GDocsDrive and Google cloud storage

Before you invest your time and energy into installing and using GDocsDrive, there are several concepts you need to know:

1.What is GDocsDrive?

GDocsDrive is a desktop client for Google Docs with some added enhancements. It helps you to manage your Google Docs on your desktop and makes backing up your files a lot easier. It has all the functions of Google Docs, and it offers some that Google Docs does not have, such as opening online Google Docs files with local applications, enabling dragging and dropping between Google Docs and your desktop, and helping longer uploads/downloads to run silently in the background.

2.What is Cloud Storage (online storage)?

While cloud storage sounds like it has something to do with weather fronts and storm systems, it really refers to saving data to an off-site storage system maintained by a third party. Instead of storing information to your computer's hard drive or other local storage device, you save it to a remote database. The Internet provides the connection between your computer and the database.

Wikipedia defines it this way: “Cloud storage is a model of networked online storage where data is stored on multiple virtual servers, generally hosted by third parties, rather than being hosted on dedicated servers.”

The most well known cloud storage providers include: Google, Amazon, and Microsoft. GDocsDrive uses Google cloud storage service.

3.What’s the different between GDocsDrive and other cloud storage solutions, such as dropbox, box.net, or Microsoft SkyDrive?

Unlike most of today’s popular cloud storage providers, GDocsDrive is not the actual cloud storage provider – Google is! GDocsDrive is just a client tool for Google cloud storage with some very useful enhancements.

GDocsDrive is not designed to be a sync tool to compete with Dropbox or Box.net, but a tool to help you to manage your Google Docs files on your desktop.