On Tuesday, Google announced its long-rumored Google Drive service. Google Drive is a replacement for Google Docs that can be described as the combination of two things:
- An upgraded version of Google Docs, rebranded with a new name
- A desktop agent that runs on your computer, synchronizing files between your Google Drive and a folder on your computer
I spent some time testing Google Drive and how CloudPull interacts with it. CloudPull works with Google Drive just as it did with Google Docs. CloudPull backs up files and folders created with the desktop agent just as it does those created with the web interface. Google did not change the API at all, and the entire change is transparent to CloudPull. The next update to CloudPull will contain changes to user-presented text that reflect the name of the service changing from “Google Docs” to “Google Drive”.
It is important to note that when the Google Drive desktop agent puts a traditional “Google Docs” document, presentation, or spreadsheet on your computer, it creates a bookmark file that points back to the item on Google's web interface. The desktop agent does not copy the contents of these items to your computer. Therefore, even if you have versioned backups of the data on your computer, running the Google Drive desktop agent does not address the need to back up the contents of these items on your Google Drive. If you were to lose access to the contents of your Google account, you would still lose access to these items. Backing up the contents of these Google Drive items with CloudPull remains essential.