Google Drive Offline

Google Drive is a get place to create documents, spreadsheets, presentations and more.  With Google Drive you don't have to worry about your computer crashing or not having access to the computer with your files.  You can access your Google Drive files on any computer, anytime.  All you do is log in to your Google Drive account and start working.

That all sounds great until the internet goes down.  Without the internet you can't access any of your files!  This statement would be true if you didn't have Google Drive Offline setup on your computer.

Step one - installing Google Drive on your computer.  Here's how...on a Mac:

1.  Open your Google Drive account

2.  Click on Download Google Drive

3.  Open the installgoogledrive.dmg (It might be in your downloads folder.)

4.  Open the installation file and drag the Google Drive icon to your Applications folder

5.  Open Google Drive from your Applications folder (You may receive a warning that Google Drive is an application downloaded from the internet.  Click the Open button.)

6.  Enter your school email account and password.  This will be the account associated with Google Drive on you computer.

7.  Launch Google Drive via the icon on your toolbar. 

*Files must be in your My Drive on Google Drive online.  If they are not in My Drive, they will not sync to Google Drive on your computer.

 Step two - setting up offline access.  Here's how:

*You can only enable offline access using the Google Chrome browser.

1.  Click More

2.  Select Offline Docs

3.  Click the Enable offline blue button

4.  Now click the blue button on the right that says Get the app.  If you already have the app installed, you won't need to complete this step.

5.  You'll be taken to the Chrome store.  Click Add to Chrome in the upper-right corner.

6.  Once the app is installed, you'll be taken to a Chrome page with the Google Drive app icon.  To return to Drive, click the Google Drive icon.

Now when that pesky internet goes down, you'll be able to continue working on your documents.  Any files you make changes to while offline will sync with a time stamp when you reconnect to the internet.


Internet Down image from http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-HFc4h9fNf4c/UEct8wR8IjI/AAAAAAAAA3g/w2i2qMT7UXw/s1600/Internet_down.jpg

 Instructions for installing Google Drive found at http://support.google.com/drive/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=2375078&topic=2375002&ctx=topic

Instructions for setting up offline access found at http://support.google.com/drive/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=2375012&topic=2375002&ctx=topic