The present technology pertains to synchronizing contents of a directory external to a synchronized directory by a content management system. The content management system is configured to synchronize only objects in the synchronized directory. Accordingly, the present technology creates an anchor object that represents the directory external to the synchronized directory within the synchronized directory. The anchor object includes special attributes that indicate to the synchronization client that the anchor object represents an external directory, and allows the contents of that directory to be synchronized directly to a server on the content management system without first storing the contents of the external directory on the hard drive of the client device.