Mendeley Series: Dropbox Workaround

There is a great article regarding a workaround on Mendeley and cloud storage, specifically Google Drive. However, the principle can be applied to Dropbox as well.

There are some clarifications needed for beginner; like myself.

I will simplify the steps based on the article.

1. Open an elevated command prompt (search cmd under start menu, right click the black box icon, run as admin).
   # Navigate to "C:\users\YOURNAME\appdata\local\Mendeley Ltd.\" at the command line.  Don’t go into the Mendeley Desktop folder itself.
2. Copy the "Mendeley Desktop" folder into your preferred Dropbox folder i.e. E:\Dropbox\Mendeley
3. Rename "Mendeley Desktop" on original location "C:\users\YOURNAME\appdata\local\Mendeley Ltd.\" to any names i.e. "MendeleyDesktop_backup"
4. Make a symbolic directory junction (crikey):
   
   mklink /j “Mendeley Desktop” “PATH” where PATH is where you saved it to your Dropbox (doesn’t need to be the same on all computers, that’s just for PDF’s so you don’t need to use the network drive path here).
   
   So, for me it was:
   
   mklink /j “Mendeley Desktop” “E:\Dropbox\MENDELEY\Mendeley Desktop
5. Now, fire up Mendeley and all should be ok.  Check it is before closing mendeley and then repeating this on each computer (no need to copy the local mendeley to google drive again, just continue from where you back it up locally just in case).

In summary,

For the master pc:

• copy mendeley data directory somewhere to Dropbox
• ensure pdfs are on Dropbox *in the same structure*
• if Dropbox isn’t on the same drive letter for all pc’s share it and map it to the drive letter of your choice.
• back up local mendeley directory
• symlink
• test mendeley works.  shut it down.

For all other pc’s,

• if Dropbox isn’t on the same drive letter for all pc’s share it and map it to the drive letter of your choice.
• back up local mendeley directory
• symlink
• test mendeley works.  shut it down.

Here's an article, explaining the magic behind symlink. 

Good luck!!!