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I lost years’ worth of Google Docs files because of a poor user interface

googledrivesucks.com

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Re: I lost years’ worth of Google Docs files because of a poor user interface

#111

Post by eono »

There is an export feature, which allows you to export "all" your data you have stored on Google's server incl. Google Docs (which will be exported to Word, Excel, PowerPoint formats, respectively). In your account settings there you can find "Download your data".

Doing regular backups even of your data in the cloud is in my opinion a crucial action, since everyone trusts fully into the cloud provider to provide his data always, anywhere and forever, which is - as you experienced - a dangerous and naive assumption.

Re: I lost years’ worth of Google Docs files because of a poor user interface

#112

Post by gknoy »

dragonwriter wrote: post #100
crazygringo wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Who knows? I don't know the internals of my Word or Pages documents. Why should anyone care what the internals of a .gdoc file look like? It could be anything. But nobody expects it to be a mere "pointer" link.

> I don't know the internals of my Word or Pages documents. [...] But nobody expects it to be a mere "pointer" link. While Word and Excel (and plenty of other kinds of non-cloud document) files usually contain data besides links, and sometimes contain no links, they can contain content which is non-obviously (from visual inspection) provided through a link which is broken if the file is moved. And, unlike gdocs, you…

When you drag something out of your folder on your local machine, how does gdocs give you a warning? (I'm curious, having never tried it.)

Re: I lost years’ worth of Google Docs files because of a poor user interface

#113

Post by Oletros »

sp332 wrote: post #105
Oletros wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How can I restore a permanent deleted file? I can't find the option to do that

I don't think you can... I don't see an "empty trash" button anywhere though. You can't permanent-delete a file just by removing it from a folder on your computer. You have to log in to the website, right-click it, select "delete", click the trash icon at the top of the screen, right-click the file again and select "permanent delete". That's not even close to what happened to OP.

Well, the OP emptied the Google Drive trash can that it is the same than permanent deleting files on Dropbox.

Re: I lost years’ worth of Google Docs files because of a poor user interface

#114

Post by sp332 »

Oletros wrote: post #113
sp332 wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think you can... I don't see an "empty trash" button anywhere though. You can't permanent-delete a file just by removing it from a folder on your computer. You have to log in to the website, right-click it, select "delete", click the trash icon at the top of the screen, right-click the file again and select "permanent delete". That's not even close to what happened to OP.

Well, the OP emptied the Google Drive trash can that it is the same than permanent deleting files on Dropbox.

The complaint is that Google Drive's UI is confusing, and can lead to unintentional data loss. Dropbox has a much better UI, and it's harder to lose data by accident.

Re: I lost years’ worth of Google Docs files because of a poor user interface

#115

Post by chrismcb »

tytso wrote: post #53

If files weren't completely deleted when the trash was emptied, then people would be kvetching about the horrible security implications and the only way to be sure was to keep files on the local disk so that when you emptied the trash, the files would be really gone....

I don't think the issue is emptying trash deletes the files. The issue is "moving" a file from Google Docs to the desktop, creates a link on the desktop, but moves the Google Docs file to the trash. You now have a link on your desktop to files in the trash. Why would anyone think this is a good thing, or what the user even wanted to do?

Re: I lost years’ worth of Google Docs files because of a poor user interface

#116

Post by chrismcb »

cldr wrote: post #19

While I sympathize with the author (it must have hurt pretty bad if it made him go create an entire website dedicated to "google drive sucks") I thought it was quite obvious that files created on Google Drive with their document editor were not actually copied to your computer with the Google Drive program. It's easy to see when you try to open the file with Notepad or a similar local text editor. Additionally you ge…

What cues did the author miss? Why would the author (or anyone) expect the file they JUST copied to their desktop to now suddenly be in the trash can?

Re: I lost years’ worth of Google Docs files because of a poor user interface

#118

Post by Oletros »

vernie wrote: post #83
Oletros wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you move a file out of the Dropbox folder it is deleted from Dropbox

Yes, but you have a copy of the actual file, not a hollow reference to the the deleted version on Dropbox's servers. You can also recover the file via Dropbox's version interface.

Yap, like Google Drive or Skydrive.

The problem is just with Google Docs files

Re: I lost years’ worth of Google Docs files because of a poor user interface

#119

Post by mikeash »

nailer wrote: post #16
blcknight wrote: post #4

Huh? If you remove the files from the copy of Google drive on your disk, they get removed on the web. It's one "drive." That's KIND OF THE WHOLE POINT. It's not poor user design. That they go to the trash is good user design, to prevent users from doings things like this guy did...

Yeah, I don't get this part. The user moved the files from google drive to his local disk. Aren't the files therefore still on his local disk? EDIT: re read article . Moving files into local disk deletes them on google drive and makes the moved versions useless links. Now agree with the author: that's goddamned terrible. EDIT 2: actually the files are always links, but if the links are moved outside google drive the…

It's interesting to see comments like this. The implementation is so awful that people literally do not believe it. They subconsciously dismiss what happened and come up with an alternative that makes sense.

Re: I lost years’ worth of Google Docs files because of a poor user interface

#120

Post by mikeash »

blcknight wrote: post #35
dchest wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When you're moving a document off some drive, you expect a moved copy to work.

Except for the part when they tell you. http://i.imgur.com/ijTQTTq.png

Heh, "tell you". The part that matters is in the secondary part of the alert and is only a single sentence. It's buried among all the other, less important stuff. And even then, "This item is just a link." is not very clear at all. Without already knowing how this stuff works, I can't say that I'd necessarily understand the meaning here.

What this alert needs to say is something like this:

WARNING: you have moved this file out of Google Drive WHICH HAS DELETED IT. The file that you moved does not contain your content. It is merely a link back to the original content WHICH IS NOW IN THE TRASH. EMPTYING YOUR TRASH WILL PERMANENTLY DELETE THE DATA AND THE FILE WHICH YOU MOVED DOES NOT CONTAIN A COPY OF IT.

They're destroying the user's data in a scenario where they would not expect it. A teeny little warning buried in an alert filled with other stuff simply does not cut it.

The fact that you need lots of DIRE CAPITALIZED TEXT to get the point across shows, I think, that this whole system is a bad idea.

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