Why nine year-olds, Dropbox and "All My Files" don't mix

[KB]

A fun start to the weekend: Late last night, Jennifer (MimeticMouton) emailed us to say that thousands of files were being wiped from the company's shared Dropbox folder (where we keep internal builds, company logos, and various important company files that need to be accessed by the whole team). On checking my own machine, I found the same thing - 8,500 files were gone; every folder in our shared Dropbox directory was empty.

The cause, it turned out, was sleeping soundly upstairs.

Julia's computer is on its way out, so she has been preparing files for backup to an external disk. It transpires that our nine year-old son, upon hearing this and noticing an empty "backup" folder on Julia's machine yesterday, decided to be, er, "helpful". How to ensure his mom doesn't lose any files? Of course! Simply drag every single file from the "All My Files" list in the Finder into that "backup" folder.

I've always wondered what the point of that "All My Files" list is (it seems very Windows-y - no offence to our Windows users), and now I know: to make it really easy for those who don't have a good grasp of the file system to lose everything. (But then Apple does like to make things easier...)

(Fortunately Dropbox were brilliant: I emailed them late last night - following this advice: https://www.dropbox.com/help/400/en - and they got back to me within five minutes to say they were restoring my files, which now all seem to be back safe and sound. Phew.)

[vic-k]

Joys of parenthood Kev...joys of paren....
Comes with the job
Vic

[Juddbert]

Very reassuring to know that the Dropbox team are providing a safety net.

[garpu]

Since I haven't had much experience with OS X past Tiger, I asked Steve and his dad about the "All Files" thing. They started screaming, and I didn't think it was a good idea to push for further information.

[Siren]

I'm very impressed with the little one's technical skills! The end-result may not have been entirely desirable, but his enterprise and confidence are admirable

[Broken Thought]

Sounds about right.

Cool thing Dropbox is on the ball. Ah, customer service, it's good to know your still around lurking in the shadows.

[AndreasE]

9-year-old destroys father's company and harms the careers of millions of writers – experts predict severe shortage of novels in coming years!

would have been a nightmarish news headline, indeed. Glad the Guardians of Data prevented it from happening!

[vic-k]

My cousins seven year old great grandson, is constantly pulling his uni-grad mum, out of the cyber-tech-computer os mire, as well as sorting out his great grand-dad’s frequent os/internet problems. As I was informed t’other day, this kid looked at one adult who was talking to him, with one of those looks that can cause the sensitive types to shrivel up, and said, “Will you please stop talking to me like a child!” According to his great grand parents, his other areas of expertise are many and varied. 7 yrs. old! What chance have us crinklies got?

A old friend of mine informed me a while ago, that his grand kids regularly change the password on his laptop, just for laughs. He’s had: Mickey Mouse; Donald Duck; Pluto, and I think he said Popeye, too.
Vic

[homeport]

Brilliant post I laughed until I cried you have to see the humour in this. What a great addition to your company in coming years. Well done Dropbox

[pigfender]

So... Dropbox still has your files even if you delete them. Hmmm. MIXED EMOTIONS.

[Fluff]

Hmmm. MIXED EMOTIONS.

Ve are vatching yoo!
vatchit!
DB

[garpu]

So... Dropbox still has your files even if you delete them. Hmmm. MIXED EMOTIONS.

Yeah, it does feel rather Faustian.

[robertdguthrie]

So... Dropbox still has your files even if you delete them.

For 30 days. If you want them to hold onto your files longer, you have to pay them: https://www.dropbox.com/help/113/en

[Wock]

Drop is rather handy but I am a little leery of it even though its one of the most secure file syncing software out there.

Dropsmack

http://www.techrepublic.com/blog/securi ... lware/9332


I likes the old VPN

[gr]

What I am wondering is why our software kingpin has not adjusted his Finder settings to remove the notorious 'All My Files' item from the Finder binder.

-G