Dropbox

• Dropbox is a US based commercial company. Any data saved via Dropbox, are affected by US laws.

• At UZH, the recommended alternative to dropbox is Switchdrive: http://drive.switch.ch.

• Advantages of Switchdrive against Dropbox:
  • Switchdrive: Swiss data protection laws are respected.
  • Switchdrive: Diskquota: 50GB.
  • Switchdrive: All major OS are fully supported.
  • Switchdrive: No device limit.

• 2019/03: New 3 device limit (non-paid account) https://help.dropbox.com/account/computer-limit

I-MATH: Thinlinc

• Disk usage of Dropbox is separated from I-MATH home quota.

• The default disk quota for the thinlinc dropbox installation is 10GB. If you need more, please contact the IT-support.

• Installation

Private computer / notebook

• Linux / Windows / Mac.
• Please follow the dropbox official installation guide.

Installation at I-MATH Thinlinc environment

• End of 2018, dropbox limits the linux client to only operate on ext4 filesystem.

• To fulfil the requirements in the thinlinc environment, we've installed a system wide workaround.

• If you run into trouble during installation, please contact the IT-support.

• Start: Applications > Internet > Dropbox.

• If you start 'dropbox' the first time: you're asked for your I-MATH password - please provide.

• The first start might take several minutes! Please be patient.
• Click 'OK' to start the Dropbox installation.
• After some time, a webbrowser opens and asks you to log in via dropbox.com to your dropbox account: do this.
• Again after some time, you'll be prompted with:

• Click on Move.

• The above windows stays in front - move it to the side, navigate to /dropbox/<your account> and click Choose.

• If you already have a lot of files in your Dropbox, it might take several minutes until the files are synchronized.

FAQ

• Q: I'm missing my Dropbox folder?

  • A: Navigate in the filemanager to /dropbox/<my account>.

• Q: I don't like /dropbox/<my account>. Can I move it to a different location?

  • A: No. Only /dropbox/<my account> will work in a thinlinc environment.

• Q: Are there snapshots/backups of /dropbox/<my account>?

  • A: No. The ext4 filesystem does not support snapshots. Use the Dropbox webinterface to access older versions of your files.

• Q: My local folder /dropbox/<my account> run's out of space, what can I do?

  • A: Contact IT-support.

• Q: On the compute hosts, there is no `/dropbox/<my account>'!

  • A: Unfortunately, that's correct. The new Dropbox directory is only available inside of the thinlinc session.