![]() Dropbox did this before using a kernel extension, so that it can hook into the kernel kauth framework. The issue is that you need to intercept file I/O to make transparent sync work. But if dropbox is just another proprietary piece of software running hacks, I can’t really blame Apple. Or at the very least, they could have attempted to publish a standard. And it's much easier to understand and work with than manually managing selective sync. ![]() ![]() Why not? It's a very handy feature for a lot of users who don't have the disk space available to store their complete Dropbox folder. Perhaps shouldn’t exist in the first place That said, this hack (pretending your files are on disk) is arguably a fragile one, and perhaps shouldn’t exist in the first place (assuming it’s not a networked file system, which I believe it’s not). Dropbox cannot afford to simply throw their hands up and blame the users for not being technical enough. Non-techies will find it incredibly annoying to map individual subtrees leading to missing files, upfront sync costs when you need those, and running out of disk space. I don’t know how others do it, but I assume that you’d have to manually maintain mappings between a subtree in the cloud to one on disk, or alternatively run out of disk space if you want to have everything synced. However, for Mac-owning Dropbox customers, the latest update is definitely a downgrade.I agree, but I think it’s important to point out: I believe the main feature they need is to sync the full file tree without having to download the actual files until needed. And on its support page, Dropbox does add that the list of problems will continue to be “updated regularly as Dropbox support for macOS continues to develop and improve”, suggesting some of these issues may be temporary. There is no doubt some of the problems with the new Dropbox for Mac are being caused by the inflexibility of Apple’s File Provider API, rather than any decision making on Dropbox’s part. Searches performed via Apple’s Spotlight facility are not affected by these changes. According to Dropbox’s support document for the new version of the macOS software, “Searching through Finder will only find online-only files or folders that have been previously accessed on your device running Dropbox for macOS”.ĭropbox adds that “only file names will display in these search results, not the file contents” and that this will “affect features that depend on searching through Finder”, such as Smart Folders. Not having local copies of files also limits which items appear in search results.
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