Upload blob to dropbox from client-side javascript

Question

I have an app that runs in the client browser and doesn't have any server side (http/js is served, but nothing posts to the server). the app is redeployed on many servers (iis, apache, nginx, sometimes localhost, sometimes on an intranet) and are served using http (not https). My app generates files such as zip files and pdf's in the clients browser as blobs BEFORE I want to save, so having them navigate away on the same page then back to the app defeats the purpose; and I can't post the generated data to dropbox anymore, since they have to start over... I want to be able to send these blobs directly to files in the end users dropbox (and later google drive).

https://www.dropbox.com/developers-v1/dropins/saver performs exactly as I would like. It pops up. It lets the user authenticate in the popup. It lets the user choose where they want to put my file. But I can't send it a data uri, or base64-encoded data, or a bytearray, or whatever. It only works with files previously saved somewhere accessible on the net. So it does not work for me.

https://www.newfangled.com/direct-javascript-dropbox-api-usage/ shows how I could embed the oauth data, which I don't have.

https://blogs.dropbox.com/developers/2013/12/writing-a-file-with-the-dropbox-javascript-sdk/ seems like it should work, except that it's trying to perform an oauth session and it uses the same window as my app (which is undesired).

My current tabs I'm looking at (includes entries from a few years ago, so things might have since changed). Some articles indicate that it isn't possible. Other articles incidate that it IS possible - i mean this particular comment https://github.com/dropbox/dropbox-js/issues/144# doesn't help me much. Neither does "I'll be sure to pass this along as feedback" - was it passed along? To whom?

• https://github.com/dropbox/dropbox-js/issues/144
• https://stackoverflow.com/questions/30094403/save-input-text-to-dropbox
• https://blogs.dropbox.com/developers/2015/06/programmatically-saving-a-url-to-dropbox/
• How can I upload files to dropbox using JavaScript?
• upload file to dropBox using /files_put javascript
• https://github.com/morrishopkins/DropBox-Uploader/blob/master/js/reader.js
• https://www.dropbox.com/developers/saver
• https://www.dropboxforum.com/hc/en-us/community/posts/202339309-Can-I-save-a-JSON-stream-object-to-Dropbox-file-with-Dropbox-Post-Rest-API-
• https://github.com/smarx/othw
• Can Dropbox Saver accept data from createObjectURL()?

Answer 1

It sounds like the code from https://blogs.dropbox.com/developers/2013/12/writing-a-file-with-the-dropbox-javascript-sdk/ works fine for you, but you want to do the auth in a separate browser window/tab.

If so, I'd suggest just changing that code to use the Popup auth driver instead.