Dropbox Proxy Switch for Teacher Laptops

[SimpleSi]

I love Dropbox but still got an issue on Teacher laptops that come in and out of school.

The school dropbox is on a staff only share on the server/

I have there laptops set for no proxy so when they are working at home, ther dropbox folder syncs normally but for access in schools, I have to have a shortcut to the dropbox folder on the server and I explain that in school, that is how they are to access dropbox.


Very simple to explain, obviously very hard to remember and do and everyone gets in a right muddle.

Now option 1 - replace teaching brain with geek brain would work but not practical

2. Need a method of auto switching (or a competing product thats just as easy to use and can handle proxies better)

Anybody managed to do this ?

regards

Simon

[Steve21]

2. Need a method of auto switching (or a competing product thats just as easy to use and can handle proxies better)

Anybody managed to do this ?

regards

Simon

I may be missing the obvious, but what's wrong with the "auto-detect" proxy option in dropbox? Or doesn't that work with your proxy? (Never tried it at work). Or don't your teacher laptops have something to change it for the internet anyway?

As an alternative couldn't you just create a custom launcher, if it sees your server it'll launch the local shortcut, else it'll load via normal web etc?

Steve

[SimpleSi]

I may be missing the obvious, but what's wrong with the "auto-detect" proxy option in dropbox? Or doesn't that work with your proxy? (Never tried it at work). Or don't your teacher laptops have something to change it for the internet anyway?

Doesn't work (for anyone in the world I believe ) and Dropbox doesn't follow ie settings (we have a LEA pac file that does IE Switching)

As an alternative couldn't you just create a custom launcher, if it sees your server it'll launch the local shortcut, else it'll load via normal web

mm - maybe your not an inveterate dropbox user (or maybe your a very advanced one !) but this makes no sense to me - "launching shortcuts"??? - loading viai web????

Simon

[Steve21]

My understanding was you're running a single shared folder on your server (the "main" box as such). Which everyone else is connecting to.

Even without an internet connection you can connect to the dropbox via normal "shared folder" style.

E.g. If you have connection to server use local share, else if you don't (aka at home) you'll use the normal web syncing version.

If that makes more sense?

Steve

[SimpleSi]

If that makes more sense?

yes

But unsure how to implement.

Standard install (on the teacher laptop) puts the Dropbox folder within My Documents or Documents on Win7.

I suppose I could move it somewhere else and put a shortcut to it instead with MyDocs.

But it would be tricky to replace it with one pointing to the server in school - actually that bits easy - the tricky part is making sure that if they are not in school then the shorcut would have to revert to pointing to the local laptop files.

Simon

[Steve21]

Well depends if you actually want it as a shortcut or not.

(As a quick fix) all you really need is a file (whether exe bat or vbs) that when run checks if it can access server then launches that folder, if not it launches local cache one.

No need to replace shortcuts etc, just make it choose where it points when "launched"

Obviously that may not work depending how other things setup, but at least that way it's invisible to user. They launch same item everytime, rest is in background

Steve

[SimpleSi]

They launch same item everytime, rest is in background

I must be being really dim today

I'll come back tomorrow

Simon