Tinys World of Technology BS

A Pain in the Whatchamacallit
By Tiny Ruisch

Last month, before the club meeting started, there was a discussion about Dropbox.  Someone asked what Dropbox was and everyone else answered, all of them differently.  A week later, at the staff meeting, someone asked how to set up Dropbox folders, and everyone gave a different answer.  At Woody’s SIG meeting, another Dropbox discussion was held, with the same differences of opinions.

What is this Dropbox thing? How do you use it?  Must you be on a cloud for it to work properly?  It sure is a good thing you downloaded the newsletter this month, because I’m going to answer all of your questions.  Maybe I’ll just answer some of your questions.  If you’re really lucky, you might get a question answered.

Dropbox is a free service that lets you bring all your photos, docs, and videos anywhere.  This means that any file you save to your Dropbox will automatically save to all your computers, phones and even the Dropbox website.  Dropbox also makes it super easy to share with others, whether you’re a student or professional, parent or grandparent.  Even if you accidentally spill a latte on your laptop, have no fear!  You can relax knowing that Dropbox always has you covered, and none of your stuff will ever be lost.

Dropbox works hard to make sure that all your files are the same no matter where you’re working from.  This means that you can start working on a computer at school or the office, and finish from your home computer.  Never email yourself a file again!  Download Dropbox for your phone to simplify your life even more – flip through all your photos or review that spreadsheet even while on the road.  Dropbox lets you work from any computer or phone with the confidence that you’ll always have everything you need.

Dropbox makes sharing so easy that you’ll be amazed at the things you can do.  Invite your friends, family and teammates to any folder in your Dropbox, and it’ll be as if you saved that folder straight to their computers.  You can send people links to specific files in your Dropbox too.  This makes Dropbox perfect for team projects, sharing party photos with friends, or recording your band’s new album.

Even if your computer has a meltdown, your stuff is always safe in Dropbox and can be restored in a snap.  Dropbox is like a time machine that lets you undo mistakes and even undelete files you accidentally trash.  Your Dropbox is always ready for action from the Dropbox website too!

People around the world rely on Dropbox to help them design buildings, compose music, run businesses, write books and even coordinate disaster relief.  Whether you’re an entrepreneur or a teacher, a photographer or an astronomer, an artist or an activist, Dropbox simplifies your life.

There you go. Aren’t you glad you read all that information?  Now you know everything there is to know about Dropbox.  How can I be so positive you have all the knowledge?  The answer is simple.  I copied everything word for word from the Dropbox website.

My point in this article is that Dropbox is whatever you want it to be.  When you sign up for Dropbox, you have to download and install it on your computer.  A new Dropbox folder is created.  Any file that you put in this folder is copied to your Dropbox folder in the cloud (remote server).  If you install Dropbox on any other computer, your phone, your tablet, etc. a local Dropbox folder will be installed on that device and the files on the Dropbox server will be copied to it.  If you make changes to any files in the Dropbox folder, the same changes will occur in every Dropbox folder that you have created.  You can also go to Dropbox in a web browser to edit your files.

Initially, Dropbox gives you 2GB of storage space.  There are several methods of getting more free space.  You can also purchase extra space.  That is plenty of space for word files, etc.  Unless you buy extra space, don’t plan on uploading a lot of pictures or media files.

The main use of Dropbox is synchronizing files between computers, but there are a lot of other uses for it.  I’m not going to list them all here.  If you Google “unusual Dropbox uses”, you’ll see more than nine million reasons why.

Personally, I don’t use Dropbox a whole lot.  The only reason I first signed up was so that someone else would get more space in their Dropbox.  Lately, I’ve started to use Dropbox much more often.  For instance, I’ve been keeping my newsletter articles in my Dropbox folder . That way I can work on an article from whatever computer I’m sitting at.

I you’d like to give Dropbox a try, signing up is simple.  There is only four blocks to fill in: first name, last name, e-mail address and password.  Here is the Dropbox sign up link.  If you use this link, Dropbox will give me more free space.

Thanks for reading!