How to determine the Dropbox folder location programmatically?

There is an answer to this on Dropbox Help Center - How can I programmatically find the Dropbox folder paths?

Short version:

Use ~/.dropbox/info.json or %APPDATA%\Dropbox\info.json

Long version:

Access the valid %APPDATA% or %LOCALAPPDATA% location this way:

import os
from pathlib import Path
import json

try:
    json_path = (Path(os.getenv('LOCALAPPDATA'))/'Dropbox'/'info.json').resolve()
except FileNotFoundError:
    json_path = (Path(os.getenv('APPDATA'))/'Dropbox'/'info.json').resolve()

with open(str(json_path)) as f:
    j = json.load(f)

personal_dbox_path = Path(j['personal']['path'])
business_dbox_path = Path(j['business']['path'])

You could search the file system using os.walk. The Dropbox folder is probably within the home directory of the user, so to save some time you could limit your search to that. Example:

import os
dropbox_folder = None

for dirname, dirnames, filenames in os.walk(os.path.expanduser('~')):
    for subdirname in dirnames:
        if(subdirname == 'Dropbox'):
            dropbox_folder = os.path.join(dirname, subdirname)
            break
    if dropbox_folder:
        break

# dropbox_folder now contains the full path to the Dropbox folder, or
# None if the folder wasn't found

---

Alternatively you could prompt the user for the Dropbox folder location, or make it configurable via a config file.

I found the answer here. Setting s equal to the 2nd line in ~\AppData\Roaming\Dropbox\host.db and then decoding it with base64 gives the path.

def _get_appdata_path():
    import ctypes
    from ctypes import wintypes, windll
    CSIDL_APPDATA = 26
    _SHGetFolderPath = windll.shell32.SHGetFolderPathW
    _SHGetFolderPath.argtypes = [wintypes.HWND,
                                 ctypes.c_int,
                                 wintypes.HANDLE,
                                 wintypes.DWORD,
                                 wintypes.LPCWSTR]
    path_buf = wintypes.create_unicode_buffer(wintypes.MAX_PATH)
    result = _SHGetFolderPath(0, CSIDL_APPDATA, 0, 0, path_buf)
    return path_buf.value

def dropbox_home():
    from platform import system
    import base64
    import os.path
    _system = system()
    if _system in ('Windows', 'cli'):
        host_db_path = os.path.join(_get_appdata_path(),
                                    'Dropbox',
                                    'host.db')
    elif _system in ('Linux', 'Darwin'):
        host_db_path = os.path.expanduser('~'
                                          '/.dropbox'
                                          '/host.db')
    else:
        raise RuntimeError('Unknown system={}'
                           .format(_system))
    if not os.path.exists(host_db_path):
        raise RuntimeError("Config path={} doesn't exists"
                           .format(host_db_path))
    with open(host_db_path, 'r') as f:
        data = f.read().split()

    return base64.b64decode(data[1])