Can a Devonthink DB/file reside on Dropbox

I was wondering if a DTPR file could reside on Dropbox. That way I could access it between my two machines. I’m just curious if anyone has tried that.

You might want to search the forum for more on this topic – it has been discussed in numerous threads for years.

The gist of the conservative side of issue is: don’t do it. DEVONthink databases are packages with numerous internal files, some of which will get changed by DEVONthink frequently, others not. Dropbox doesn’t handle packages well when the application that created the package is accessing it. A corrupted database is very possible.

The DEVONthink sync plugin will support a type of synchronization with Dropbox (and other remote storage options) that has been designed specifically to address the risks. The approach is not the same as putting the database into Dropbox. The plugin is available in public beta (see Eric’s blog) and version two of the beta was recently posted.

NEVER access a single instance of a database from two machines at the same time. This is guaranteed to fail. DEVONthink is a single-user database and doesn’t have the necessary features to allow simultaneous users. Your database can become irreparably corrupted. If you need sharing, consider using the DEVONthink server built into advanced versions of DEVONthink.

Thanks for your reply. Its exactly what I wanted to know. I was also curious if that public beta 2 was out yet. I’m glad to hear that it is.

I can confirm that placing a DT database into Dropbox invites problems (data corruption, possibly slowdowns), even when Dropbox is used on a single machine and solely for backup purposes.

My alternative is to instead sync a tar archive of my databases. I chose tar because it produces uncompressed archives, which I guess (perhaps wrongly) might be less sensitive to content modifications than compressed ones, and therefore faster to upload given the “differential syncing” algorithms that Dropbox utilizes.

So, I first created an automator process warning me to close all databases prior to archiving, and then executing the command:


tar -c -f <Destination> <Source(s)>

``` for example:

tar -c -f ~/Dropbox/DTBackup.tar ~/Documents/Database1.dtBase2 ~/Documents/Database2.dtBase2 ~/Documents/Database3.dtBase2


It's all been working well so far, and it is fairly transparent. My databases add up to nearly 10GB, with tar requiring approximately 3 minutes (during which I keep DT closed) and Dropbox a minimum of 2-3 minutes for the differential syncing (depending on the volume of modifications to my databases, though this is inconsequential as I can safely run DT and work meanwhile).

The most significant downside to this method is that it obviously doubles up the amount of storage used. You may want to use compressed archives instead if your space is limited.

Thanks for sharing this macula (and for more anecdotal support on the Dropbox dangers). Cheers!
:^)