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Google to Roll Out New 'Drive for Desktop' App in the Coming Weeks, Replacing Backup & Sync and Drive File Stream Clients

Unfortunately I simply don't trust that this will be around in 2 years - or they'll yank it for another option by that point.
 
I just moved from Dropbox to Google Drive for work, and initially got very confused because I downloaded the Backup and Sync app and had even sent out instructions to my employees to do the same. I didn't realize that was for personal drive, and File Stream was for Google Apps at Work. So this makes sense.

However, while most things are working well, I can't figure out how to get Spotlight (or Alfred) search to show files in my shared drives. Anyone know how to do this? It worked great on Dropbox.
 
How does this work on M1 Mac?
Is there another app that work better on M1 to sync my Google drive?
 
I feel like they change the app for this like once a year. Can they just stick with one and fix it?
 
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WiseAJ said:
I feel like they change the app for this like once a year. Can they just stick with one and fix it?
Click to expand...

As I explained last time:

Santiago said:
It's quite simple, really. They had Google Docs, where you stored all your files, then they decided that should only refer to their web-based text documents, with other files now under Google Drive. Then they released the Google Drive desktop client, renamed it to Google Backup & Sync, released Google Drive File Stream with slightly different features for slightly different accounts, and are now renaming Google Drive File Stream to just Google Drive and merging Google Backup & Sync (the old Drive) into the new Drive. I look forward to next year, when they rename it all back to Google Documents and use the Google Drive name for their self-driving cars.
Click to expand...
 
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Am I the only one who was happy with Backup & Sync? I have been using it to synchronize selected folders between the cloud and my Mac file system. Now, being forced to move to the "Google Drive" app, I notice three major problems right away:
1) the files that I need on my Mac are not sync’d, but somehow made available, even offline, through a proprietary mechanism
2) I cannot make backups of the Google files from my desktop anymore, as they are not sync'd (see above)
3) Spotlight does not search in the Google files
4) when the Google Drive is not running, all Google files, even the ones “available offline” are not visible

Help!
Is there an alternative sync app available for Mac? One that actually syncs files into the Mac file system so that they are physically intact and avilable for backups?

Thanks!
Tom
 
egoldin said:
However, while most things are working well, I can't figure out how to get Spotlight (or Alfred) search to show files in my shared drives. Anyone know how to do this? It worked great on Dropbox.
Click to expand...
It's dependent on where the service/tool makes its "home" folder.

If it's in the user directory, like Dropbox and Backup&Sync/B&S do, Finder/Spotlight will index it. Old FileStream/GDFS was good too.
If it's somewhere in the library, Finder/Spotlight can't see it. Apps that rely on this backend, like Aflred, do not see it either. From experience, CyberDuck, MountainDuck, and CloudMounter all have their folders somewhere here and thus don't get indexed.

Some third party tools that can index all of your Google Workspace account (including Shared Drives) are Odrive (pretty much like GDFS) and StrongSync (new and uses some Big Sur advancements, but stability YMMV).

I personally use an old beta version of B&S that was the first release with M1 support. It still works well, but it is for personal drives only (no team stuff).
 
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Anyone know if there is a way to PREVENT Google Drive for Desktop from taking your old Google Drive Folder and making a totally new partition for that folder?

I'm pretty sure whatever it's doing in terms of creating partitions completely screwed my setup.

Pretty sure I didn't check anything strange during setup but my setup ending up resulting in the following.......


OLD SETUP

OS on C:

Storage Drive was D:

Google Drive was D:\GoogleDrive

__________________________________________


NEW DEFAULT SETUP for Google Drive for Desktop resulted in

OS C:

Storage Drive D: disappeared (didn't show up at all until I uninstalled Google Drive for Desktop)

Google Drive created a completely new partition F: and the named it using the gmail account address

Like F:\email@email.com
 
Has anyone here heard of GoogleDrive stopping/affecting Spotlight - I moved from backup & sync to drive for macOS Big Sur (running on an M1/mini) and it has just .... stopped. GoogleOne help disengaged after 10 emails and frankly gave up. Anyone else with this problem too?
 
Slitted said:
It's dependent on where the service/tool makes its "home" folder.

If it's in the user directory, like Dropbox and Backup&Sync/B&S do, Finder/Spotlight will index it. Old FileStream/GDFS was good too.
If it's somewhere in the library, Finder/Spotlight can't see it. Apps that rely on this backend, like Aflred, do not see it either. From experience, CyberDuck, MountainDuck, and CloudMounter all have their folders somewhere here and thus don't get indexed.

Some third party tools that can index all of your Google Workspace account (including Shared Drives) are Odrive (pretty much like GDFS) and StrongSync (new and uses some Big Sur advancements, but stability YMMV).

I personally use an old beta version of B&S that was the first release with M1 support. It still works well, but it is for personal drives only (no team stuff).
Click to expand...
Thanks -this is useful
 
Backup & Sync was working well to upload my Photos Library to Google Photos as a backup to iCloud Drive.

Since the move to Drive for desktop, photos are no longer uploading. Looks like Drive for desktop no longer supports .heic (Backup & Sync did).

I would rather not change my iPhone photo format to .jpg given the storage savings with .heic. Has anyone gotten around this?
 
I just updated to Monterey. We used Google file stream to access a large Google Drive folder system for work. I immediately had to figure out what happened to my desktop icon, and how to connect. Thats sorted, although it wont auto connect on login/startup.
NOW, i cant search the drive, which I've heard is an issue.
AND, I dont get any control click contextual menu options to share files on drive. All of my google drive related options are gone. Any thoughts on how to get those back?


Screen Shot 2022-02-10 at 4.18.36 PM.png
 
jefftopping said:
I just updated to Monterey. We used Google file stream to access a large Google Drive folder system for work. I immediately had to figure out what happened to my desktop icon, and how to connect. Thats sorted, although it wont auto connect on login/startup.
NOW, i cant search the drive, which I've heard is an issue.
AND, I dont get any control click contextual menu options to share files on drive. All of my google drive related options are gone. Any thoughts on how to get those back?


View attachment 1957418
Click to expand...
You can't, there is a new API which has to be used by Apple (for good security reasons) and the hacks with ctrl-click contextual menu -which Google used before- are therefore gone.
 
JackNL said:
You can't, there is a new API which has to be used by Apple (for good security reasons) and the hacks with ctrl-click contextual menu -which Google used before- are therefore gone.
Click to expand...
So is there no way to link people to files and locations on google drive now?
 
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