Using the same local folder for Dropbox and Skydrive

Question

Ever since I switched to windows phone I've sorely missed having an official dropbox app. Recently I've toyed with the idea of moving all my crucial files to OneDrive instead. I have more storage on OneDrive and the WP OneDrive integration is very handy.

I'm thinking about having both cloud sync services point to the same local folder for the first few weeks. That way if I want to go back its an easy task (and I can keep using dropbox's superior public folder)

Has anyone else done this? Are there any potential issues (permissions, conflicts etc)

Answer 1

I have done some tests with sharing the same folder on different clouds (One Cloud, Google, dropbox,...)lately. To be honest, it seems to give nothing but problems. In fact, the files seem to be in 'sync mode' all the time and the services take a lot of memory resources. I think the reason is the following: one cloud (f.ex. dropbox) sees a new file and starts synchronising. Once done, it seems that something on the folder or file is modified. The other cloud starts syncing as well. Once done, dropbox sees a change in the file and resyncs. But so does the other cloud when dropbox has synced. So both clouds seem to be syncing all the time.

Answer 2

Cloud services will always timestamp their synch folder on your device with the time of their last synchronisation. How exactly they do this may vary from service to service.

If the synch folder is shared between services, the second service will see the date change of the first service as an update and will then go off and try to synchronise.

This can get you into a deadly embrace situation where everything is synchronising all the time.

I find it easier to have a daily run of robocopy (on Windows) to synchronise the two local synch folders. That does mean that you have two copies of everything on your local system but I have put each service's synch folder on a separate local hard drive so there is additional redundancy.

I haven't tried this on a phone so can't say if this is feasible there.

Answer 3

This is not possible. OneDrive (as of Oct 2014) always creates a sub-folder called OneDrive inside the folder you select. The best you can do is create a folder called OneDrive inside your DropBox folder, or vice versa.

Answer 4

I have linked OneDrive and DropBox successfully to the same folder in Windows 10 using a junction. I used DropBox as my cloudstorage. Then I decided to sync also to OneDrive, because I noticed that DropBox took more and more memory resources, so I decided to test both in paralled on the same folder. If OneDrive works fine, I will finally phase-out DropBox, since I have more space on OneDrive and integration with Windows 10 seems tighter.

This is how I did it:

• Default DropBox folder is: \users\"user"\DropBox
• Default OneDrive folder is: \users\"user"\OneDrive
• My Dropbox folder was synced completely
• My OneDrive was empty and synced as such
• Important: I stopped DropBox and OneDrive service/process (the green checkmarks on the DropBox files and folders will be invisible now)
• I took a backup of my DropBox in case of emergency
• I moved all my files from my DropBox folder to the empty OneDrive folder (locally): do not copy them, move them!
• I renamed (now empty) DropBox to DropBox.old in case of emergency
• I created a junction using mklink:

in cmd:

cd c:\users\"user"
mklink /j DropBox OneDrive (this creates the junction)

Now DropBox folder points to OneDrive folder. Dir will list DropBox as junction)

• Be careful: when you delete DropBox folder, you will delete OneDrive folder!
• I changed the icon from the DropBox folder to the one in the dropbox.exe (C:\Program Files (x86)\Dropbox\Client\dropbox.exe)
• I also moved the hidden and protected operating system files in the root of the DropBox.old folder to the root of OneDrive (must first make them visible: uncheck option "hide protected operating system files" and check option "show hidden files,..." within "view/options/change folder and search options" in explorer): these files are: .dropbox.cache, .dropbox, desktop.ini
• Now I started the OneDrive service/process by starting OneDrive (will ask your credentials and notice that OneDrive is not empty)
• OneDrive now starts syncing to the cloud (my "old" DropBox files)
• Inportant: I waited until all files were synced to OneDrive!
• Then I started DropBox
• DropBox started syncing a few new files (created by OneDrive)
• I tested creating/deleting/updating files locally, in the DropBox cloud and in the OneDrive cloud. All synced perfectly and did not start bouncing endlessly like other people mentionned.
• Addition: I made it even more complex and started syncing on an XP pc with SyncDriver for OneDrive pointing to the same DropBox folder. I confirm this works too. Sync is perfect between Windows 10 and Windows XP and Dropbox and OneDrive.

Note: There is only one problem so far: when OneDrive starts, it creates a hidden file in the root like: ".458A9789-D782-6E78-8D4E-78129F2A846B". DropBox cannot sync this file. Does someone have a solution for this?