How to safely consolidate duplicate folders on Google Drive and then delete the emptied ones, syncing the kept ones?

Question

I was reinstalling my system, and I carelessly copied folders to the folder I use for Google Drive and started syncing at the same time.

That resulted in my files being split between duplicate folder, such as folder becomes folder and folder (2). I thought I would just consolidate the folders by copying the contents of folder (2) into folder and then deleting folder (2). However the result of this is that that neither folder nor folder (2) is present in my online Google Drive, even though folder is present in my Google Drive folder on one computer. Further, if I go to selective sync folder does not even appear as available to sync. If I go to the trash of my Google Drive online, I see folder.

If I undelete folder, it creates folder (2) again and I am back to where I started. So, how do I consolidate duplicate folders such that the newly consolidated folders will be synced?

I am using Insync as my client for Drive.

Any ideas for getting out of this jam?

Answer 1

1. Move the newer folder outside of Google Drive. For example, put it in your Desktop. Don't worry, it's just temporary.
2. Go to https://drive.google.com/drive/trash and delete the newer folder (it was moved to Trash when you moved it outside of Google Drive).
3. In that website, find the older folder and enter it.
4. In your computer, enter the newer folder (e.g. in your Desktop), select all files and drag and drop them into the website.
5. As result, you'll have everything in one happy folder while matching files will be upgraded into their newer versions. Make sure it worked.
6. In your computer, now you can safely delete the newer folder (again, e.g. from your Desktop) as it's now part of the old folder anyway.