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suibom's avatar
suibom
Helpful | Level 5
2 years ago

Can't understand the meaning of the Dropbox icon in the finder and it doesn't sync.

My system info HW: Apple M1 Pro OS: Ventura 13.5 (22G74) Dropbox ver: v180.3.4837 & joined beta   Dropbox beta has an incomprehensible behavior when using the file provider feature on macOS...
Desktop
Dropbox Family
Sync
  • Jay's avatar
    Jay
    2 years ago

    The previous article described the icons you would see in Finder.

     

    • The green sync icon means the file is available offline
    • No icon means it's 'available'. This means you doubleclicked it to open, and it's stored on your computer. However, if you're low on hard drive space, the Mac OS will delete the local copy to free up space
    • Cloud icon with a down arrow means it's online-only.
    • This would only apply to entire folders. Individual files won't have two icons at the same time.
Jay's avatar
Jay
Icon for Dropbox Staff rankDropbox Staff
2 years ago

Hi suibom, thanks for bringing this to our attention.

 

For the folders that have both a green icon and a cloud icon with a down arrow, this means that there is at least one online-only file in the folder. There can also be files that are “available” and/or “available offline” in the folder.

 

If you open the folder in question after marking it as available offline, so you see any files syncing down to the machine?

 

This will help me to assist further!

  • suibom's avatar
    suibom
    Helpful | Level 5
    2 years ago

     

    First off, thanks for the reply.


    I'm just writing this after changing my Dropbox/Movies directory with "Make avialable offline", and dropbox is in "syncing x files..." status.
    As for the icon in the finder, do I understand it as follows?
    1. the "dropbox icon" in the finder: this is dropbox's "goal", i.e. the state it wants to be available offline, and does not mean it is currently available offline.
    2. if there's no icon in place of the dropbox icon in the finder, it's only available online.
    3. cloud icon in finder: an arrow down icon means it's downloading, no icon means it's "actually" downloaded.
    4. the user can only assume that "real" offline access is available when the dropbox icon is offline available and the cloud icon is gone.

     

    Does this make sense?

    • Jay's avatar
      Jay
      Icon for Dropbox Staff rankDropbox Staff
      2 years ago

      The previous article described the icons you would see in Finder.

       

      • The green sync icon means the file is available offline
      • No icon means it's 'available'. This means you doubleclicked it to open, and it's stored on your computer. However, if you're low on hard drive space, the Mac OS will delete the local copy to free up space
      • Cloud icon with a down arrow means it's online-only.
      • This would only apply to entire folders. Individual files won't have two icons at the same time.
      • csmini's avatar
        csmini
        New member | Level 2
        2 years ago

        "This would only apply to entire folders. Individual files won't have two icons at the same time."

        Yes they have.

        That's exactly the issue here.

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