is here on apple's forums: https://discussions.apple.com/thread/253479408
Just giving credit where credit is due.
In case that goes away, instructions are also listed below.
- Open System Preferences and go to Spotlight's Privacy tab.
- Add the entire hard disk INTO the Privacy list.
- Maybe wait 30s.
- Remove the hard disk FROM the Privacy list.
Spotlight will re-index. After finish re-indexing, the search in folder works for me.
(To see if Spotlight is indexing, use Command+Space to invoke Spotlight, and type in something. Wait a second. You should see a progress bar to show indexing progress)
Of note, I am on Mac OS Monterey 12.6 (21G115). My dropbox version is 158.4.4564. These are both the lastest, as of now, 10.3.2022.
Hopefully this helps! Changed my life - I can work again!
davidarden
Helpful | Level 6
I have found a solution, everyone! I hope everyone struggling with this will find this post. The problem isn't with dropbox, it's with Mac Spotlight. Which surprised me, as I always thought the finder search was separate from Spotlight, but apparently, on the back end, both are one-in-the-same. I've heard many times that re-indexing spotlight didn't work, but it does! You just have to do it a different way for everything to ACTUALLY 100% reindex.
Tutorial is here on apple's forums: https://discussions.apple.com/thread/253479408
Just giving credit where credit is due.
In case that goes away, instructions are also listed below.
- Open System Preferences and go to Spotlight's Privacy tab.
- Add the entire hard disk INTO the Privacy list.
- Maybe wait 30s.
- Remove the hard disk FROM the Privacy list.
Spotlight will re-index. After finish re-indexing, the search in folder works for me.
(To see if Spotlight is indexing, use Command+Space to invoke Spotlight, and type in something. Wait a second. You should see a progress bar to show indexing progress)
Of note, I am on Mac OS Monterey 12.6 (21G115). My dropbox version is 158.4.4564. These are both the lastest, as of now, 10.3.2022.
Hopefully this helps! Changed my life - I can work again!
Rjd223
3 years agoNew member | Level 2
Thank you so much, this has prevented me from buying a new windows laptop now!
Search hasn’t worked for months and nothing I could find could sort it out. Tried this and it’s working great now!
Was impossible to work efficiently before, having to have Dropbox open in a browser window to find out where files are and the LN manually opening them in finder!
Thanks again 👍
Search hasn’t worked for months and nothing I could find could sort it out. Tried this and it’s working great now!
Was impossible to work efficiently before, having to have Dropbox open in a browser window to find out where files are and the LN manually opening them in finder!
Thanks again 👍
- davidarden3 years agoHelpful | Level 6
Glad to hear it!!
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