Box CLI for Linux

Hi ,

Thanks for your post and yes to confirm, there is no Box CLI for Linux, only for Mac and Windows.

As of now, there is no plan to support Box for Linux. We will provide an update either in our developer blog or Box Product News blog for more updates on this front.

Hi ,

To follow up on what Howard mentioned, it is possible to build a binary for Linux. Here's the issue response on it with the walktrhough: https://github.com/box/boxcli/issues/55

I am very disappointed by Box policy of not supporting Linux.
I was looking for a solution like Box for our company, but as 95% of our employees uses Windows I must leave Box.com out of my search and evaluation list.

Hi Howard,

Box CLI for Linux would be really useful as we're building all our folder / content automations as micro services hosted on Linux. Having access to the CLI in the development environment would be a useful addition.

Thanks,

Matt.

Why not compile the code that already have Android or Windows on Linux?
Why not use Embedded web platforms to have a Client in Linux?

The latest version of the Box CLI (see https://developer.box.com/docs/box-cli#section-source-code) is compilable on other platforms, according to that page....and see https://github.com/box/boxcli/issues/55 for more details.

Hope that helps,

Ian

I agree it would be great to have BOX for linux. How come you do MAC and ANDROID but not LINUX? That's a minor effort. My university is a major customer, but I will recommend they switch to a company that provides for all users.

Any new news on the Linux front?

We are just starting a major collaborative project, and some folks have Linux.  I'll have to tell them we are staying with DropBox.

Hi  — I'm Matt, one of the engineers on the Box SDK team (we also support the Box CLI).  Packaging the Box CLI for Linux is on our roadmap and you can track progress on it via the relevant GitHub issue.  The CLI was recently rewritten and should run fine on Linux, but there are some technical issues we've been working through to get it packaged in an easy-to-consume format for various Linux distros.  Until we're able to fix that, you should be able to manually run the CLI on Linux, as others have done. 

I made a small docker image that uses boxcli 2.0

FROM node:10
RUN curl -L -o tmp.zip https://github.com/box/boxcli/archive/v2.0.0.zip
RUN mkdir /box
RUN unzip tmp.zip -d /box
RUN rm -f myfile.zip
RUN cd /box/boxcli-2.0.0/ && npm install
#ADD config.json /box/config.json
#RUN cd /box/boxcli-2.0.0/ && ./bin/run configure:environments:add /box/config.json
RUN ln -s /box/boxcli-2.0.0/bin/run /usr/local/bin/box

The config.json is the file from your developer portal.

In our kubernetes cluster we have created a secret holding this file so it is not boundeled with the image.  You should also do something similar

Hi,

thanks for the reply.  I was looking though this community's postings and the questions on a Linux client have been around since at 2015.  You mentioned the Linux client is on a roadmap to becoming a box feature.  How long is this road?  I joined your Box User REsearch, as suggested in a 2015 posting... But still have to go with DropBox for the next major project we are starting up.

thanks

Hi ,

Thanks for posting to the Box Community!

For clarification, are you asking about the Box CLI for Linux, or for a Linux version of Box Sync or Box Drive? As noted earlier in the thread by , packaging the Box CLI for Linux is on our roadmap and you can track progress on it via the relevant GitHub issue.

If you are looking for where to add your voice to Linux for Box Sync or Box Drive, please vote for the suggestion you are most interested in on Box Pulse.

Thanks again for posting!

-Scott

my apologies,

A "Box Drive" is what I'm looking for.  Similar to DropBox.  Matt showed me the CLI tools on github , but I'm not a programmer, just need a collaborative drive showing up in my Linux file manager such as Nautilus.  The github is a development package only for the CLI,  so the "Box Drive" feature isn't even on the roadmap?  Well, I guess that's what I wanted to know.

I posted this elsewhere but I will post it again. We need a Linux client and there is still no word for when this will happen.

You might want to check out rclone (https://rclone.org/box/) and/or the public beta of ExpanDrive for Linux (https://www.expandrive.com/expandrive-for-linux/) as alternatives. Box has unfortunately repeatedly made it clear both publicly and privately that they don’t see sufficient demand for a Linux client based on what they see in their logs/usage statistics. Essentially, they’ve said they don’t see enough usage coming from Linux hosts to make it worth the expense to develop and provide ongoing support for a Linux Box Drive client. 

For what it’s worth, our researchers here at UC Berkeley have been pretty satisfied with rclone. (I’m not sure how many of them have tried the ExpanDrive beta.)

Hope that helps!

Ian

I'm an artist and author and I feel the same.  I need to share with university people who are on the front lines of research. They help me build my healing art and fictional writing.

If you can't use Box to share files, how would those of us running linux show up in logs and usage statistics?  Those logs don't capture the frustration one has jury-rigging a solution to bridge the gap.  Moving linux files through supported OSs is time consuming and error prone.  I hope the limited view and limited seeing does change. 

I'll try these: (https://rclone.org/box/) and/or the public beta of ExpanDrive for Linux (https://www.expandrive.com/expandrive-for-linux/) and see if I can jury-rig better.

I too, have several institutions that use the Box share.  But 99% of my work is on my Linux local (synced) DropBox folder and it works like a charm.  All us Linux users have for Box is the web page.  But DropBox works great

this may work,, using Box soley as online storage,

https://www.multcloud.com/tutorials/transfer-files-from-dropbox-to-box-0708.html

Any time soon the Box for Linux client?. Not sure you understand how many developers, architects, system administrators, and IT people, in general, is working on Linux and have to struggle with the Box Web client to manage documentation and just saying that they don't have the demand to do so... I never hear any of the other offerings available saying something like that they just come up with all the clients right away.

Try this:

https://www.xmodulo.com/how-to-mount-box-com-cloud-storage-on-linux.html

working fine for me.

Yep works via WebDAV @ Nautilus (and probably other WebDAV software) no problems!

Basically the most important is the server URL: davs://dav.box.com/dav

WebDAV is not working with me. I get a notification via SMS for MFA which means it is properly authenticating and reaching the service.

When I turn of MFA in order to not confuse the process, it still doesn't work.

/sbin/mount.davfs: Mounting failed.
Could not authenticate to server: rejected Basic challenge