Gmail Drive, not Google's ?

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Gmail Drive is a third-party application that allows utilisation of the humongous greater-than-2-GB Gmail mail box as storage space. As mentioned, it is a third-party tool, meaning Google does not support its use. From Wikipedia: “GMail Drive is an experimental package that depends on but is not provided by Google. Changes in Google’s Gmail system may render Gmail Drive temporarily or permanently inoperable. Google’s terms of service for Gmail do not explicitly ban or permit Gmail Drive or the use of Gmail space for files other than email. Heavy use of a GMail Drive can trigger at least a temporary suspension by Google.”

Once installed, Gmail Drive creates a virtual drive on your system, and this is visible along with the other drives in My Computer. Unlike other drives, this one does not have a drive letter associated—it is just Gmail Drive called Gmail Drive. Use GD as you would any other drive on the system. Double-click to open the drive. If you haven’t logged in yet, a pop-up will ask you to do so. Once logged in, you can see the files that already exist in the drive. Right-clicking on the drive and checking its properties will show the used and free space.

To store files, you copy and paste as you normally would in the case of any other drive. GD integrates into Windows Explorer and shows up under the “Send to” options when you right-click on a file. Since the data needs to be uploaded to the drive, the speed of your net connection will dictate the process time.

In case you’re wondering if there’s a way to know if the mailbox is being used—you’d be dead not to notice! What Gmail Drive does in the background is send an e-mail with the file as an attachment. These show up in your Inbox as sent by “me”. All file manipulations, like creating of a new folder and transferring of files between folders, will also show up as e-mails in the Inbox. If you uninstall Gmail Drive, the files in the drive will still be accessible from your Inbox.

In conclusion, GMail Drive is a handy application that allows putting the Gmail mailbox to better use. But given Google’s dis-pleasure regarding extensive use of the tool, it is not recommended for users planning to store and retrieve large files frequently on a daily basis. While it does accomplish its core task of uploading files to Gmail without hassles, the semi-polished nature of the product cannot escape a frown.