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Forum Discussion
Make offline files visible in the android filesystem
I think you should make files stored offline on Android available in the file system.
As it is now, the dropbox files marked as 'available offline' are hidden from the rest of the operating system. This gives a number of problems:
1: When opening a file in an app, that app may put the file path in its 'most recently used documents'-list. However, since the path it gets from the Dropbox-app is not long-lived, the 'most recently used documents'-list becomes unusable, since the links on it become dead rather quickly.
2: It makes using browsing apps, like photo viewers or podcast players, on your offline files impossible.
3: Some apps expect content to be found on the file system. For example, the samsung app used to download content onto a samsung smart watch, expects to find files in the file system. It cannot be used to download files from dropbox onto the smart watch.
4: Sometimes a smart phone is used a bit like a computer. Like uploading files to an FTP-server and the like. A FTP-client typically expects to find files on the file system, and allows them to be selected and uploaded. This does not work with Dropbox.
A possible work-around is to export the contents from the dropbox offline folder onto the phones regular file system. This is unsatisfactory because:
1) It feels cumbersome. The number of clicks to send a podcast episode to a smart watch, or to download a .pdf from dropbox and upload to an FTP-server, becomes a few too many.
2) For files which can be edited (like password manager saves, various profiles, text documents etc), the user needs to remember to copy the file back to Dropbox, which is very error prone.
Dropbox obviously already has technology to synk a file system folder with dropbox. Could not this functionality be offered on smart phones also?
So great that I first pay a monthly fee for dropbox, and then I need an additional 3rd party app to access my files outside the dropbox app.. makes no sense. Considering changing to another cloud service after my current payment period ends.
- My solution that solved it was the Dropsync app from the Google Play store. You can set up folder pairs (your music or video call or whatever) to sync where you want them to be. I set up the folder holding my music on Dropbox linked to a music folder on the SD card in my tablet. It indexed all the subfolders in the DB, then created matching subfolders on the SD card, then filled them all with the mp3 files. You can choose whether it checks for changes and syncs them, how often, if it can use your mobile data, if you don't want to sync unless the android is plugged in, and if it syncs files both directions or just one. The free version is limited, but the pro key is reasonable and permanent and lets you set up a large number of folders to sync. This is the best way I've found to make your offline files visible and accessible to any app you want to use locally.
Upvote!! Dropbox please bring the feature back.
2.5 years later and still not fixed. This list of comments likely only scratches the surface of the number of people who are affected by this (most people just wouldn't bother to comment).
People want to be able to edit the file with other apps and, when saved within that other app, have that sync to their DB account.
Does the DB team even read these comments?
"Does the DB team even read these comments?"
Doesn't matter. The overpaid, technologically illiterate suits with MBAs at the top have zero vision and cannot understand why someone would want this ability.
I need someone from dropbox to explain why this is so messed up. I used to love your service hiding the files on android phones is ridiculous.
Definitely one more vote for this "feature" here. I cannot believe this design choice, it severely diminishes the value of Dropbox as a cloud service. Now I cannot do on my tablet or cell phone what I can do on my PC... It is truly unbelievable.
Dropbox is already lacking in terms of integrations with available apps on the mobile market, as most support other clouds, often natively. Now the only way to still use Dropbox in 3rd party apps is closed, this is a huge misunderstanding of the needs of many users.
Obviously no fix will be made in any reasonable time frame, so I'll look for another cloud storage that is actually living with its time.
The fact that this doesnt work like that is utterly useless. I will be cancelling my pro, not even waiting till the trial ends. Might as well not have the app at all and only use web version in chrome on mobile. Who came up with the idea of REMOVING the only point of the goddamn service - file synchronization. This is a joke.
- Jay
Dropbox Staff
Hi everyone, due to recent updates made to Android systems, offline files can only be stored in a Cache folder. I am afraid that the only way to access your Dropbox files on your mobile device even when offline is to use the Dropbox App directly. This would be the intended functionality.
If you wish to access these files outside of the Dropbox App then you can always export your Dropbox files to your mobile device directly instead. We appreciate your patience and understanding throughout this process.
Please let us know if you need further assistance.
Jay wrote:
[D]ue to recent updates made to Android systems, offline files can only be stored in a Cache folder.That is just not true. There are plenty of apps out there that store things in the file system where it's accessible by other apps.
Jay wrote:
This would be the intended functionality.That's the functionality that YOU have chosen. It's clearly not the functionality that your customers want. It may be working as intended, but your intentions here are rubbish.
Jay wrote:
If you wish to access these files outside of the Dropbox App then you can always export your Dropbox files to your mobile device directly instead.Again, that's not true and also defeats the purpose of Dropbox. The purpose of dropbox is to keep folders and files in sync across multiple devices. The app does not let you download folders. Plus, once a file is download to my phone, changes to that file on my phone are no longer reflected on my other devices.
Jay wrote:
We appreciate your patience and understanding throughout this process.
Please let us know if you need further assistance.My patience for this ran out a long time ago. My understanding is that you're sticking cotton in your ears and pretending everything is just fine. The only "process" going on here is Dropbox making false statements and claiming there's nothing they can do (about their own product).
I do need further assistance though. I need Dropbox to abandon their push on the web interface and again focus on the client programs/apps, which are the reason anyone ever starts using dropbox in the first place. You are ruining your own product by believing you can tell customers what they want, rather than selling the product they need.
- Jay
You and DB are just searching for (invalid) excuses. Not for solutions.
Every other app out there can make own folder in the root drive that is fully available to the user and all other apps (android user). For example, I have an app from DJI (drones) and cached photos are stored in publicly available folder. Even the standard Gallery app has access there. So - no excuses from DB. You tell us just bullsh*t. I think it's time to move to a competitor. Jay Stop saying that. It is simply not true. There are several apps out there, on Google play, with better star rating than Dropbox app, that do exactly that, which I bought and use to sync up files. "offline files can only be stored in a Cache folder" cannot be true as MULTIPLE software apps do this, and only one is needed to prove you wrong.
27,377 people have vouched for ONE of the sync solutions available. Another has 38,174. And all of them on the first page that I checked have a better rating than Dropbox's own solution, hovering between 4.6 and 4.8 with DB's own at 4.2.
And may I say, it's well deserved. DB has positioned itself as the premium and it's so warm and fuzzy in its throne that it doesn't even consider adding features that everyone else has. Even the reviewers recommend using a good explorer with Dropbox functionality in place of the original app. I don't understand how a solo developer using APIs that DB made outpaces a 2500 employees corporation.
simpson b. Please share what apps you've found that have this functionality, I'd like to know my options.
- JayHi everyone, we appreciate the feedback on how to improve the Dropbox mobile app.
This is the expected behavior of the Android app, so it wouldn't be possible to change it for offline files to be visible outside the app.> This is the expected behavior of the Android app, so it wouldn't be possible to change it for offline files to be visible outside the app
When I pay Dropbox every month, I'm paying for a service that keeps files in sync across multiple devices. I don't pay you for just the Android app. The Android app is just one element of the service you provide. What I expect from it is the same service I get everywhere else: keeping a folder on the device in sync without me having to think about it.
In other words, the current Android app behavior is NOT the behavior I expect from Dropbox. Go back to your roots and maintain the functionality that brought me to you in the first place.
No. Clock off.
- Love, Dropbox team.
Oh by the way, since I'm a developer myself, I read up on restrictions in Android 11 and 12, turns out, you can access the folders just fine, just not with Dropbox. Third party tools can, other apps can and some of the browsers even support Dropbox. Best 4 bucks I ever spent.
There's a list on reddit in r/Android with all the tools that can access restricted folders and can sync from cloud services, some from dropbox some from competing services. I don't have the time to read on linking so I'll just say: if you know where reddit is and what r/Android means, it should take you under a minute.
I mean I GUESS I don't care who syncs it. Bit disappointed, but from what I care this issue is solved.
There's this guy who says he syncs his savegames between PC and Android from 4 days ago so I'm happy. 😀
“This is the expected behavior of the Android app, so it wouldn't be possible to change it for offline files to be visible outside the app.”
…
Customer: “Dear restaurant, your food tastes like garbage. Please make your food not taste like garbage.”
Restaurant: “This is the expected flavor of the food, so it’s not possible to make it not taste like garbage.”
I feel like I’m taking crazy pills.
Jay wrote:
Hi everyone, we appreciate the feedback on how to improve the Dropbox mobile app.
...Jay, The application for Android used to work in such a way, so... "to improve"... 🤷 There is nothing to improve! Just get back the feature available on versions 202.2.2 and earlier (and might be one more later).
Jay wrote:
...
This is the expected behavior of the Android app, so it wouldn't be possible to change it for offline files to be visible outside the app.What are you saying? The versions I mentioned above are "impossible"?!... Strange... 🤔 Probably they are imaginary... They don't exist and never existed on the earth.
Oh... I forgot to mention that I'm using the version mentioned and it's working "as expected":
... As most people expect, not as you expect! 👆 So it's possible... definitely. 😉
"Save a file to the Dropbox folder on your computer, and it will synchronize automatically to your mobile device. Cloud file sync is available on multiple devices and platforms, from Windows and Mac to mobile devices like iPhone, iPad and Android via the Dropbox mobile app."
Of course it syncs to my Android. You just have to open the app, wait for it while having internet, then select the file, then click export and it gets downloaded.
How is this not "syncing"? What do you mean you can just use a browser?
What do you mean the browser has a "download" option for a folder and the app doesn't, so you can download and unpack it?
What do you mean what is the point of the android app? It's for uploading the camera reel and ... erm. Well it's worse than the web interface but at least it has fewer features. Might be faster.
Is that why my go***bleep** smarthome stopped working, cause all my tablets have stopped having access to the shared resources that dropbox synced.
Look. I like dropbox, a lot, but some of these decisions are incredibly hard to understand. What am I supposed to do, Dropbox, export each file in my music collection? Manually export every jpg that is used as a background? Export an entire website structure by hand, file by file?
Why are you making yourself so difficult to like? Make a dropbox folder in the root storage or whatever and sync there.
This is ridiculous. Either sync to all supported platforms or admit you can't - I can see and export files from a web browser, I don't need an app.
Also, hell, Dropbox, it worked until I opened the app it it forced me to update so it works, you just killed the feature cause newer users upgraded to a newer android. So an app that works on an OS that works just gets nuked cause you can't be bothered to keep the feature.
