BOX Not Syncing - Misclassification of Files suspected
AnsweredI am running the latest version of Mac OS Ventura, BOX, and Adobe Apps.
When I open a synced file through finder and edit it the changes show up on my local computer but not on the web versions or colleagues computers. Refreshing does nothing, box does not mark the file with a unique indicator in finder (it really should instead of using the "online only" cloud symbol), there are no errors reported via the Menu Bar pop up.
The only way to tell at a glance is that the problem file has the "online only" cloud indicator when the entire parent folder has been set to be "available offline" and the parent folder and all unaffected files within show the green circle and white checkmark. There's only one problem with this indicator, Online only files are also marked with the same cloud "online only" indicator. So you have to check the file itself 1 by 1 to see if it's truly online only or if it's a problem file that wont sync. You do this by right clicking (ctrl + click) on the file and under Quick Actions it says Cannot Sync (ignored item). There is no way to "force" sync the problem file you simply have to find a workaround which don't always work and can often lead to "broken links" in adobe files or duplicate but different files on the box server.
( one is legacy, never got updated, the other is the edited file. The box versioning feature no longer works for those files, they are now separate and there is no way to merge them easily. If you want to preserve versioning, you'll have to download the edited version via the web, click on the old one via the web, and "upload a new version" via the web to upload the edited file you just downloaded)
What causes the issue?
I suspect its an error in how box implemented it's block of temporary files. (https://support.box.com/hc/en-us/articles/360044195433-File-Types-Ignored-or-Blocked-by-Box-Sync-and-Box-Drive ) [ "Box Sync and Box Drive ignore the following file types and shortcuts: Temporary files and folders (.tmp and files starting with the ~ character)" - Box page Quoted here ]
Why?
because the file is up to date on both versions, web and desktop, until you save, which generates a .tmp file with all the edited data before then overwriting the original file with the contents of the .tmp file and deleting the .tmp file (if saving went successfully)
What I think happens...
box blocks the .tmp file as they admittedly do. Locally the file successfully updates and saves because changes were generated locally, not on/via box. On the Web/Box Drive however, your file is never updated because somehow Box Drive manages to tie the .tmp file that was created during a save and associate it with the source file. So now Box considers this updated locally available file a tmp file and Box will not let you sync it to box servers, Box will not actually refresh the file, even if you refresh the specific file or any of its parent folders. Your updated local copy is now stuck being a local copy because Box misclassified it as a tmp file.
Yes there are workarounds but they are not at all seamless or intuitive AND with files that reference other files these workarounds are often nonsensical as they have a high probability of "Breaking" the links.
Box needs to fix this as soon as possible...
Note,
While I reference specifically Adobe Apps, my assumption is that this issue affects all programs that use .tmp files to save on all MAC OS Ventura computers. This is also not the first time an issue like this has occurred for box on other mac os versions and for people that rely on their colleagues to use the absolute latest version of a file you updated I would really consider shifting cloud storage providers if this isn't fixed in a timely manner. I have already had several projects be negatively impacted and have had to identify the potential cause of this issue on my own.
@ box support - I have a support case currently open against this problem with the appropriate logs, screenshots etc. feel free to contact me via that case. I have already done all the basic troubleshooting Box has requested, so no need to post those troubleshooting steps here as they clearly didn't help/work and would be misleading to other users currently experiencing the same/similar issues.
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