GroupFolders access issues - is there an access log?

ℹ️ Support
1

Nextcloud version (eg, 20.0.5): 26.0.2
Operating system and version (eg, Ubuntu 20.04): Debian 11
Apache or nginx version (eg, Apache 2.4.25): 2.4.56
PHP version (eg, 7.4): 8.2.7

The issue you are facing:
Our users have intermittent issues when trying to copy, paste or move files from certain folders. Is there a log where such events are logged in NC?
I can’t pinpoint to what is failing; the server, groupfolder permissions, desktop client or Windows 10 filesystem which makes it near impossible to resolve.

2

nextcloud.log (located in the root of your data directory)

That will have any error logs, stack traces, etc.

3

Thanks jtr,

That log doesn’t annotate blocked access or I’m missing something

4

another way to go about it is to recreate a test instance of Nextcloud and try to get to the most simple replication scenario that you can get. Groupfolders issues often get complicated with the different permissions, especially if you nest them (groupfolders inside groupfolders).

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5

yes, that’s absolutely correct. It becomes difficult to keep track of special permissions and fine graded access on all GroupFolders. We try to use tags for any deviations or temporary changes in config to keep on top of this.

It would be great to have a tool to audit permission on subfolders. Maybe “File Actions” app could do it?

I think I’ve managed to find the cause of my issues, which was Flow with “block access” not recognizing Desktop Client. Not sure if this was caused by an upgrade from NC 25 to 26 but once flow was reapplied we no longer suffer access issues.

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6

great to hear you found the solution!

7

To answer my own question, the log annotating file/folder access is the apache2 access.log

On Debian usually at /var/log/apache2/

D’oh!

8

You might want to turn on the audit log. I don’t recall what groupfolders logs to it offhand, but here’s how to enable it:

https://docs.nextcloud.com/server/latest/admin_manual/configuration_server/logging_configuration.html#admin-audit-log-optional

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