Dropbox channel

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Go to the Channel Catalog to learn more about what plans have access to this channel. Sign into Quickbase, and then go to Pipelines > Channels.

Dropbox is a file hosting service that offers cloud storage, file synchronization, personal cloud, and client software.

Please note that terms used in the Dropbox channel categories are Dropbox specific terminology.

How to connect

  1. On the My pipelines page, select Create Pipeline.

  2. Search for or select a step, and then select it to add it to the pipeline.
    When you add a step to a pipeline, it is added to the canvas of the pipeline designer.

  3.  Expand the Connection section of the step, and add the required information.

Connect to Dropbox

  1. Expand Dropbox in the list of channels on the right side of the page and click Connect to Dropbox.

  2. In the pop-up window, click Connect to Dropbox.
     

  3. Sign in with your Dropbox credentials and click Sign in.

  4. You will be asked to allow Quickbase permission to access your Dropbox account, click Allow.

How to reconnect

You may need to reconnect your account to a channel. Reasons may be (but not limited to):

  • If you need to connect a different account.

  • Authorization updates, such as a changed password.

  • Editing the access rights that Pipelines has to the channel.

To reconnect:

  1. Select a pipeline that already has this channel in it.

  2. Open a step that contains this channel.

  3. Under account, select Connect (or reconnect) and follow the process above, How to connect.
     

Steps

The steps you can use with Dropbox fall into two categories: Folders and Files.

Note: You cannot use jinja expressions in trigger conditions unless explicitly specified as possible.

Type

Name

Description

Folders

Action

Create Folder

Creates a new child folder in the parent folder identified in the Parent Folder field. If the field is left empty, the root folder will be used.

The Name field used for naming your new folder, accepts the standard forward-slash ( / ) sub-folder(s) prefix . For example, Q1-reports/finance-jan, where finance-jan is a subfolder of Q1-reports.

Action

Delete Folder

Deletes a target folder identified in the Folder field. This field receives information that is either created or looked up by path/id in a previous step within the pipeline.

Action

Copy a Folder

Copies the target folder, identified in the Folder field, and all its contents to a new location. The Folder field receives information that is either created or looked up by path/id in a previous step within the pipeline. You may choose to provide a Destination Folder for the copied contents to be placed or if left blank, the default root folder is selected. *

Action

Move a Folder

Moves a particular folder and its contents from one place to another. It functions similarly to Copy a Folder by supplying the Folder field with information that is either created or looked up by path/id in a previous step. Specify a location to move your folder to, in the Destination Folder field, or leave blank to use the root folder as the parent.*

Action

Share a Folder

Share a particular folder and its contents.

Query

Search Folders

Searches for folders and returns a list of potential matches based on the search criteria. The Recursive field is set to Yes by default.

Action

Look Up Folder

Looks up a folder and returns a single record based on the search criteria.

Note: When using a path for your query, use everything after the /home section of the Dropbox URL.
For example: https://www.dropbox.com/home/EmploymentContracts

Files

Trigger

File Modified

Initiates the pipeline when any file is modified (i.e. uploaded, moved,or copied). The optional Folder field is used to select a particular folder to watch for any activity to any of the files, in order to trigger the pipeline.

Action

Delete File

Deletes a target file identified by information received from uploaded, moved, or copied files from previous steps, or looked up by path/id, in an earlier step.

Action

Copy a File

Copies a target file identified by information received from uploaded, moved, or copied files from previous steps, or looked up by path/id in an earlier step. The Destination Field is optional and is used to specify the location for your file(s).If nothing is entered, the root folder is the default location. *

Action

Move a File

Moves a particular file from one place to another. Similar to the Copy a File step above, the File field is populated with options from information that is either created or looked up by path/id in a previous step. Use the Destination Folder field to specify where to move the data or leave blank to default to the root folder.*

Action

Upload a File

Uploads a file. Max allowed file size is 100 MB.

You can designate a folder only by path or ID, not by name. The path in Dropbox is considered to be everything after the /home section of the Dropbox URL. Folder ID could be looked up in a previous step and then referenced in this field.
If left blank, the root folder will be used.

Query

Search Files

Searches for files and returns a list of potential matches based on the search criteria.

The Recursive field, which will recursively search to all sub folders and return results, is set to Yes by default.

Action

Look Up File

Looks for a file based on search criteria and returns a single record.

*Common issues when using Copy and Move steps

At times, there have been issues with the Copy and the Move steps running correctly and cause them to fail, typically due to an external issue. The following example image shows a typical error window and the following list are the other types of errors you may see in the error window.

  • cant_copy_shared_folder - shared folders can't be copied

  • cant_nest_shared_folder - move action would result in nested shared folders. This is not allowed.

  • cant_move_folder_into_itself - cannot move a folder into itself.

  • too_many_files - the action would involve more than 10,000 files and folders, which is not allowed.

  • duplicated_or_nested_paths - there are duplicated/nested paths among from_path and to_path.

  • cant_transfer_ownership - move action would result in an ownership transfer.

  • insufficient_quota - the current user/account does not have enough space to move or copy the files.

  • cant_move_shared_folder - can't move the shared folder to the given destination.

Use case examples

The following are some examples of using the Dropbox channel.

In this example, when the file is added or changed in Dropbox, we want to upload the file to Quickbase.

  1. We add the Dropbox step File Added or changed.

    dropbox.1.png

  2. We find our Quickbase record using the step, Look Up a Record.

    dropbox.2.png

  3. We upload the file with the Quickbase step Upload a file.

    dropbox.3.png