Even a small free 15GB volume of Google cloud storage - Google disk, makes it possible to organize a platform for storing daily backups of key information of a small organization.
Because Since the concept of Google disk implies the use exclusively for personal purposes, it is impossible to establish an automated backup without tricky settings. The main problem is moving deleted, out-of-date backup files to the trash, without freeing up disk space. By default, the Google Drive Trash can only be emptied manually, which requires constant personal intervention. This fact practically negates the possibility of using Google Drive as a free storage for backups, but ...
A special automation tool comes to the rescue - Google Drive API. Below we will consider a special case of using this universal tool. So,
How to set up automatic deletion of files from Google Drive Trash?
Choose My Drive / Connect other applications
Sort a lot of applications "from Google" for ease of search
Connect Google Apps Script
Follow the instructions ...
After connecting Google Apps Script, in the "Create" menu, you will be able to create a script to automatically delete files from the Google drive trash can.
In the project window that appears, select the "Resources" / Additional functions of Google in the menu
Step 8. In the window that opens, enable the Calendar API and Drive API and go to the Google Developer Console.
Step 9. Follow the instructions ...
Step 10. In the API / Library Manager, select Drive API.
Step 11. In the API Manager / Control Panel, select Enable.
Step 12. Return to the tab from Step 7. Erase everything and paste the following text:
function emptyThrash () { Drive.Files.emptyTrash (); }
Step 13. In the top menu, select "Resources" and in the drop-down list "Triggers of the current project"
Step 14. Create a project trigger - defining the conditions for launching the deletion of files from the Google Drive recycle bin. Those. how often files will be deleted from the Google Drive Recycle Bin.
Step 15. Agree with permissions
Step 16. Save the project through the "file" menu.
It's all. Automatic deletion of files from the Google Drive recycle bin is configured.
As you probably know, Google recently consolidated all the quotas allocated to users for storing files in their services into one 15 GB disk space. Thus, if you actively use one of the Google services to store your data, then the space allotted to you may very quickly run out. Learn how to clean up Google Drive and free up precious cloud space in this article.
In order to find out how much space you have already used from the allocated to you in Google Drive, you can go to this link and hover over the pie chart. A tooltip will appear, which will show the layout for each of the services.
Cleaning up Gmail
If you are an experienced user of the mail service, then you probably have accumulated a significant archive of letters. By itself, each letter takes up insignificant bytes, but if you have thousands and thousands of them, and even with large investments, then they can take up a lot of space. The gentle cleanup method is to find all emails with large attachments. It is very simple to do this, and we wrote about it here and there.
The second method is more radical and consists in abandoning the use of the Gmail web interface in favor of a desktop mail client such as Thunderbird. Configure it to receive mail from your account and enable the option to delete messages from the server. As a result, you have an empty space in Google Drive and your mail archive in a local form, which can be very useful in terms of ensuring privacy.
Converting files to Google Docs format
Google confused us all a little by naming two different services with the same name: an online office suite, which we sometimes call Google Docs in the old fashioned way, and a cloud storage for files like Dropbox. But here's what you need to know about Google Drive in terms of reducing the space of files stored there:
- Google Docs files - documents, spreadsheets, presentations, presentations, forms - don't take up space in the cloud at all. So store as much data there in Google-native formats as you like.
- All other files, such as PDFs, images or Microsoft Word documents, take their corresponding space in Google Drive.
From this we can conclude that if you want to save cloud disk space, then when uploading any files, check the option to convert them to Google Docs formats.
Removing previous versions of files
Google Drive retains previous versions of files and may consume additional space. If you have already finished editing the file, you can delete the previous versions to free up space.
To check for previous versions, right-click the file and select Version control... In the window that appears, you can delete all revisions that you no longer need. Please note that Google Drive automatically deletes old versions every 30 days or when their number reaches 100. Therefore, there is no reason to specifically do this, except when you need to free up space in the cloud right now.
Keep track of the photo size
Your photos from Google+ can also take up space in the cloud storage, but here you need to know the following nuances:
- You can upload pictures with a resolution of up to 2048 × 2048 pixels. Photos of this size or smaller do not count towards remaining disk space at all.
- Videos up to 15 minutes can also be stored on Google+ without counting your cloud storage quota.
This means that when uploading a photo to Google+, do not exceed these dimensions, unless, of course, you want to save space. This is very easy to do. Open the Google+ settings page, scroll down to the section Photo and make sure the option Upload photo in full size not marked. In this case, all your uploaded images will be automatically compressed and will not consume storage space. You can do the same on the Google+ Android app if you upload your photos to the clouds this way.
You can also view the photos already stored on Google+ and reduce their size to what they offer for free storage. It is very easy to do this now with the help of.
Hello everyone Today we will talk about such a program as Google Drive, I will tell you what it is, show you how to use it, and then you can understand whether you need this program or not. So, as you probably already understood, the program was made by Google, which is good, because Google is always quality and stability, you get the idea. Well, Drive means a type of disk, in general, the Google Drive program means Google Drive, which in fact is a cloud data storage
Google Drive works very stably and clearly, no glitches were noticed in the work, so I advise you to use this program if your data on your computer is dear to you. I didn't write something that Google Drive is, so to speak, a program that connects your computer to the Google cloud. How does this happen? Well, for example, you want to use the cloud, right? Here you download Google Drive, install, specify the folder and then everything that you throw into this specified folder, then all this will then be in the cloud. And everything also works in the opposite direction, so to speak. In general, Google Drive is a cloud storage folder on the Internet, but the folder itself is on your computer. Everything in this folder, you will have it all in the cloud. Delete something from the folder, it will also be deleted from the cloud. Well, something like this, but today I will try to consider all this in detail in practice, so to speak, there is nothing particularly complicated there, but I have experience using Google Drive, so I will share it with you, I hope that everything will be here understandably
Damn, I completely forgot to write to you that in order to use Google Drive, you need to have a Google account, that is, to have a Google account. For example, do you have Gmail? If so, it means that you also have a Google account. For in Google, one account goes to all services.
So, let's get started with Google Drive? Let's start, then the first thing to do is, of course, download it. To do this, follow this link:
So, okay, went to the download page and click on Download there:
Then you will need to click on Download version for PC, click here:
Then there will still be terms of use, you can read .. In general, click here Accept terms and install:
That's it, then the installer will download, I have a Chrome browser, so what was downloaded, it seemed to me at the bottom, there I right-clicked and selected Open:
Then there was such a window, I clicked Start here (you may not have this window, this is such a type of Windows security):
Then the download of the program itself will begin (because we actually downloaded the web installer from the site):
By the way, why it was necessary to make such a hefty window, I do not quite understand .. Well, okay .. Then you need to enter your Gmail mail and click Next:
Then enter your password and click the Login button:
Click Forward again:
In the next window, do not rush to click the Finish button, here it is better to click on Synchronization options:
I may have been looking badly, but it seems that if you install Google Drive, then you will not be able to change the Google Drive folder in Windows later, so it's better to immediately click Synchronization options to see what and how. But maybe I'm wrong. It just happened like this, I had Google Drive installed, and I wanted to change the Google Drive folder, but alas, no matter how hard I tried, I didn't find such a setting, I still remember that I was very surprised at this ... Well, in short, such things, in general, we clicked on Synchronization options, then you will see the following settings:
As you can see, here you can manually specify the Google Drive folder. On the Advanced tab, you can set a limit on the speed of exchange with the cloud on the Internet:
What's the catch? Well, firstly, in order for Google Drive to work quickly, you need more or less fast Internet. But if your Internet is not very fast, so that during synchronization Google Disk does not clog the entire Internet channel, then you can limit the speed. See for yourself whether to limit or not, but if anything, you can turn on the limitation and leave it as it is, well, that is, 100 KB / sec, if you have not very fast Internet, I think this speed will be enough in principle. But if anything, you can increase it. And yet, just for a note, I will say, for example, you have 10 megabits of Internet, how much is this kb / s? In 1 megabit, in terms of speed, there will be 128 kb / s. Based on this infe, you can limit the speed. But this is me, already a little carried away by these restrictions and speeds ... Well, at the bottom, well, in the settings window, there are still checkmarks about loading Google Drive along with Windows, show some Google Drive icons in the context menu (I have this checkbox I take it off, because I just don't need it), well, and a checkmark regarding confirmation before deleting objects. In general, guys, if everything is configured as you need, then in the end you already click the Synchronize button.
Note to you! Everything that you put into the Google Drive folder, everything that you delete there, it will all be done in the Google Drive cloud itself. Even if you have a text file in your Google Drive folder, you opened it and wrote something there, then closed it, then this file will be updated in the Google Drive cloud itself! That is, roughly speaking, everything that you have in the Google Drive folder, then consider that you will have all this in the Google Drive cloud. The whole synchronization process is fully automatic!
That's it, now you have installed Google Drive, before that, I hope you looked at the settings and, if anything, changed them for yourself, and that's basically all, you now have a real Internet cloud on your computer. Now everything that you put into the Google Drive folder, then all this after a while will be in the Internet cloud. But how fast will it be there? Well guys, it just depends on how fast your internet is. Here I will tell you this, in this case it is better not to bother, the main thing is that the Internet is not too slow. Google Disk knows its work very well that it will be able to upload it, what it cannot, then upload it another time, do not worry about it. Well, in any case, I didn't have any problems with Google Drive at all, it's just a great thing! No, there was a problem, I'm lying, but I already wrote about it: after I installed Google Drive, after that I could not find the setting to change the Google Drive folder itself, well, that is, to specify a different folder, I didn’t found it ... Therefore, I showed you how to change it during the installation process, because it seems to me that then it will no longer be possible to change it ... These are the pies ..
In general, guys, let's go back to Google Drive itself. I clicked on the Synchronize button, after which it was written that the installation was complete. Then my Windows shell disappeared for a second, I don't know a glitch or it should be so ... Then the shell came back and the Google Drive folder window opened, here it is:
Here is the path itself where this folder is located (where VirtMachine is, this is the name of the computer account):
C: \ Users \ VirtMachine \ Google Drive
The folder is still empty, well, that's understandable, I haven't put anything there yet .. Now look, here is the Google Drive icon in the tray:
I just clicked on it with the left mouse button, then with the right one, in the end, the same window still appears, like this:
Blunted a little, there is another menu, in short, if you click here:
Then the following menu will appear:
And here guys, if you select the Settings item in this menu, the settings window will appear:
Well, you want to know what's the catch? And I'll tell you what's the catch ... In short, the fact is that if I'm not mistaken, then the settings to change the Google Drive folder on your computer, then there is really no such setting as I understand it! Here, in the settings, there are three tabs, I have worked through them all and there is no option anywhere to change the Google Drive folder on my computer! Here is such a joke guys, what can be the conclusion? The folder for Google Drive can be set only when installing Google Drive, this is what you need to remember! And I'll also write, well, just a note, here in the settings on the Account tab you can see how much is busy on Google Drive and how much is free:
Well guys, let's try to test something? So now for the test I will throw some large file into the Google Drive folder, and let's see what happens ... I threw an archive weighing a little more than one gig for the test, a certain label appeared in the Google Drive folder on the archive itself, which means that the archive is like this I would say during synchronization:
After a while, the Google Drive icon in the tray moved, this means that synchronization has started, and if you click on the icon, a window will appear like this:
As you can see, it is convenient to write here what is happening in Google Drive right now. Well guys, I'll wait until the file is uploaded to the cloud and see what will happen next, well, that is, what will be written ... In general, everything, synchronization is over, and now if you click on the icon in the tray, a window will appear in which it is written Well Synchronized:
In the folder itself, there is now an icon in the form of a green checkmark opposite the archive, which means that everything went without problems, so to speak:
That is, as you can see, Google Disk works well, everything is done conveniently, and you know what I'll tell you now? It is very stupid not to use this Google Drive! Moreover, this is Google, which means stability and quality! By the way, guys, would you like some advice? If you are used to doing many of your things right on the desktop in Windows, then you know what you can do, you can put the desktop as the Google Drive folder. And everything that you have on your desktop, then all this will be safe, because Google Disk will constantly synchronize it with the cloud, you know what's the catch?
So guys, look, I've now deleted the archive from the Google Drive folder, then clicked on the tray icon, and now, it also says that the file was deleted:
That is, it means that the file was deleted in the cloud as well. In this window, well, where it says what is happening in Google Drive, I showed you that there is a button of three dots, well, the one in the upper right corner. In short, if you press it, there will be a menu in which there is a useful Pause item. If you select it, then the work of Google Drive will be frozen, so to speak, at this time the icon will be like this:
And then, if you need to resume work, then go back to the same menu and select the Continue item.
Well guys, it seems that all the important functions have been sorted out. Now look, imagine that you have a broken hard drive. Then, when you buy a new hard drive, or a laptop, if the laptop is broken, then in short, if you install a new Windows and install Google Disk, then everything that was in it, then all this will be in it! That is, the data that was in Google Drive, then you will not lose it, do you understand what is its advantage and why I advise you to use it?
So what else to tell you, the Google Drive program runs under such a process as googledrivesync.exe, here it is in the task manager (why there are two of them I don't quite understand):
As you can see, the processor is not loaded, there is not so much RAM used .. This means that Google Drive is installed in this folder:
C: \ Program Files (x86) \ Google \ Drive
By the way, if you right-click on a folder, then there will be a Google Drive item like this:
But what does that mean? To be honest, I didn't really think about what it was for, because somehow everything suits me .. This item seems to be removed when installing Google Drive, there seems to be a checkmark in the settings .. I've blunted something and didn't remove it her…
Well, everything seems to have shown what is needed ... or have you forgotten something? Everything seems to be. The only thing left is to show how to remove Google Drive from your computer completely. At the same time, files from your Google Drive folder will not be deleted and they will not be deleted in the Internet cloud either. Before uninstalling, it is better to exit the program, to do this, click on the Google Drive icon in the tray, then click on the three dots and select the Close Google Drive item there:
So look, now you hold down the Win + R buttons, the Run window will appear, there you write the following command:
Then click OK. You will see the Programs and Features window, in this window there will be a list of all installed programs, here you need to find Google Drive, right-click and select uninstall:
Then you will have such a window, then you click Yes (well, if you haven't changed your mind to delete, of course):
Then you will have a window like this for a few seconds:
And then it disappears, and all the guys, Google Drive has been removed from your computer! But at the same time, as I already wrote, your files in the Google Drive folder will not be deleted. The folder itself will remain in its place, well, that is, it will remain in this folder (this is where it is put by default, if you do not change the settings):
C: \ Users \ VirtMachine
Let me remind you that where VirtMachine is, then this is where you should have the name of the computer, well, that is, the name of the account. So, this Google Drive folder can be safely deleted if there are no necessary files in it. In any case, what was in this folder, then it will most likely be in the Internet cloud, well, unless, of course, all the files have been synchronized. To delete a folder, just right-click on it and then select Delete:
That's all guys, as you can see, there is nothing complicated in this Google Drive, as it seems to me, it is easy to use it, it does not load the computer, well, as I already wrote, due to the fact that the program is from Google, it is worth using it , because Google is quality and stability. Good luck, guys, so that everything is fine with you
04.01.2017Google provides 15GB of free space on Google Drive, which seems like a pretty good deal compared to 2GB in Dropbox and 10GB in Box. But there is a caveat - this 15GB limit includes not only your Google Drive, but also your GMail account (messages and attachments) and Google+ Photos.
If you are using Gmail as one of your primary email accounts, you are probably stumbling into this 15GB limit more often than you would like. Here's how you can track files, messages, attachments and media files that are wasting valuable gigabytes and reclaim that space in Google Drive.
Step 1: Find the problem.
To find out what's taking up so much space on your Google Drive, go to Google Drive capacity page... Here you will see a pie chart that shows how much space you have occupied; Hover your mouse over the pie chart to see the platform breakdown.
As you can see, most of my Disk space is taken up by my files, and a bit of Gmail.
On this page, you can see how much space is available to you, including any bonuses you may have earned, and you can upgrade your rate if you feel like you need more space. Pricing starts at $ 2 per month for 100GB and up to $ 300 per month for 30TB (1 terabyte = 1024 gigabytes).
Step 2: What is outside the limits?
Not everything on your Google Drive counts as data storage, so don't indiscriminately delete files. Anything you create in Google Docs, Google Sheets, or Google Slides doesn't count (unless someone has shared with you). Almost everything in Gmail counts, but only photos larger than 2048 by 2048 pixels and videos longer than 15 minutes on your Google+ Photos count towards storage.
Step 3: Disk Cleanup.
Open up Google Drive page and take a look at the "My Drive" folder. If you see a grid of thumbnails instead of a list, click the List View button in the upper right corner of the screen.
You should now see your files in Google Drive listed and sorted by name. Google allows you to sort files by file size, but if you click the sort button in the upper right corner, you will see that you have the following sorting options: By Title, By Date Modified, By Date I Modified, and By Date Viewed.
But you can still sort files by size. In the lower left corner of the screen, you should see the amount of storage space that you are using and a link to "Purchase additional storage". Hover over this area until a pane pops up with a breakdown by Disk storage. At the top of the list, you will see "Disk" - click on it.
Your Drive folder will now be sorted by size and you can start deleting large files to free up space.
If you have PDF files that you don't want to delete, you can save them and free up space by converting them to Google Docs (or Sheets or Slides, depending on the content of the file). To do this, right-click on the PDF file, hover your mouse over "Open With", and select Google Docs from the drop-down menu.
A new Google document will open with the same name as the PDF file, and you can delete the old PDF file.
After you have deleted files from your drive, you must empty the Trash folder. Click on the Trash, select the files you want to delete permanently, right-click and select the "Delete" command. Until the file is permanently deleted, it will continue to consume disk space.
Step 4:PhotoGoogle+
I don't have any files on Google+ Photos, but some people use this service quite often. Because they use automatic Android photo backup, which downloads all the photos taken with their Android phone to their Google+ account in their original resolution.
Unfortunately, you cannot search for Google+ Photos by file size, so there is some extra work to do here. First, go to the page Photo on Google+ and click "All Photos" to see all your photos. In the upper right corner, you will see the total number of photos saved in Google+ Photos, so you can imagine how long it will take.
To delete a photo, hover your mouse over it, a check mark will appear in the upper left corner. Click on the icon, the photo will be marked (you can circle several photos with the mouse). Check all the photos you want to delete and click the "Delete" button to delete the selected ones.
To prevent your Android phone from automatically downloading full-size photos, open the Google+ app on your phone and go to Settings> Startup> Photo Size and select Reduce. Standard photo sizes will be less than 2048 by 2048 pixels, and therefore will not be protected on Disk.
Step 5: Clean up your Gmail.
If you've been cleaning your inbox a long time ago, well, let's face it - your Gmail account probably takes up most of your Google Drive space. To spare your GMail large attachments and unwanted newsletters, check out Clean Up GMail.
Google provides its users with 15 GB of free space on Google Drive. Here you can store and edit information of any format, and if the allocated space on the hosting is not enough, it is possible to expand the limits of the established volume for an additional fee.
An alternative solution to the problem of lack of space is to selectively clean up unnecessary files or delete them completely. Cloud storage includes Google Drive, Gmail, and Google+ Photos. All the information stored on them takes up precious disk space limited by Google, so if the volume is full and is approaching a critical point, and there is no desire to expand the boundaries of the allowed number of gigabytes for storage, you can simply clean Google Drive.
An interesting feature of the storage is the fact that not all files are counted when calculating the occupied space. The user can store in the cloud as much of such information, not exceeding the specified volume.
For example, Google Drive does not include documents, spreadsheets and other Google files, and Google+ Photos does not include photos with a resolution of less than 2048 x 2048 pixels, as well as videos less than 15 minutes in length, so deleting such data will not bring the desired cleaning results space.
Only the owner can delete information from the cloud; files not created by you will remain in the same place. If the user has configured and enabled synchronization of Google Drive with the device at the time of operations with data, then any changes made, including deletion, occur both in the cloud and in the device's memory.
Deleting Google Disk Files on Computer and Phone
You can carry out the cleaning process selectively, sorting the information according to the specified parameters, and then get rid of unnecessary folders that take up space or completely format the space so that nothing remains on the disk. There are two ways to delete data. In doing so, they are placed in a trash bin, which must then be emptied for final disposal. Until the files are completely deleted, users who have access to them have this information further.
Method 1
Method 2
In case of accidental deletion by any of the methods, it is possible to quickly correct the situation by pressing the button " Cancel”That appears immediately after moving. 
Final cleansing does not provide an opportunity for subsequent recovery, the data will be destroyed irrevocably, and the users who had access to them will now lose these powers, so if you are not satisfied with this state of affairs, it is better to transfer the ownership of the information to another person.
Emptying the recycle bin
You can quickly delete all items from this folder by clicking the " Empty trash"Or, by ticking the Heading box, after which all the elements will be highlighted, you should press" Delete permanently». 
To carry out the procedure on a phone or other device running on Android or IOS, a number of similar actions are carried out:
Emptying the basket
Clearing Gmail
Messages do not take up much disk space, but if they contain attachments, and the mail has been functioning for more than a year, the volume of letters reaches a certain scale, so it is better to clean the folders, including " Spam "and" Trash". Options allow you to get rid of individual elements or all of them at once. To do this, select the letters, and then move them to the trash bin, then go to this folder and press the button " Empty trash». 
To filter letters with attachments, you need to click on the arrow in the search bar on the top panel and check the box next to the item "There are attachments", then set the size of the attachments.
How to delete a photo from Google Cloud
The process of deleting photos is carried out in the same way as with Google Drive files. To do this, follow these steps:
Data sent to this folder is automatically deleted after 60 days. In order to immediately get rid of unnecessary photos, go to the menu located in the upper left corner. Here we select the item "Trash" and press the button "Empty trash", after which the permanently deleted photos will not be available for recovery.
