Google Drive Blog: Google Drive: 5 ways to take some stress out of the holidays

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Google Drive: 5 ways to take some stress out of the holidays

Wednesday, December 10, 2014

Organize your holiday essentials

Having trouble keeping track of the flight itineraries your children are sending your way? Maybe you just need a central space to store photos from a family trip? With Google Drive, you can organize your stuff into folders so you can easily come back to it.

To create a folder, click New in the top left corner of Drive, choose Folder, and name it. From there, you can drag and drop your stuff into it or right-click a file and choose Move to to add it to a folder. Now the need to dig around your desktop is gone!

Quickly share files with your entire family

Have a pie recipe that you want to send to others? Quickly share it straight from Drive. You can even decide whether the people you are sharing it with can edit, comment on, or simply view what you send them. That way, you can keep your grandson from “accidentally” adding an extra pound of sugar to your recipe.

To share your recipe (or any other file), select it in Drive, click the Share icon and add the email addresses of the people you want to share it with. Next to the addresses, choose from the drop-down menu which level of access you want people to have (e.g. edit, comment or view). Then let the family bake-off begin.

Go attachment-free in your holiday emails

When sending invitations to your family’s annual holiday party with Gmail, you can also add a big file straight from Drive, like the home video you put together for the occasion. Adding the file from Drive keeps you from using up storage space in Gmail and allows you to control who has access to the file you’ve included.

When writing an email in Gmail, you can add a file from Drive at any time by clicking the Drive icon at the bottom of the email and choosing a file to add. Now everyone can see that video showcasing your unparalleled baking skills.

No Internet at the cabin? No problem

Relaxing with nature doesn’t mean you shouldn't be able to see your photos or keep working on the holiday newsletter. Before you lose access to your Internet connection, simply sign in to your Chrome browser and visit drive.google.com. That way, anytime you lose Internet or WiFi, you can just go back to Drive in Chrome and your files will be immediately viewable offline!

You can even edit your Google Docs, Sheets, and Slides offline, and all the changes you make will be saved for when your Internet connection comes back. That way, you can enjoy the end of fall without falling behind.

Family photos and shopping lists on every device

Whether you’re in your living room or at the holiday party, on your laptop or your phone, you’ll never be without the ability to show off your family photos with Drive. You can download the Drive app for your Android or iOS device and have all of your files available on your phone or tablet — even offline.

On your Mac or PC, install the Drive app so files in Drive are synced to those devices, too. As always, Chromebooks automatically use Drive to store files so those all important shopping lists and recipes are safely stored and available from anywhere.

Bonus – Scan your holiday receipts on Android

It can be difficult to keep track of all your receipts when you’re at the mall doing holiday shopping. With the Drive app for Android, you can scan all of your receipts directly into Drive so that you can easily organize them when you get home.

To scan a receipt or another file, open the Drive app, click the plus (+) sign in the bottom right, and click Scan. You can then scan the item with your phone’s camera and it immediately gets uploaded to your Drive. And with that, no more boxes of receipts to sift through on Tax Day.