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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

#61

Post by vxNsr »

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…

That's not how Google drive works: the gDocs "files" stored on your computer are not actually files, they're just links to files that are accessible on google drive. to test this you can turn off your router (or just disconnect from the internet) and then try opening a gDoc, you'll get a "cannot connect" error.

There is very little you can do about this, google is okay with it because there's no official offline gDocs viewer/editor so in their minds it doesn't make sense to fill up your harddrive with real files that can't even be accessed on your computer. Also they warn you that those files aren't real under certain circumstances (I've seen the warning before, though I don't remember the context).

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

#62

Post by ndewitt »

Oletros wrote: post #27

Google Drive does that Dropbox does that Skydrive does that All of them have poor user interfaces?

I have a Skydrive synced folder on my computer. Files I put in there are copied to Skydrive. If I remove a file from that folder, it is still a physical file on my computer. Google drive local "files" do not contain your data. I don't know about Dropbox.

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

#63

Post by woof »

crazygringo wrote: post #58
koko775 wrote: post #30

Well, he deleted years' worth of Google Docs files because of a poor user interface, but he lost the Google Docs files because of an irresponsible backup policy. Sad, to be sure, but there's no kind of critical document storage that doesn't need a backup.

But there is no way to backup Google Docs files, is there? What exactly was the "responsible" backup policy supposed to have been?

Something like https://code.google.com/p/gdocbackup/ combined with another backup (on physical media or in the cloud).

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

#64

Post by cldr »

jchung wrote: post #54
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…

Glad you thought it was obvious. I just learned it after reading the OP's article. Not obvious enough, apparently.

Yeah, like I mentioned, "There were cues which the author missed, but they were obviously not prominent enough which is a (the) design flaw." I focused more on the lessons to be learned but the situation is absolutely very sad for anyone who goes through something like this.

Glad you read the article though, now you're not going to fall for this flaw in the future.

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

#65

Post by Oletros »

300bps wrote: post #51

Google definitely jumped into Drive and Apps without putting any thought about privacy or recoverability into it whatsoever. There's a reason why they keep launching in beta - because they get an MVP out the door and then people start using it as if it's ready for production. Further, everyone I know that uses Google Apps / Drive has no idea how to use it properly. One common thing I see is people will send a link to…

> One common thing I see is people will send a link to a particular document not knowing they've unwittingly given the person access to all of their documents

What? Share links for documents are just a link to that document no to the folders where they are

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

#66

Post by toddmorey »

koko775 wrote: post #30

Well, he deleted years' worth of Google Docs files because of a poor user interface, but he lost the Google Docs files because of an irresponsible backup policy. Sad, to be sure, but there's no kind of critical document storage that doesn't need a backup.

I disagree with this. It sounds like he had the reasonable expectation that the files WERE backed up, living both locally and on Google's servers. He might have even thought he was testing his backups by opening one of the local "files" after he moved them.

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

#67

Post by mlntn »

As bad as I feel for the OP, you have to take responsibility instead of blaming Google. Seems like they do a good job of explaining when you empty the trash in Drive:

"Files in your trash are about to be permanently deleted, including Google Docs in your Trash. Warning: When using Google Drive for PC/Mac, Google Docs aren’t actual files saved on your hard drive; they are links to files stored online."

If you want a real backup of Google Docs, try Takeout: https://www.google.com/settings/takeout

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

#68

Post by cldr »

jchung wrote: post #48
nollidge wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But how could that possibly work for a document that's edited in a browser? What file format would such a document be stored in when there's no local editor available for it?

Good question. Seems a pretty simple solution: the browser is the editor, even if the files are local. We use browsers to interact with local files all the time, for example during local web app development.

Only that's impossible as it is now (and will be for the forseeable future) because it wouldn't be very wise to give browser apps write access to the local filesystem.

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

#69

Post by 300bps »

bighi wrote: post #28
eli wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, if not clear to the users, then it isn't good UI -- even if it's obvious to you.

But this is how EVERY DAMN cloud drive works. It's how EVERY DRIVE in the history of computers work! If I take my files out of my HD, they will be deleted from the HD. If I move my files out of my flash drive, they will be deleted from my flash drive. The only way that I would be surprised by this behaviour is if I had never used a computer at all in my life.

But this is how EVERY DAMN cloud drive works.

No. No, it's not. I have experience with Google Drive, iDrive, SkyDrive and DropBox. The only oddball one that leads to losing data like this is Google Drive.

With SkyDrive, it works very similar to DropBox. Your cloud drive is just a folder on your disk, synched between multiple computers. If you move a file from your cloud drive to your local drive, it moves the actual file - not a pointer to it.

Google Drive is a terrible morass of confusing design. It's not an exaggeration to say they should shut down and start over.

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

#70

Post by ceejayoz »

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…

> 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.

For a techie, perhaps. For a non-techie, that's something they're unlikely to have ever seen happen in their filesystem. Even if they opened it in Notepad, they'd probably not know the ramifications of what's shown there.

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