Feedback on the new desktop app "ignore files" feature.

[jvasileff]

@Daphne that's great news! I look forward to trying it out.

But it would also be nice to have a configuration file, like ".dropboxignore", to list paths or patterns to exclude. The reason is that extended attributes are tied to the actual file or folder, and will be gone if the file or folder is deleted and recreated.

The common use case for this is a software build folder that gets deleted and recreated on clean builds. Under xattr system, the "new" build folder would sync to Dropbox even if the "old" build folder had the necessary com.dropbox.ignored xattr.

[nickyhajal]

@DaphneAs jvasileff mentioned, this is awesome! Already putting it into action and taking it for a spin.

To build on their comment, I have a ton of projects that have a bunch of common folders like, "node_modules", "Pods", "vendor", "build", "public", etc. It's fairly challenging to have to manually go through all my projects and ignore those files.

Are there any plans to have a centralized place in the Dropbox app where we can add file patterns to ignore?

Thanks!

[Daphne]

Thanks for all your feedback so far on this!

As this is in beta, I don't have any additional info to share on whether these functionalities (such as ignore by patterns etc) will be added.

We really appreciate the interest and feedback you've given on this, and letting us know how those additions would help with your workflow.

So keep it coming! I'll make sure to pass along your feedback to our dev team and keep you all up to date with any news here.

Hope you all have a wonderful day ahead! 

[Antonio A.17]

I hope that the ignored files will continue to be ignored if they are removed and regenerated, e.g, `rm -rf node_modules && npm install`

[cabreu]

It is true that ignored folders will no longer appear in dropbox.com but substantial problems remain in place with this feature.

In particular, it seems that dropbox still monitors what happens inside ignored folders. When I have a "build" folder that is set to be ignored where thousand of files change suddenly, dropbox still tries to index and even sync all files, consuming a lot of system resources. 

This can easily be replicated. If I go inside the build folder that I ignored and create a simple .txt file, dropbox immediately starts indexing and syncing it. 

[jvasileff]

I hope the issue @cabreu brought up will be addressed. A significant advantage I hoped to gain with this feature is improved battery life, and it sounds like that may be currently missing. (I haven't tested this myself since I'm not sure I want to install the beta.)

[dkobia]

@Daphne how would I remove a folder from the ignore list that I added by mistake with xattr -w com.dropbox.ignored 1 ?

Edit:

Resolved with: xattr -d com.dropbox.ignored [file/folder]

[ssyk3s]

This feature is long overdue. It's not just a simple matter to "just put folders you want to ignore outside of dropbox".

It's very common when working in some types of projects (especially involving code) to want to avoid crufty temp files or machine generated files saving to the cloud, and at the same time, for the human created files to upload normally. 

This is why .gitignore is a thing.

Of course I use version control, and can do this outside of Dropbox, but I've found it's quite annoying when collaborating, and I have a perfect project folder to work out of, which has art assets and such under Dropbox, to then need to completely set up a separate duplicate project outside of the folder structure just to get Dropbox to ignore some folders.

[sebastian_]

A .dropboxignore would be a very simple straight forward solution for developers as it conforms to the .gitignore standard which is proven and already used globally by developers. Further, this feature / solution would not confuse general Dropbox users because it’s an invisible file that only developers would likely work with.

Per recommendation from @Lucil community advocate, please see the post below for a developer-grade workaround since the Swap-a-Roo Ignore Hack stopped working.

(Updated Link)

How to make Dropbox ignore node_modules folder with symbolic links (aliases) 

Hope this helps.

[cabreu]

Hi @sebastian_ ,

I was curious to see your link but it says that the message I am trying to access is not available.