Syncing issues (Dropbox, general)
I frequently have issues getting Dropbox to synchronize or update. See Indexing... (Dropbox - Case 2024.06) and 'Syncing' maar er gebeurt niets (Dropbox) for examples. In 2024.09, I had installed Dropbox on a new old laptop with the same 2TB subscription. Now the issue is and endless Starting... status. However, there is some Dropbox
General problem
It seems that these syncronisation problems basically are related to managing over 2 million files. Not downloading these files, but just managing them. One example that points to this: When reducing the number of files through Selective Sync, the problem might actually occur because of this managing issue.
Solutions
Two general solutions:
Give it a week
- Give it some time. Meaning: A week, and some stuff may appear
- Unfortunately, this doesn't mean that from that moment on, this instance of Dropbox will be up-to-date.
Increase the number of file watches
In Sep. 2024, this surprisingly seemed to work - I didn't expect that this would be relevant concerning initial downloading of files. Maybe it does, because immediately following the download of a file, Dropbox has to monitor it on this new device for changes.
Diagnostics: Use dropbox stop & start
Get some diagnostics through stopping and starting Dropbox through the Dropbox CLI:
dropbox stop dropbox start
Case, 2024.09.05 - Including some familiar additional information:
$ dropbox stop $ dropbox start Starting Dropbox...dropbox: load fq extension '/home/jeroen/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-206.4.6506/cryptography.hazmat.bindings._openssl.abi3.so' dropbox: load fq extension '/home/jeroen/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-206.4.6506/cryptography.hazmat.bindings._padding.abi3.so' dropbox: load fq extension '/home/jeroen/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-206.4.6506/apex._apex.abi3.so' dropbox: load fq extension '/home/jeroen/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-206.4.6506/psutil._psutil_linux.cpython-38-x86_64-linux-gnu.so' dropbox: load fq extension '/home/jeroen/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-206.4.6506/psutil._psutil_posix.cpython-38-x86_64-linux-gnu.so' dropbox: load fq extension '/home/jeroen/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-206.4.6506/google._upb._message.cpython-38-x86_64-linux-gnu.so' dropbox: load fq extension '/home/jeroen/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-206.4.6506/tornado.speedups.cpython-38-x86_64-linux-gnu.so' dropbox: load fq extension '/home/jeroen/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-206.4.6506/wrapt._wrappers.cpython-38-x86_64-linux-gnu.so' Done! $ Unable to monitor entire Dropbox folder hierarchy. Please run "echo fs.inotify.max_user_watches=100000 | sudo tee -a /etc/sysctl.conf; sudo sysctl -p" and restart Dropbox to fix the problem.
Case: Increase the number of watches (2024.09)
- Based on the diagnosis mentioned above
- Updated to 10 million:
echo fs.inotify.max_user_watches=10000000 | sudo tee -a /etc/sysctl.conf; sudo sysctl -p - See File watches & Dropbox for details
When stopping & restarting Dropbox, the message disappeared:
$ dropbox stop $ dropbox start Starting Dropbox...dropbox: load fq extension '/home/jeroen/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-206.4.6506/cryptography.hazmat.bindings._openssl.abi3.so' dropbox: load fq extension '/home/jeroen/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-206.4.6506/cryptography.hazmat.bindings._padding.abi3.so' dropbox: load fq extension '/home/jeroen/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-206.4.6506/apex._apex.abi3.so' dropbox: load fq extension '/home/jeroen/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-206.4.6506/psutil._psutil_linux.cpython-38-x86_64-linux-gnu.so' dropbox: load fq extension '/home/jeroen/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-206.4.6506/psutil._psutil_posix.cpython-38-x86_64-linux-gnu.so' dropbox: load fq extension '/home/jeroen/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-206.4.6506/google._upb._message.cpython-38-x86_64-linux-gnu.so' dropbox: load fq extension '/home/jeroen/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-206.4.6506/tornado.speedups.cpython-38-x86_64-linux-gnu.so' dropbox: load fq extension '/home/jeroen/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-206.4.6506/wrapt._wrappers.cpython-38-x86_64-linux-gnu.so' Done!
And to my surprise:
$ dropbox status Syncing 548,597 files • 2+ days Downloading 548,597 files (LAN) (31.0 KB/sec, 2+ days)
I never had anything else than Starting... in the two weeks that this laptop has been switched on.