Earlier quoted context omitted.
So is this basically a switch from hardlinks to softlinks?
It's a switch from inference to direct collection of intent from the user.
How so? Are hard links still allowed?
Google Drive: Shortcuts replacing files and folders stored in multiple locations
41–50 of 74 posts
Re: Google Drive: Shortcuts replacing files and folders stored in multiple locations
#42I use Google Drive as a trailing safety backup. Client installed on a machine that updates once a month with all the files from drive. Manual process. In case something happens and a folder gets wiped off of Google Drive I can walk over and transfer the files from the trailing safety backup since Google Drive actually copies the files.
Under the new process the files will no longer exist on the drive, but will now be links to files on Google Drive. Is that correct?
Re: Google Drive: Shortcuts replacing files and folders stored in multiple locations
#43Earlier quoted context omitted.
What you are describing sounds like two distinct files with the same content. The change only affects the same file that has been "hard linked" into two separate folders. Copies of files are unaffected.
I see. I think your "hard linked" term is the difference between the "Add shortcut to Drive" and "Make a copy" options when right-clicking a file in the web UI. If this announcement affects only files created with "Add shortcut to Drive," and uploaded files that happen to have the same content as another file aren't automatically turned into shortcuts, then I'm less alarmed by the change.
No, "hard link" here essentially means "folders are really just (tree of) labels", so a single file can be assigned to many folders. All references are shared, and a file is only deleted if you delete it, not merely remove it from a folder (label).
Re: Google Drive: Shortcuts replacing files and folders stored in multiple locations
#44I use Google Drive as a trailing safety backup. Client installed on a machine that updates once a month with all the files from drive. Manual process. In case something happens and a folder gets wiped off of Google Drive I can walk over and transfer the files from the trailing safety backup since Google Drive actually copies the files. Under the new process the files will no longer exist on the drive, but will now be…
If you're actually copying the files then no; this removes the ability for a file ID to be able to exist in two places at once, but if you're copying drive->another medium->drive a new file ID is being created on the user's drive. This is regardless of whether or not the file is being de-duped behind the scenes.
Re: Google Drive: Shortcuts replacing files and folders stored in multiple locations
#45I use Google Drive as a trailing safety backup. Client installed on a machine that updates once a month with all the files from drive. Manual process. In case something happens and a folder gets wiped off of Google Drive I can walk over and transfer the files from the trailing safety backup since Google Drive actually copies the files. Under the new process the files will no longer exist on the drive, but will now be…
If you're actually copying the files then no; this removes the ability for a file ID to be able to exist in two places at once, but if you're copying drive->another medium->drive a new file ID is being created on the user's drive. This is regardless of whether or not the file is being de-duped behind the scenes.
Thank you for the clarification. I should have specified I turn on sync through Google Drive once a month and not a direct copy. Going forward if I stay with Google Drive I'll need to switch off sync and just do a direct manual copy.
Re: Google Drive: Shortcuts replacing files and folders stored in multiple locations
#46Earlier quoted context omitted.
> various applications that were being folded into / integrated with Google Drive The Photos/Drive integration was removed a long time ago. What other integrations were behind the original requirement? I'm curious to know if the extra complication was worth it in the long run and how long the integrations that needed this feature hung around for.
I don't specifically remember whether there were other motivations for that requirement. Possibly a desire to support "tag" style interfaces, where an item can have multiple tags applied. But it may have mostly been the Photos integration. And no, definitely the complication was not worth it in the long run. :-) That project got way more complicated than anyone wanted (not that there's anything unusual about that).
I actually remember early Google Drive to have only tags for files, and no folders. Apparently, the idea was to distance from the file tree paradigm, but eventually the traditional approach proved to be more user friendly.
Re: Google Drive: Shortcuts replacing files and folders stored in multiple locations
#47Slightly related, has anyone moved off Google Drive and into NextCloud or similar and been happy with it?
I'm losing access to the unlimited Google Drive storage that my uni provided and trying to figure out where I should move to.
A NAS would be great but at this moment I'm too nomadic to want to worry about that.
I'm fine with paying but would rather pay an organization that's very respecting of privacy and less likely to nuke your account without warning if you do something they don't like.
Only need a few hundred GB of space.
Re: Google Drive: Shortcuts replacing files and folders stored in multiple locations
#48Slightly related, has anyone moved off Google Drive and into NextCloud or similar and been happy with it? I'm losing access to the unlimited Google Drive storage that my uni provided and trying to figure out where I should move to. A NAS would be great but at this moment I'm too nomadic to want to worry about that. I'm fine with paying but would rather pay an organization that's very respecting of privacy and less li…
Nextcloud is too slow and bloaty.
I'm using https://filebrowser.org/
You can run it on a VPS, NAS or homeserver.
If you want something managed, you can pay Hetzner for managed nextcloud.
Re: Google Drive: Shortcuts replacing files and folders stored in multiple locations
#49What happens to a file if post-replacement the file is modified? Does it modify the link target, or is it copy-on-write? I might want to have different copies as "snapshot" and "working", de-duping them makes any version-control-like system mutable, doesn't it?
If you were storing the same document in two folders before, you did not have two different (snapshot/working) copies. You had one document. There is no de-duping mentioned anywhere in the Google support page.
ok, so previously Google Drive used hard link equivalents and now they're using soft-link equivalents?
thanks!
Re: Google Drive: Shortcuts replacing files and folders stored in multiple locations
#50Slightly related, has anyone moved off Google Drive and into NextCloud or similar and been happy with it? I'm losing access to the unlimited Google Drive storage that my uni provided and trying to figure out where I should move to. A NAS would be great but at this moment I'm too nomadic to want to worry about that. I'm fine with paying but would rather pay an organization that's very respecting of privacy and less li…
I switched from Dropbox to Nextcloud, and within a couple of months from Nextcloud to Google Drive. Really didn't like the software and it was so slow since I wasn't self-hosting it, but renting it from Hetzner.
Currently thinking of switching from Google Drive to Syncthing, since the new Google Drive clients suck and Google is going to be making my service worse with the new G Suite changes.