Forum Discussion
Are the dev for onedrive for mac stupid？
HenryHuang It would help if you came to the forum without a list of personal grievances based on complete misconceptions, AND provided some useful information (standard on support forums) such as your MacOS version.
These forums are also supported by other users. If you want Microsoft tech support then it's not hard to find out how to contact them.
Please go and do some training and read-up on OneDrive usage, particularly around selective sync. If you want files on demand, make sure your MacOS version is sufficiently up to date. There are also plenty of troubleshooter pages out there which you can step through. If they fail, and you don't want to call Microsoft, then come back and detail what you've tried, and some useful information about your system that volunteers can make sense of.
Hi, Mike Williams
Thank you for your reply.
I use this product for about 5 or 6 years. I have both windows machines (Cloud and physical) and a Mac machine. I set the sync between those machines. One machine as the main server, keep all files on that, and other machines only sync a few folders as I need different files in different machines. In my main server, There are 502GB data in my business account, 195,614 files in it.
Trust me, I do not need training on how to set sync.
MacOS: 10.15.6.
OneDrive: 20.084.0426.0007
Both business and personal onedrive keep sync status, but no files can be truly synced.
First, I am thinking it's the Chinese Great firewall block the sync, I tried SG / US VPN, still the same result, after 2 days waiting, I realize that will never work.
Then I checked the articles to troubleshooting the issue.
Uninstall/reinstall.
Reset Onedrive.
File On-demand is the key here. Onedrive set it as default and start sync immediately when you first log in. Onedrive will read / sync all files name to your local machines, only the file name, but not download it.
If there are 1,000 files, it's OK, read the folder structure and file name is an easy job. But if there are a huge number of files, for example, 1,000,000, read the filename will get stuck. And you can not change the sync setting (unselect those folders you do not want sync now), because the sync process is not finished, an endless loop.
That's why I would like to ask MS that please Let the user select sync folder, select File on Demand or not, then start the sync. If they can do that, I must take my hat off to them.
HenryHuang If you're going to try to sync 1000000 files then you're running at 3x the suggested limits documented by Microsoft: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/invalid-file-names-and-file-types-in-onedrive-and-sharepoint-64883a5d-228e-48f5-b3d2-eb39e07630fa?ui=en-us&rs=en-us&ad=us#numberitemscanbesynced
Essentially with OneDrive you're in a single SharePoint doclib. If you have content that you don't need to keep offline, I would suggest using SharePoint and spreading your file load across multiple doclibs to minimise sync queue overhead.
Your network situation can also be part of the problem. I've found that syncing of OneDrive and DropBox can really suffer when running through a VPN even if the underlying network is fast. Individual users' combination of local machine and network ability differ wildly across the world, so Microsoft's limits need to be read against that. I'm syncing quite a lot more than you are bitwise across all my Cloud accounts, but not so many files. Large numbers of little files are a real killer in many network situations even transmitting one way. However as soon as you introduce sync then you're not only transmitting files, but having to check whether any of the files you've already transmitted have already changed on either side.
If you want to have a discussion about algorithms for monitoring a million files then go for a thread like https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/onedrive-for-business/onedrive-for-business-file-limits/m-p/53006 which is more useful than starting one called "Are the dev for onedrive for mac stupid?"
Thanks again.
First I apologize for the title I used in the first place. It was not the real me. It was a person who wasted 5 days to test and was blinded by anger.
1,000,000 files just a just an inflated number. I also have a personal account with only 25,575 files, about 30GB, this is definitely within Microsoft's recommendations. This account also has the same issue.
Network connection and small size files should be the factor. However, I use the remote cloud machine which is located in the US to avoid the impact of network connection speed and VPN, a little bit better, but not good enough.
I could not control the file size.
Most files are needed sync, just need to sync to the different machines. I usually modify the data on one machine, then sync to others，sometimes，opposite.
The root of this problem is that Onedriver opens the file on-Demand by default. as soon as logs in, sync all files will start, but it gets stuck there. And users can do nothing on it.
For me, add the account to a new machine, that's a nightmare. Alway stuck there.
I have a workaround, which I feel very stupid.
- on my main machine, move all folders from onedrive folders. (Same machine, same driver, should be quick. )
- One driver will delete everything on every machine.
- Add the account to a new machine, sync, then close files on-demand, only select one folder or one file.
- Then move all folders back on the main machine.
- on each machine, change the setting, select sync folders.
I “created” hundreds of gigabytes of Internet traffic.
If the product manager can let the user select the sync folder first, the data transferred will be reduced and the chance of getting stuck will be reduced.
I may delete this post soon.
Thanks.
