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I really should have seen it coming. You're dead to me, Mortimer. (Source)
You've been typing for what seems like hours. Your brilliance is just spewing out of you and into Microsoft Word. After this is turned in tomorrow morning, the persuasive essay world will never be the same. It is a truly momentous occasion, and glory is within reach.
Then, one of these three things happens:
The cat jumps onto your desk to say "Hey, buddy! Want to pet me?" In the process, an entire large glass of water is knocked over, directly onto your laptop. It makes weird noises, and then goes black.
A freak thunderstorm rolls through, you heard a loud crack, and your computer goes black.
Nothing in particular happens, and for no known reason whatsoever—neither cat, nor water, nor freak thunderstorm are near—the computer goes black anyway.
The essay is gone. All of it.
Cue weeping.
But dry those tears, young pilgrim! It's cloud storage to the rescue.
Next to Google, cloud storage (i.e. storing work on the internet) is the student's best friend. We've all had essay or research paper mishaps, and there is nothing worse than that fateful realization that, yes, we do have to start over. It's gut-wrenching.
With cloud storage, however, we always have a backup. Neither lightning strikes nor evil cats can stand in the way of our forthcoming essay glory when our documents are stored safely somewhere other than our local hard drive. Today, get the basics on clouding.
READING: HOW TO USE GOOGLE DRIVE
Let's start off this cloud backup adventure with a YouTube video about a dog named Frank. You're welcome.
There are a ton of options for "clouding" our work, like Dropbox or Box. The cloud is the cool, new, technology thing, so every company who is able is jumping on it like Twitter stock. Some storage systems cost money, others are free; some are automatic, some are not.
Since we're sticking with the Google suite here at SACA (and because it is awesome and free), we're gonna do a deep dive into Google Drive. How does it work, you ask? And does it necessitate a car or the use of public transportation? Why, no! Read this introduction to Google Drive and get excited. Essays lost into the abyss are a thing of the past.
Also, if you hadn't heard, Google Drive has a whole app store! It was inevitable, really.
READING: MEET GOOGLE DOCS
First, I should clarify something about Google Drive naming conventions: Google Drive and Google Docs are considered two different things, but they both happen in the same place.
What are these mysterious Google Docs, you ask? Are they revolutionary and totally mind-boggling?
Nope.
Google Docs are essentially the same as MS Office programs, but Google versions instead of Microsoft versions. Kind of a let down, I know.
The difference we care about today is that we can edit Google docs inside Google Drive, but we can't edit MS Office documents. If we arrive at school and remember we didn't print off our essay, we can—like last lesson—go into Google Drive, download our cloud copy of the essay, print it, and meander carefree into class.
Let's say, however, that we did remember to print our essay, but find a really embarrassing typo that needs fixing before we turn it in. We need to find our cloud copy and make some edits before printing it. Are we sunk?
Nope.
Google Drive lets us convert Microsoft Word documents to Google Docs for editing with a few clicks. These clicks, actually:
Click on a Microsoft Word document (we can tell it's a Word document because it has the blue "W" beside the file name)
Click "Open" in the bottom right corner
Click "File"
Click "Open with…"
Click "Google Docs"
Now a new, more Google-Dockier version is opened, and it's already been saved to our Drive automatically (the version with the blue square next to the file name instead of the "W"). We can edit that typo away and print it just in time for class. We'll do more with this in today's activity, but for now, remember that to edit a document in Google Drive, we first have to convert it to a Google Doc. (Are you taking notes? Write this down.)
As if that weren't exciting enough—and I know it isn't—Google Docs not only lets us edit our documents, but allows us to share them with other users. In its simplest form, we can share a folder of vacation pictures with Nana, or share an essay we've been working on with a friend for feedback.
The absolute coolest part, though, is that once we share documents with other users, like for a group project, those users can edit the same document, together, at the same time. We're basically using Google Drive to bend the entire time/space continuum, and we should feel no shame about it.
This is where today's reading comes in, except today, it's a lot less like reading and lot more like watching. (I thought I'd shake things up a bit.)
Watch this quick YouTube tutorial on collaborating on Google docs and prepare to be amazed, or at the very least, mildly interested.
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