Virtual Files mode instead of Classic Synch, desktop app

📱 Desktop & mobile clients 💻 Desktop
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1

I’m using macOS Ventura 13.7.8 with Nextcloud Desktop Client 33.0.5.

I have just installed Nextcloud Desktop Client for the first time and when connecting to my Murena account, the setup wizard only offers Classic Sync (local folder synchronization).

I want to be able to push the files to Murena and off of my hard drive to save disc space. I believe I need the macOS File Provider / Virtual Files mode in order to do this but I can’t find where to turn on this feature.

The client includes FileProviderExt.appex and FileProviderUIExt.appex, and macOS registers both extensions:
com.nextcloud.desktopclient.FileProviderExt
com.nextcloud.desktopclient.FileProviderUIExt

2

macOS 13.7.8 is End of Life and do not receive security updates anymore:

I can only speculate, but I suspect the Virtual Files feature requires a reasonably up-to-date version of macOS. Maybe @iva.horn can answer that :slight_smile:.

3

Hi all
Would upgrading to Sonoma 14 be be enough to get Nextcloud to offer me Virtual Files mode?

4

@Junglefish I am so sorry to say that we cannot offer the file provider on macOS 13 Ventura due to security constraints imposed by macOS 13 Ventura. :pensive_face: See the following GitHub issue which explains it to some extend:

Technically, it could still work on macOS 13 Ventura. :confused: It did until the introduction of the macOS app sandbox with 33.0.0, for obvious reasons.

Yes. macOS 14 Sonoma brought a more relaxed sandbox policy which does not require the provisioning profile anymore. :slightly_smiling_face: