Can't open downloaded files due to file path corruption

[Rick R.6]

hello. First post. Yesterday strange things started happening to files in Dropbox. This is a work Dropbox.

This started when I was editing some word files. Some files opened fine, but others would not open at all when accessed through Dropbox either online or through windows explorer. These files had originally been put in the folder back in September.

If the file in question was downloaded to my computer, it opened and edited fine. If edited on my computer and copied back to the same folder on Dropbox, it would not open. If copied to a different folder on Dropbox, it would open and edit fine.

Looking at the properties of the files, I found the following. If you right click on any file, go down to the bottom of that box and click properties, a box with info will open. In that box is the full path name for the file, called “Location” in that box.

The path for the files that opened fine started with D:\Dropbox....

The path for the files that would not open started with \\?\D:\Dropbox....

This even happened to a cad file I had been able to open during the day. When I went back to it at the end of the day it would not open. Same issue with the path.

Dropbox tells me that it's up to date.

Any ideas are appreciated.

thanks, Rick

[Jay]

Hi @Rick R.6, thanks for joining the Community!

Regarding this matter, the \\?\ could indicate it’s on a network drive. Are you using any network drives on your machine when moving and copying files across, or are these all local drives?

When you say that the files were downloaded, was this manually via the site, or by using the Dropbox desktop application to sync them automatically? Are you using Smart Sync and then marking them as local?

Any details you can provide would be great so I can help out!

[Rick R.6]

Hey Jay,

My Dropbox files are on a local hard drive on my computer. I have two drives, C: where everything but Dropbox exists, and then 😧 where all the Dropbox files are.

By downloaded, I mean that I copied the file from Dropbox to my local C: drive. It can be downloaded either via Dropbox.com or via windows explorer. Either way the file will open and edit fine.

I have had this same computer setup for four years. All my Dropbox files are Local files. This issue only started yesterday.

One odd tidbit is that if I copy or move a file that will not open from its original folder to another Dropbox folder, it will open and edit fine and the odd path name slashes are gone.

thanks, Rick

[Jay]

Could you check the full filepath, to ensure it isn’t longer than 255 characters from D:\ all the way up to and including docx?

Windows has an upper limit of 255 for files, and 218 for Excel files

Keep me posted!

[Rick R.6]

hey,

The file names are not that long. These files have been in this folder since last year and edited previously with no problem.

I did an experiment though. These are construction specifications. 16 of the 26 files would not open when in their original Dropbox folder. I copied all the files to my local C: hard disk, then made a new folder on Dropbox with a different name, but in the same job folder as the original spec folder, then copied all 26 files into that new folder. All of these files now open and edit with no issues.

The problem that I am experiencing seems to have something to do with syncing. At this point I have a way to work around it, but I don't know how many more files I will find that have this same problem in the future.

Is there a way to re-sync a single folder? I am curious if that will fix the issue.

thanks for your time and ideas,

rick

[Jay · Accepted solution]

Since you moved the files to a different folder, most likely it has fewer characters in the folder names so the filepath is much smaller.

Could you try copying one of the original files to a directory two folders above its current location, and see if they open fine?

Rrgarding resyncing, You can try moving the folder you want to re-sync out of the Dropbox folder completely, give it time to sync the deletions, and then move the files back in.

[Rick R.6]

Hey Jay,

You may be on to something. I actually counted the characters in the one file path, 233 characters. I know, we have a complicated folder structure. I didn't create it.

So, I copied the file up two folders and nothing. I copied it up to our main Dropbox folder and it opened. So I progressively copied it to lower folders until it didn't open. At some point our complicated folder system provided for a path name that was too big to function.

Thank you for your help. I had never run into this issue before. It's easy enough to fix.

have a great day, rick

[Jay]

Glad that I could help out, Rick!

Enjoy the rest of your week. 🙂