Reassess the possibility to ignore or exclude selected OneDrive folders and files from the sync process.
It would be great to be able to ignore or exclude selected files and folders within the OneDrive folder from syncing. It has been requested a few times before and solves user problems in a variety of areas: from software developers having problems with temporary build files and node_modules folders, through users who want to ignore sync problems (or issues like waiting days for a file to upload on a slow connection) by ignoring files in sync, to users who want to ignore files and folders created by applications, especially photo applications. There are many use cases where this feature would be a solution.
It might also be the case that a feature would reduce the number of support requests and user dissatisfaction, since users would have a way to fix various issues themselves (there is probably more applicable scenarios than described above) by desyncing a file or folder causing problems.
I know this feature has been requested before, and has received the status 'not right now', therefore I have termed this request 'reassess', to determine if the 'not right now' status is still the state of this feature request. I have collected the IDs of the uservoice requests for which this feature would be a solution (listed at the end of the request), summing the votes on these requests, this feature has a total of 549 votes, which would place at about the 35th position, among other requests which have status of 'working on it' or 'thinking about it'.
Thanks for your consideration!
The IDs of the related uservoice issues are: 6988070,10720758,10932591,10778649,10954851,11301837,11344905,11654178,13452462,15748891,17236724,8026992,15017205,17169314,18429295,7290507,11625105,12915153,13541754,16044514,7927728
William Clear
shared this idea
This feature has rolled out for files (https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/onedrive/use-group-policy#exclude-specific-kinds-of-files-from-being-uploaded) and we are looking to expanding it to folders in the future.
339 comments
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Cyprus Glenn
commented
The reality is this is a financial move from Microsoft. They know that almost all games/applications these days put files in your Documents folder. How are casual users go to be aware of OneDrive unless they get an alert telling them that they're running out of space so they make the ill-informed decision to just pay for a subscription. I have no problems paying for a subscription, but I will never ever pay for a subscription from a company that skirts on basic functionality so they can trick customers. If you make a great program people will flock to it, Microsoft doesn't understand this.
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Steve McHargue
commented
The single most important features Microsoft needs to enable for OneDrive. Just do it right. I don't want to have to go to 150 folders and say "Don't sync node_modules here, and not here, and not here, and not here.......
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Anonymous
commented
This needs to happen. I started working with some new software packages with huge libraries, and my One Drive is now non-functional as it tries to sync approx. 17,000 files...Why can't I just keep this local? It is hard to believe that this isn't required functionality from a Data Privacy perspective....
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Anonymous
commented
This an feature this service really needs. All the software/application/program files that you might not really need or want up in the cloud, uploads and taking unnecessary space in the cloud.
Right now have I solved it by try to put all the things i want to upload and are suppose to be in (in my case) document in the picture folder. Go to setting remove any connection to the documents folder which is a very annoying process of changing the setting, remove the unnessary data from the cloud, moving files, sync, and desync Onedrive.
Me for an exchange want to use my document folder in Onedrive for content related to it without worrying that other junk in the folder uploads aswell.
So please add this ignore function soon so we can to stop this madness.
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Zeke
commented
PLEASE add this. I love using OneDrive but this specific feature is insane to not be included already. It is making me consider canceling my subscription to use another service.
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Tom Wildenhain
commented
Dropbox supports this using NTFS data streams: https://help.dropbox.com/files-folders/restore-delete/ignored-files
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Alex Rothacker
commented
VisualStudio and pretty much all development environments create subfolders with intermediate files (.obj, etc.)
SVN, Git, etc. create temporary .svn and .git folder that are very large and duplicates of other files.
Not having this functionality is IMHO unacceptable for a product like this. -
Andrea Gandolfi
commented
If I remember correctly this functionality was even available in the awesome Microsoft SyncToy!
It's a MUST. -
Daniel Magalhães
commented
I trully believe it's something really necessary, specially about file types (like .lnk and so)...
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Anonymous
commented
Please implement this feature!
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Vincent Lee
commented
How can i give all my votes to this!!!!!
WE NEED THIS!!!!!! -
Noah Sherwin
commented
You *can* select specific files to not be synced by marking them as Hidden in File Explorer.
However, this does not work for files that are generated when programs are run such as log files. -
Alfonso Martínez de Lizarrondo
commented
I was looking to use OneDrive with the option to use it as a backup system on the cloud, but I really need to exclude folders like .git, temp, obj, or whaterver is automatically created by various apps under the folders that I want to backup.
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luoyong
commented
Hi, Months have passed, are there any new developments?
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Roland Harrison
commented
I advise people to open MS support tickets on this issue. Then it will start becoming peoples personal KPIs when it is marked as "unsolved" continually.
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Roland Harrison
commented
Even if you hate your customers and want to run a purely profit driven business it makes sense to implement this features as it will reduce bandwidth costs and pay for the developers time 100x over. It is completely brain dead to ignore this issue for this long at so many levels.
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LM
commented
it is insane that a software development company would have to be explained why this feature makes sense .... it is rather tiresome to see how many incompetent idiots act as so called product managers in this industry .... ... absolutely baffling
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Riccardo
commented
The inability for OneDrive to IGNORE (vs block) filestypes makes keeping our work flow in OneDrive impossible. it BREAKS software by latching onto transitory files whilst trying to sync them, making programs fail when attemping to rename or delete these files. Show stopper.
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Alt F4
commented
Pleeeeeaaaaaase!
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Alejandro Díaz-Caro
commented
It would be great to being able to produce a file similar to .gitignore, to tell OneDrive what to ignore. As instance, I have problems with Emacs Lock Files, since they start with .#, and with some collaborators naming their auxiliary files for LaTeX as aux.sty, which is also forbidden by OneDrive. I would certainly prefer to chose the file names that I want, but this is also a fine solution.
