How does the app sync large content?

[Niki_p]

Hi - after an issue with an external HDD I'm in the process of loading up lots of images to Dropbox, so syncing from my computer to Dropbox and making everything online-only. Syncing up around 5~10GB at a time and waiting for a folder to complete before adding a new one to Dropbox. I know it will take time. 

I wait till Dropbox says "all folders are up to date" then add a new folder to Dropbox. I added a new folder yesterday that has maybe 900 images in it but for some reason Dropbox says it's syncing nearly 4,000 files. Many of the files waiting to sync are files that it previously told me are up to date. 

Anyone any ideas on what could be going on? It's going to take me months if Dropbox re-syncs everything each time I add a new folder. I'm using a MacBook Pro with MacOS Sonoma 14.5 and Dropbox says I am up to date on Dropbox App. 

Cheers,

Niki

[Mark]

Hi @Niki_p 

It is almost certainly not resyncing BUT is reindexing (the wording on the app has always been terrible!). 

Dropbox will reindex each type it starts up but then upload any changes to files if it finds them when it indexs. 

[Niki_p]

Thanks for replying Mark. So does that mean that each time I load a bunch of new jpg files Dropbox will re-index every jpg file in my Dropbox folder? If that's the case I'll be here for years, the process seems to take forever. It's almost impossible to tell what Dropbox is actually doing at all, not very informative, so I have no idea if new files are getting loaded up or old files are being re-indexed. Is there anything I can do to speed things up or prevent re-indexing?  

[Здравко]

Hi @Niki_p,

If I'm in your shoes, I would try upload folder by folder and once entire folder is ready, just selectively unsync it and after that continue with the next one. The same for any other folder you don't need immediately. In such a way on your local Dropbox folder will be small subset of all data available in account, so significantly less time for reindex (whenever needed) - the local files only (or their placeholders) are indexed. 😉 Try at least.

Hope this helps.

[Niki_p]

Oh - that sounds like it would work, thank you! Just want to confirm with you please this is how I'd do that. From Dropbox app on MacBook Preferences -> Sync -> Selective Sync then from Choose Folders To See On This Computer -> untick (un-select) everything, add all my new folders to Dropbox (Dropbox will no longer re-index everything unticked, was till syncing is complete on all my new stuff then if I want to see placeholders back on my laptop I can go back through steps above and re-tick/select everything I want to see on my computer and re-indexing will happen at this time. Is that correct? I'll do it with a couple of folders to see result first 🙂

[Здравко]

May be not precisely exactly (regarding the details what happens), but yes, that's the idea - your way is the correct one. If you want you may not remove all ticks, just need to be enough.

One more detail that you need to avoid. Never copy content that's already in your account!!! Despite you cannot see it locally, it's there. If you copy file with the same name on the same place, selective sync conflict error will happen and file name will change. Just keep in mind.