Disaster: Dropbox removing external disk support for Mac users :(

fjazzfjazz UKD I’m going out in a limb here because I rarely use Dropbox for file sharing or collaboration, and don’t think that’s going to change if I migrate. But from what I see in the “getting started” instructions, your collaborators will need to use Sync as well, and — while it’s conceivable that two different storage providers could create a joint-use framework — I don’t see much incentive for this to happen in the real world. For one thing, the engineers at Sync have created a true “Trust No One” environment, with real end-to-end encryption that only YOU have the keys to unlock. At Dropbox, the company’s engineers have keys as well, and I won;t go any further down that rabbit-hole. So you’re going to need to keep at least a minimum paid Dropbox account unless you can persuade all your coworkers to switch.

fjazzfjazz from my understanding you can share folders which is what I do with my team. Now how this would work with external partners I'm not sure. I too have specific folders shared with external partners so how this works I will find out.  I presume you can share a link to a folder and they can upload and download files if you give them access. Again, I'm not sure if that's right or they need to have an account or be part of your team licence.

In my testing I can create a team folder which is I guess our day to day working folders but as for externals, I'm not sure yet. I've only started playing around but I have downloaded the beta version of their desktop app as that's the one that has the same as smartsync as dropbox. Non-beta version is download files only.

What I have found out so far, and for which I've emailed support on to get clarification on, is that it seems that if you open a file like indesign and it has links, those links if they're online only do not automatically sync locally. So what in turn means is that if you have files all over the place it's gonna be fun times ahead.

Very helpful, thanks ArthurPix ArthurPix

UKD ufff.... sounds like it will also be an uphill battle with Sync.com then.

If you could please test if you share an InDesign session, with the assets correctly on the same folder, to someone that does not have Sync.com, can they work on it? Just " sharing a link to a folder and they can upload and download files if you give them access" wont be enough for audio and video editors. 

Also, (if you have time) can you explain why the duck can Sync.com allow external drives and Dropbox can't? 

Thanks!

fjazzfjazz I can't test an external user on an indesign file because of copyright and protection for our clients. I have to be super careful in that and external partners.

Do you mean if someone can be on the file at the same time as you? If yes then Indesign never allowed that itself anyway. Dropbox treats the file as an individual file once stored locally and is therefore a local file. Now if you were working on that file on your machine and saved your file and someone else was working on their file at the same time as you but saved after you, then their version would overwrite yours. There's no joint working on files that I am aware off.

And I presume Dropbox cannot be bothered to do it and are just saying it's Apple's fault. Maybe there's higher encryption in theirs, maybe they use Apples API and haven't created their own. Maybe it's because they've turned themselves in to a bloatware company with all these new and amazing features that nobody f*****g wants. Who knows, but I am pretty sure they do not give a flying f*** about us customers.