What to Do When Files in the Import Folder Don’t Show Up

Sometimes you drop documents into your Import folder, but nothing appears in the Paperless dashboard. This usually isn’t a bug — it’s just how Paperless watches for new files. Here’s a quick guide to diagnose and fix it.
Paperless watches the import folder using inotify, which only reacts to new events:
a file is created
a file is modified
a file is moved into the folder
If the files were already in the folder before Paperless started watching, no event fires — so Paperless never notices them.
Make sure the files are visible inside the container by running following command inside a VM
docker exec -it paperless-webserver-1 ls -l /usr/src/paperless/consume
Trigger Paperless to Notice Files by running touch command
sudo touch /mnt/nas/Import/*.pdf
Also, it might be optional but good idea to restart webserver 
docker restart paperless-webserver-1
 
Premissions matter. If paperlerless can't write to the folder, imports will fail. To check permissions:
docker exec -it paperless-webserver-1 touch /usr/src/paperless/consume/test.txt