Eclipse: "'Periodic workspace save.' has encountered a pro‍blem."

I'm using Eclipse Indigo on Mac 10.7.4. While working, I get these periodic, annoying dialogs

'Periodic workspace save.' has encountered a problem.

Could not write metadata for '/.org.eclipse.jdt.core.external.folders'.
/Users/davea/Dropbox/workspace/.metadata/.plugins/org.eclipse.core.resources/.projects/.org.eclipse.jdt.core.external.folders/.markers.snap (No such file or directory)

I seem to be able to continue as normal, but I was wondering how I can eliminate these errors.

Solution 1:

I had the same problem.

'Periodic workspace save.' has encountered a problem. Could not write metadata for '/External Files'. D:\java\fuentes\.metadata\.plugins\org.eclipse.core.resources\.projects\External Files\.markers.snap (El sistema no puede hallar la ruta especificada)

I created the folder "External Files" and it worked fine. In a few minutes the files ".markers.snap" and ".syncinfo.snap" appeared in this folder and the message didn´t appear any more.

Solution 2:

I fixed mine by closing eclipse and deleting the whole .metadata folder inside my workspace folder.

Solution 3:

Today I faced the same issue consistently, whenever I exit the eclipse. While trying the above solution provided by TS.xy, the below steps got rid of this issue for now.

1. Switch to new workspace and close the Eclipse.
2. Open the Eclipse with new workspace and after that switch to the actual workspace(in which exception occurs).
3. Actual workspace loaded with all my previous projects.
4. Now exiting the Eclipse, does not result in that exception.

Hope that this step may work for someone.

Solution 4:

Just for another data point, none of the above helped my situation. The way I finally got past this issue is that each time Eclipse complained about some folder not being there, I went on my hard drive and created the folder. E.g. after I see

Could not write metadata for '/servers'.
C:\...\.metadata\.plugins\org.eclipse.core.resources\.projects\servers\.markers.snap (The system cannot find the path specified.)

I create the "servers" folder (not the file inside it). This gets me to the next error. I went through 3-4 of these iterations (exiting Eclipse each time to force the save) before the issues went away.

HTH, Mark