Can I sync network folder with a Google drive?

Question

The brand new released Google drive allows to sync a folder which resides under My Documents (on Windows systems). However, I would like to sync a folder that resides on a network-mapped drive. Would it be possible please and if yes then how?

Answer 1

You can choose any folder during the Google Drive install.

Firstly select "Advanced Setup" on the second page of the Getting Started screen.

Then click the "Change" button next to Folder Location

Select any folder you want, including network shares and mapped network drives.

Voila! You have Google Drive on any folder you want.

Answer 2

If this functionality is not explicitly included (you go into the preferences of Google Drive, add the folder on the networked computer and it does not allow that folder to sync)

You could mirror that folder on your local computer. (Or really simply just install google drive on that network computer, but I would guess that you would not be asking this question if that was an option).

To mirror it locally I would suggest using a version of rsync (do a quick google search to find a bunch of options).

Or use another technique to mirror the contents onto your local machine.

Answer 3

You can sync a network folder with DropBox. Maybe the same method will work for Google (I haven't tried yet).

1) Log in on the CONSOLE of the file server (that is hosting the network share/folder). 2) Install Google Drive (I installed DropBox). 3) Set the location of the Google Drive to be in a sub-folder of the network share (on the physical drive of the server that you've just installed it on). 4) Use the Google Drive account to share the Google Drive as appropriate. 5) Log off the Console of the server.

Now... Go to any client that's connected to the network share, navigate to the new sub-folder you just created, and place files in it. You'll now see those files on Google Drive.

WHAT I USE THIS FOR: I have all the sales and technical staff using Drop Box, and subscribed to the Network Shared folder. There are two sub-folders, one for Sales and the other for tech staff. I simply place files in their respective folders, and sales has all the sales/marketing brochures, videos, pdf, spreadsheets, etc. And Tech staff has all their stuff separate too.

It works for BOTH iPad, and laptop users! Love It!

Answer 4

I am pretty sure I have found a working solution. I'll also run down the things I have tried that didn't work so that people can be spared the time to try these things.

I have a Drobo and have some shares mapped as windows drive letters. Several months back, I set the share permissions to "Everyone" on the Drobo dashboard, and I was able to set that share's mapped drive as the Google Drive root folder in the past.

HOWEVER, something happened with an update somewhere and it stopped working. I kept getting the message that the folder is not writable. I was clearly able to write to the folder through explorer. I tried connecting to the share as Administrator and then running sync as an administrator. That didn't work either, so I concluded that it wasn't a permissions problem, but perhaps Google updated the sync program to flat out reject UNC paths. But I tried some permissions tweaks anyways...

I tried going into the folder properties through explorer and changing the ownership, and setting permissions to full control. Windows couldn't do it.

I tried changing the credentials that windows uses to map the drive. Nothing worked there. I tried using different ways to try and fool the sync program into thinking it was not a UNC path. Nothing worked there. (subst, mklink) It kept seeing the UNC path through the mask.

I also tried InSync, but for a terabyte of data in 100's of thousands of small files, downloading 2 files at a time would take WEEKS.

I also tried ExpanDrive, and although I was able to map a drive letter directly to Google Drive, it was a very slow connection and still left me with the need to set up some sort of sync between the mapped cloud and my NAS. When I tried using CrashPlan to back up from the mapped Cloud, it couldn't see the drive letter that ExpanDrive had mounted. So I gave up on that.

I tried creating a VHDX on the share, and then mapping it to a folder on my C drive. That seemed to work but Sync kept crashing. ( \drobo\share\GDrive.VHDX -> c:\GDrive\ )

Then I tried mapping the VHDX directly to a drive letter. That seemed to work, but sync was getting hung up on the System Volume Information and Recycle folders. ( \drobo\share\GDrive.VHDX -> G:\ )

SO... I created a folder, on the root of the VHDX that is mapped to a drive letter. I set that folder to the Sync folder. It has now synced 3249 files and 2GB without a hiccup. I have a TB of data to download, so (fingers crossed) I am feeling confident that this solution works. I will update the answer if I discover any issues with this. ( \drobo\share\GDrive.VHDX -> G:\ ) THEN created a GDrive folder on G:\ and then selected G:\GDrive\ in the Sync application.

HTH

As an added bonus, mapping the VHDX to a drive letter makes thumbnails work in explorer even though they are in a network location. Woohoo!