<story><title>Expected changes with Dropbox for macOS</title><url>https://help.dropbox.com/installs/macos-support-for-expected-changes</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>jez</author><text>A lot of people are taking this as yet another example of Dropbox changing things for no reason, but I think it’s important to make clear that in this case Apple is forcing their hand. Dropbox is being told by Apple that apps must integrate with File Provider API[1] if they want to present files that don&amp;#x27;t exist on disk until they’re first opened.&lt;p&gt;This API is hamstrung and limiting, full of instabilities and quirks (designed to fit iCloud primarily but not necessarily everyone else).&lt;p&gt;In my opinion, the fault lies with Apple here.&lt;p&gt;[1] &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;developer.apple.com&amp;#x2F;documentation&amp;#x2F;fileprovider&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;developer.apple.com&amp;#x2F;documentation&amp;#x2F;fileprovider&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;(Full disclosure: I interned at Dropbox for 3 months 8 years ago.)</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>t8sr</author><text>Apple can’t (yet) stop you syncing a folder somewhere on the disk. Other services offer this feature - sync.com for example, which I switched to after Dropbox announced this change.&lt;p&gt;Dropbox wants to offer some features that are only available through Apple’s API. They want to be on the App Store. But they need to weigh that against what still is their primary feature, and literally how the product was described when sold. “A folder synchronized across all your devices.”&lt;p&gt;I am not a product manager, but I simply would not throw out my main feature and the thing that differentiates me in the market, in order to provide some features Apple wants, where the only difference between me and OneDrive is the icon.</text></comment>
<story><title>Expected changes with Dropbox for macOS</title><url>https://help.dropbox.com/installs/macos-support-for-expected-changes</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>jez</author><text>A lot of people are taking this as yet another example of Dropbox changing things for no reason, but I think it’s important to make clear that in this case Apple is forcing their hand. Dropbox is being told by Apple that apps must integrate with File Provider API[1] if they want to present files that don&amp;#x27;t exist on disk until they’re first opened.&lt;p&gt;This API is hamstrung and limiting, full of instabilities and quirks (designed to fit iCloud primarily but not necessarily everyone else).&lt;p&gt;In my opinion, the fault lies with Apple here.&lt;p&gt;[1] &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;developer.apple.com&amp;#x2F;documentation&amp;#x2F;fileprovider&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;developer.apple.com&amp;#x2F;documentation&amp;#x2F;fileprovider&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;(Full disclosure: I interned at Dropbox for 3 months 8 years ago.)</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>shortformblog</author><text>I had frustrations with Dropbox about a lot of this when I realized they had made little public effort for Apple Silicon, but I think the fact that Dropbox is kind of stuck moving in this direction essentially highlights that Apple’s approach to cloud works for Apple … but not really anyone else.&lt;p&gt;I think for tools like like Box or even OneDrive, this move makes sense for, but Dropbox is intended to be a living backup of your primary folders, and that model just doesn’t fit with this.&lt;p&gt;This is almost bad enough to the point where the right play might be to have a machine on another platform, like Linux or Windows, manage your file sync, then to just access it on your local network. Apple really messed this up.</text></comment>