Dropbox

Introduction

To connect Dropbox to your ownCloud installation requires four steps to be completed.

Install ownClouds Dropbox app

Install the External Storage Dropbox app from the ownCloud Marketplace

image

  1. Click Market in the ownCloud web UI drop-down menu on the left side

  2. Go to the Storage category

  3. Select External Storage: Dropbox App

  4. Click INSTALL

Create a Dropbox app

Next, you need to create a Dropbox app. To do that, open the new app creation form, where you see three questions:

  1. "Choose an API" –> "Dropbox API"

  2. "Choose the type of access" –> "App folder"

  3. "Name your app"

With all of the required details filled out, click the blue Create app button, in the bottom, right-hand corner. After you do that, the settings page for the application loads.

Dropbox app configuration settings

Redirect URI: Here you must enter the exact URL of the page where you configure the storage.

Examples:

When configuring as an admin:

http(s)://<<Server_Address>>/index.php/settings/admin?sectionid=storage

When configuring as a user:

http(s)://<<Server_Address>>/index.php/settings/personal?sectionid=storage

Create a Dropbox Share

To create a Dropbox share, under Admin  Settings  Storage, check the Enable external storage checkbox, if it’s not already checked. Then, in the drop-down list under External storage, click the Dropbox option.

There are two Dropbox options in the drop-down list, as Dropbox functionality is currently part of ownCloud’s core. However, the internal Dropbox functionality should be removed in ownCloud 10.0.4.

Then, you need to provide a name for the folder in the "Folder name" field, and a "client key" and "client secret", located in the "Configuration" column. The client key and client secret values are the "App key" and "App secret" fields which you saw earlier in your Dropbox app’s configuration settings page.

After you have added these three settings, click Grant access. ownCloud then interacts with Dropbox’s API to set up the new shared folder. If the process is successful, a green circle icon appears, at the far left-hand side of the row, next to the folder’s name.

A Dropbox share successfully created.

Other Options

If you want to restrict access to the share to a select list of users and groups, you can add them to the field in the "Available for" column.

Using the Dropbox Share

After a Dropbox-backed share is created, a new folder is available under "All Files". It has the name that you gave it when you created the share, and it is represented by an external share folder icon, as in the image below.

A Dropbox share successfully created.

This links to a new folder in your Dropbox account, under Dropbox  Apps, with the name of the Dropbox app that you created.

A new Dropbox share is available.

Now, if you add files and folders in either the new Dropbox folder or the new ownCloud folder, after being synced, they will be visible inside the other.

The Dropbox Apps folders.