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Forum Discussion
New named Dropbox structure
I am a user of DropBox Business, on Windows 10.
Last week, I suddenly realized that the shortcuts to some of my Dropbox folders were broken.
A quick look learned me that the structure had changed.
While I used to access my folder through:
C:/User/{username}/Dropbox (COMPANY NAME)/, I can now find them at:
C:/User/{username}/{COMPANY NAME} Dropbox/MyFirstName LASTNAME/
Now, both structures seem to remain while the first one is now a hidden shortcut (although I can't seem to see where it links to).
So that I don't really know where my files actually are.
Is this change documented anywhere?
Thanks
After a couple of days, I realized this happened to all of this Dropbox Business users across the company, Mac and Windows, and that it messes up with backup strategies.
I didn't find anything about this new structure in DropBox's changelog.
Dropbox upgraded overnight and now my files have been "moved". I cannot open anything. It is stating it has been moved.
- Megan
Dropbox Staff
Hi Simon, thanks for sharing more info about this!
Essentially, what happened here was that your account changed from the old Team structure to the new one. At the moment, there's no way to revert back to the structure you had.
However, if you're facing any difficulties locating content, or finding out more about this we're happy to help! If you search for file or folder names, were you able to locate all the necessary content?
Hannah,
We will manage.
I noticed last night that the old file folder is still there but as a hidden "short cut" to the second level (critical) file structure. To the other person on this chat I suggest you set "show hidden files". This may help you to locate your files.
Unfortunatey one of the machines in our team is stuck in "dropbox is updating " mode now for over 24 hours.
Please advise what we should do. Is it OK to uninstall DB and re-install?
Thanks
- Hannah
Hey AN26 and simonemwood, thanks for reaching out to our Community.
Do you mean to say that the Dropbox application was updated and when the update finished, your folder structure had changed?
Or are you referring to a different kind of upgrade/update?
Any additional info you can give us would be really helpful.
AN26, can you please send us a screenshot of this 'has been moved' message that you're getting?
Yes. The structure changed and now the files can not be opened. They also created a personal dropbox name and a company name a split the files between the two. Can you tell me the difference with the green check marks and the gray marks?
Dropbox updated automatically on my computer and my colleagues computers and has altered the file structure.
I found my files but WHY ? did they make such drastic change ? It took a very long time to "update" and now im not sure if all the various shared folders I have work anymore.
It also recreated a set up that loaded all my files to my C drive when I previously had them on my D drive. Now I have two copies of everything and my computers memory has maXED OUT. tHIS IS SO ANNOYING. WTF ! Now I need to delete files and I dont know which to delete., AFU !
Thoroughly P'd off.
I got an email noting my account will be updated to the latest Dropbox for business. I have some questions.
I already postponed it but can I opt out?
- We really do no use team folders. I have only one team folder noted as a test folder and it is empty.
- Since we are not using team folders and each user just has their own folders, will that be the same as each user having personal folder on this new DB and all their subfolders will be there at the same subfolder locations?
- Who can see files in the personal folder? Just the user or also an admin?
- What happens to shared folders? Do they remain personal folders and remain shared to both internal and external users?
- Are share folders moved for each user and remain shared? I have shared folders to external users and they may have moved that folder to another location in their DB. I did the same with an internal user. Will the shared folder be in the same location in the users personal folders?
- What happens to shared links to files? Do they remain the same?
- What is the advantage of this upgrade?
- Is this upgrade Team Spaces?
On Mapping, I found this article.
https://help.dropbox.com/accounts-billing/plans-upgrades/upcoming-business-team-changes
The naming convention of the Dropbox folder will change from “Dropbox [team name]” to “[Team name] Dropbox”.
Right now, the DB Folder has a path like
C:\Users\john\Dropbox (TEAM)
Will the new one be this?
C:\Users\john\(TEAM) Dropbox
Each team member will now have their own personal folder called a team member folder. Will it look like this:
C:\Users\john\(TEAM) Dropbox\John
All other content, including shared folders, will be moved to each member’s team member folder.
We do not use Team Folders. I have one that is a test that only I am a member of
Existing team folders will move to the team space. Will the one team folder I have appear like this?
C:\Users\john\(TEAM) Dropbox\TEAM\Test
- Walter
Hey Rinconman, thanks for posting on our Community!
For starters, note that even though you can't completely opt out of this upgrade, you can keep postponing it until you're completely ready to move forward.
As for the advantage this offers, the new Dropbox Business organizes your team’s content into a consistent folder structure called the team space. Each user is also given an individual (and hidden) team member folder for their individual work.
The member folder always has the same name as the user and it’s the best place for users to keep work stuff that they don’t necessarily want to share with the entire team.
Even though the team member folder is inside the shared workspace, only that specific user can see or access its contents.
The member folder is also where things like saved screenshots will go, and will be the default location when users choose to “add to Dropbox” from other applications.Team admins will also have access to this folder via the "Sign-in as user" feature.
Shared folders and shared links to files shouldn't be affected by the upgrade at this point.
As for the folder paths you mention, you seem to got them correctly, but I can't be 100% sure without seeing the actual paths.
I hope this helps a tad and please let me know if you have any other questions.
My DB for Business is scheduled to upgrade in a few days but I may postpone again. I have a desktop where the DB folder is on a D drive and not the C drive. I read one post this was an issue. Will the upgrade mess that up and create the new DB folder on the C drive instead of where I have it now on the D drive?
I am not using any Teams folders. I have five users and we just all use the personal folders and have some folders shared with both internal and some external users. From what I read, there should be no issue with my upgrade other than the on system with files on the D Drive.
Ticket: 18237317
Our account was opted in to be upgraded to the latest version of Dropbox Business.
Although not conveyed in the changes email, this has re-worked a number of shared folders structure from:
Dropbox Root -> Shared folderto
Dropbox Root -> Username -> Shared Folder
This has broken some critical LOB apps for us as as they require the same folder structure on each PC.We would not have opted into this change if it was conveyed that this change would happen.
This was raised 5 days ago to Dropbox support and still no resolution. I've conveyed the severity of this multiple times.
Please assist.
We have experienced the same mess - it has taken my PC 5 days to sync correctly and for the upgrade to be complete. The other team accounts are still syncing/updating. We're all working off different file/folder versions and it is a nightmare. Why make such a drastic change and in August too? I was on hols when the email came in, giving me no time to prepare!
- Rich
Super User II
Zondor wrote:
Although not conveyed in the changes email, this has re-worked a number of shared folders structure from:
I haven't seen the content of the email but this change is described in the help article describing the upgrade, which I'm pretty certain is linked in the email (from other posts I've read).
Notes:
- The naming convention of the Dropbox folder will change from “Dropbox [team name]” to “[Team name] Dropbox”.
- Existing team folders will move to the team space:
- /[team name] Dropbox/[Team-name]’s shared workspace
- Each team member will now have their own personal folder called a team member folder:
- /[team name] Dropbox/[Team member’s name]
- All other content, including shared folders, will be moved to each member’s team member folder.
Also, while you could have delayed the upgrade for 30 days, I've seen no way to opt out of this change. This appears to be a change that Dropbox is making across the board, for all Business accounts, and there's likely no going back.
Unfortunately what you have shown wasn't in the email we got from Dropbox. Opting out for 30 days is also a not an option as this is critical for our LOB apps to function.
We simply wish to keep using Dropbox the way we always have, otherwise we will need to move to another product.
Seems crazy that even with our 14,000 yearly bill that no one is able to assist us.
Why do you change the top folder name of Dropbox in my case from e.g.
"C:\AB\Dropbox (MUSTER)" to
"C:\AB\MUSTER Dropbox" and
How can I change the name back to "Dropbox (MUSTER)"?This is a disaster. All links and connections, established in the past, are now broken.
Why not give users the option to decide whether they want to have the new name (made up by dropbox) or keep the old name?
- Rich
Eastsite wrote:
All links and connections, established in the past, are now broken.
Create a symbolic link that points C:\AB\Dropbox (MUSTER) to C:\AB\MUSTER Dropbox.
We are experiencing the same issue, our head file is preceded with the name of each user, so it's different for everyone. As a result, when one user works on and saves a file, the link will be broken for the next person who opens it as the filepath has the previous user's name associated. We are having to relink every time a file is opened (using Vectorworks and Adobe Indesign software).
Our office is split between Windows and Mac users - is the symbolic link applicable to both, and would it work for this issue?
The whole set-up of my company is based on the Dropbox folder.
All software that builds on data from Windows files now uses invalid addresses because Dropbox changes the path name. My software is therefore flying blind at the moment. I have to set everything up again. And I am only one of x-million customers.
The reason for staying with Dropbox and not switching to OneDrive was that Dropbox understands how important file structures are, and Dropbox keeps its hands off the top folder level, unlike Microsoft. That reason no longer exists.- Jackson
Hello Eastsite, sorry to hear about your issue.
The Dropbox folder is named automatically, and it can not be manually renamed.
Each Team Admin, should have been notified prior to the upgrade, about the incoming changes.
You can request renaming the folder as feature, by up-voting it in our Share an Idea part of the forum.
Hope this clears things up.
This morning Dropbox did a database update and all the folders in our work Dropbox are now under main folders with each users name. What has happened? Is this a new folder structure that Dropbox implemented? I cannot find anything about such a change.
Same thing happened to us. Whole path structure is broken, software we are using non of them work properly as they cannot access files with correct paths. Whos great idea on Dropbox side was this? Especially in Business sector when companies relies on precise file structures?
This is not an acceptable change that you are pushing as an "upgrade". You are going to break systems for my team and I'm going to have to try to fix what you've "improved" over the weekend. You should not modify any file system paths. We rely on them being static. Your postponement window is also too narrow and does not allow for long-term planning of this project - and it is a project to adjust to this on our side.
Recently the business portion of Dropbox now has my folders under a new directory as my user name and I need to open / uncollapse that in file explorer every time I want to view my files and folders. This added step every time is annoying. Any idea why this happened and if there is away to revert? I did some searching and may be related to teams. I am the Admin / Owner and my user type is Team Admin (no idea if the team part is the issue or how to correct).
As a semi-workaround if you have a few key folders you use all the time, you can right click and add them to 'Quick Access' so they show in that section at the top of your windows explorer side bar.
It appears to me the business account is updated and personal named folder is added to the root folder.
This creates the below problems :
1) Our office team used to send across folder path in whatsapp for quick file sharing, with the added peronal named folder, all files has unique path and cannot be shared efficiently.
2) Our team uses programme like Rhino / Indesign, which one file will link to another file, like the material mapping, or link to a illustration etc. With the added personal named folder, my colleauge now have trouble to open another rhino / indesign file, as all the links are wrong. It limits our team ability of sharing working file across.
I don't see there is any benefit of adding a personal name folder as the root folder for the dropbox, and it creates a lot of problem for office using dropbox as their server and sharing work file. If someone needs a personal named folder, they can simply open a folder as they want at anywhere, which is under the team's control, rather than a compulsory change. I strongly recommend to revert back the version WITHOUT the personal named root folder. I believe this issue also happened for many other offices, and as a user we are looking for alternative platform to solve this problem. I hope Dropbox can review this asap.This is exactly our setup. In a customer perspective, a totally unneeded change.
Hi,
I work for a small organization with only 10 staff members. We run statistical code that all of us share, so our file path names are important and have to remain stable. Last night, all of our computers changed the file path names from "C:\Dropbox (Enrollment Research)\" to "C:\Enrollment Research Dropbox\Staff Name\," which breaks everything.
How can we get our file paths to go back to the simpler version?
Thanks!
frances
- Rich
FrancesERA wrote:
Last night, all of our computers changed the file path names from "C:\Dropbox (Enrollment Research)\" to "C:\Enrollment Research Dropbox\Staff Name\," which breaks everything.
This is due to your Business team being upgraded. Your team admin would have been notified prior to the change. You can read more about it here:
Once your team has been upgraded, there is no going back to the former folder structure. Your team admin could have postponed it for 30 days, but once upgraded, it's done.
Yea, no, you cannot keep putting off the migration.
I knew about it. But there was nothing, ultimately, we could do to stop it EXCEPT dropping Business and going to paid personal with shared folders, which negates a lot of the Business management side of things.
The OTHER issue was their changing everything to Cloud-based rather than on the device. Holy crap, this messed up things. My ability to search through my folders depends on the files being on the device, and multiple devices still haven't fully synced (despite forcing everything to be offline).
And, yes, I probably should have noticed this change and acted accordingly.
Here's the rub, though—I chose DropBox because it was a simple, streamlined, and accessible file sharing service that integrated into my devices' file browser directly.
Now DropBox is trying to be the one Cloud-business product to rule them all, with tasks and project management and all this other rubbish I get elsewhere from more industry-specific or otherwise-superior products.
I have DropBox for file sharing. It used to be the best in simplicity, features, and cost.
Now, it's screwing up it's file sharing, making it worse, making it more complicated, and trying to add services I DO NOT WANT or CARE about.
If I wanted NetDocuments or some Oracle file-sharing junk I'd do that. Hell, I could roll up some Amazon AWS sharing solutions using S3 Buckets if I really was hard up for cheap, complex, and multi-faceted file-sharing solutions.
But I'm not. I want something simple, easy, and that laypeople can use (and that I don't have to spend a bunch of time managing, because while I *could* with the IT background I have, that is *not* my job now—I am now the owner of a professional services company, and I want to wear my IT hat as little as possible.)
It's a shame. I chose Dropbox over Box.com early when I began my company, and I have been wondering lately if that was a mistake.
Ironically, because of OTHER services my company uses, we have access to Google Drive and MS OneDrive. We kept Dropbox because it was still the best at integrated into our local file systems, and syncing simply.
However, Dropbox's recent "upgrades," which add no real functionality as far as I can tell, and only made things worse, have me looking at migrating to these other solutions. (I may still give Box.com a chance, too, but that will cost more—not a lot, but more than what we have with Dropbox—and I already have the Google and MS solutions as part of other plans. We just don't use them at the moment.)
It's a real shame. Still, change is inevitable I suppose . . .
Dropbox should stop chasing Enterprise-do-it-all Rainbows and focus on their core product, and making improvements based on that. Instead, their core product keeps getting worse . . .
I need to know this as well. It broke all of our links in our job tickets. There are thousands of tickets that we would need to change because of this.
Thank you for responding and letting me know that it's not just us!
I've been looking online, and it appears that if you log into Dropbox online and go to All Files, you can tell Dropbox to move the shared folders out from under your name, which puts them back in the C:\Dropbox\ path instead of including your name. The name of our main Dropbox folder has changed, so we'll still need to update all of our code, but at least we won't have to add our names to each path every time any of us needs to use code.
Good luck!
Hello Dropbox,
I am wondering why Dropbox runs out a fundamental folder structure change without notifying it's customer beforehand?
What has changed?
- Main Dropbox folder name changed from "Dropbox (*Company*)" to "Dropbox *Company*"
- A "User folder" added as a "root directory", so an extra step into the Dropbox file directory.
- "Team folder" sits alongside "User folder" in the Dropbox "root directory"
Why Dropbox should notify before this kind of change?
- This change broke all links in all programs that use reference links. (InDesign, CAD programs).
- Our company now needs to go through all files using links and relink files with the added step of the user folder.
- This change broke the "Virtual drive letter" link in Windows.
- Creates confusion in the company, suddenly files dont work, links that were there, are not there...general confusion for a whole day.
I want to emphasize that I am not againts this change, it makes sense. But it is a change that Dropbox needed to notify beforehand. At the minimum write something about it in the "Whats new" page. I cannot find any information about this change.
We have the exact same problem since yesterday.
All our folderpath, which link to a local dropbox file/folder, don't work anymore. Also Folders became visible but not accesible for users who don't have permissions.
We are having the same issue and I don't understand why this is not a bigger 'headline'.
Before my local folder was called "Dropbox (companyname)" but now it has been automatically renamed to "companyname Dropbox"
And for some reason there's now a personal folder with my name placed in the root of the dropbox folder and when I open it, it contains folders (that were previously located in dropbox root) it makes no sense to us and we have not been making these changes our selves. Something has happened 3-4 days ago?We face the same issue - the structure automatically updated somehow and now it doesn't work like before because of the personal suborders, so if somebody creats a link to any document in an folder where everybody has access to in another folder, the otherones are not able to open the link.
- Walter
iam trying to use export command in RootsMagic 7 in windows 10. When ever use the command "save to dropbox for Apps"
I get the fvollowing error. I have upgraded firefox. Still I get the following error. This is something to do with dropbox I think.
Hi Walter
I'm obviously not the only one facing this issue.
There might be not much to worry about, but it's a surprizing change as a user, especially since it doesn't seem to be mentionned anywhere in your public changelog (unless there's another one accessible?).
Any info from you dev teams?
Thanks
- Walter
Hi all - thanks for your patience while we looked into this from our side.
In short, it seems that you received the upgrade mentioned in this Help Center article on your business accounts recently.
If you happen to be a team admin, you should have received an email regarding this upgrade.
I hope this clears things up!
Please find enclosed the double dropbox structure I explained earlier.
I had a look at the links you provided. Unfortunately, it doesn't make sense in our (company-wise) case, since we use DropBox Business for years now, and all the computers have faced this change at the same time. Thus, it can't be related to the computers setup.
Where this new structure comes from?
Thanks
