Technology that Works: Dropbox

I’m a little late with this, but the joy of the Internet is that someone out there doesn’t know about what I’m talking about yet. I’ve been using Dropbox since the last day of their private beta. As soon as I had invites to give, they went public and my chance to look ahead of the curve went up in a tiny cloud of blue smoke.

Regardless, since using Dropbox I can only say that it does everything perfectly. If ever you could have a backup system for the lazy, the inexperienced, or the uninterested this would be it. I know that casts an odd light on Dropbox, but trust me when I say that it is probably the single most impressive piece of software/service that I have ever installed. I’ve commented on using Dropbox before, but now I’m going to get into it with more detail.

So what is Dropbox?

Though their website explains it well enough, the jist is this: Anything in your Dropbox is automatically synced with any computers attached to that account, as well as the Dropbox web server. That’s a lot of things that are awesome all in one sentence, so I’ll try and explain in greater detail.

First, most back-up devices require you, the user, to do something; click a button, tell the system to sync, commit your files, etc.. Sometimes you have chron jobs set up to do these things for you. The joy about Dropbox is that it’s all automatic. Even better is that it’s silent about it. If you add a file, it just tries to sync to the server. If your computer isn’t connected to the Internet, it just sits there patiently. No error messages, no dialogues, no chicken-with-head-chopped-off reactions from the program. This is fantastic.

When you are connected, and you add or remove files, it silently updates your computer and the server, and when it’s finished, it will tell you what has changed. It silently ques files to upload or download and just goes to town. No confirm or allows required.

Second, you can sync as many computers as you want to the same account. This means that personally, my laptop and my desktop have all of the same files within their Dropboxes. This allows me to share files between them even when I’m not on the network. This also means that if anything explodes, I’ve got at least one backup. The kicker is that my files are also stored on the Dropbox server, so if both of my computers die, I’ve still got the ability to recover anything that was in my Dropbox.

This as an added bonus. I have a niece, and she’s recently started in ballet. My mother is gaga over the little’un, but as she is currently in Alberta and we in Ontario, viewing is a limited practice. MSNs Sharing Folder decided to stop syncing. This is something that happens between specific users, and I have no idea why. In any case, I opted to get around it by creating a Dropbox account for my brother and my mother and linked their computers together. They can now share files hassle-free. Brilliant

Third, they’ve got a solid online management system. You can view a history of files you have changed, as well as that copy of the file. This is an impressive step on their part. Basically if you over-write or delete something, you can actually go and recover the file. You can set permissions on files to allow public linking, download entire folders as zip files, and even view what computers are attached to your account.

Fourth, it’s free. Well alright, you get two gigs of server space free, and if that’s not enough, you can upgrade to 50 gigs for 100 dollars a year (or 9.99 a month, if that’s what you’re looking for). This simply blows my mind, and I know that when I really get into designing and freelancing, this could very well be the best 100 dollars I could spend on my business.

Fifth, it acts like a normal folder. Add files to the folder, delete some, create sub-folders, whatever you want. Dropbox will replicate the structure and files on the server and any of the computers sync’ed to the account. No fancy interface to learn, no special keyboard commands to learn; it lets the operating system do all of the UI work for structure management.

Lastly, it’s unreasonably easy to install. You can either get Dropbox running in basically two ways:

First way

1. Go to www.getdropbox.com.
2. Make an account.
3. Download and run Dropbox.
4. When asked if you have an account, say yes.
5. Fill out account info.
6. Finish.

Second way

1. Go to www.getdropbox.com.
2. Download and run Dropbox.
3. When asked if you have an account, say no.
4. Fill out account creation form.
5. Finish.

That’s it. That’s everything you need to do to have Dropbox up and running. It honestly puts WordPress’ famous “Five-minute install” to shame. If you have a fast connection and quick fingers, you can have Dropbox running in about 2 minutes. That is an impressive engineering feat.

So what if you want to add another computer to your account?

1. On new computer, go to Go to www.getdropbox.com.
2. Download and run Dropbox.
3. When asked if you have an account, say yes.
4. Fill out account info.
5. Finish.

Now I think there could be a confirmation requirement on the web interface, but I honestly cannot remember. I don’t think so, but I’ve been wrong before.

Additional perks

So I’ve talked about Dropbox and what it can do from a main feature stand-point, but what about those who are more technologically inclined? What is there in Dropbox that really makes it a solid program technically?

Well first off, you can specify where you want your Dropbox. By default it picks a location (Users/coreydutson/Dropbox on the ol’ Mac) but if you want to store it somewhere else, you are more than welcome to.

Using one set of credentials, you can attach multiple computers. This means that you only need to remember one user name and password for all of the computers attached. Though I admit that I haven’t found a way to attach to multiple Dropboxes (probably avoided purposely to negate free account abuse), and this could be considered a limitation, you must remember that it was made to be simple. This means that some consessions had to be made.

You can set Dropbox to use Growl, if you’re on a Mac and that’s what you’re into. You can also set maximum upload and download rates to help stop Dropbox from slowing your connection down. You can even have proxy information for those that need it.

So what?

Well for me, this is my only means of backup at the moment. This may horrify some people, but remember that should my hard drive fail, I can always replace it and re-install. There isn’t very much on this computer that I couldn’t get again. Everything stored in my Dropbox are files that I cannot replicate; namely all of my school work, resume information, and some freelance work I’ve done.

I can rest easy knowing that should my computers die at any time, I can still access all of my schoolwork upto this point. This is something that any student can appreciate. Those who work with a lot of important documents (layout PSDs come to mind) can probably share a horror story about losing a HDD or over-writing a file and being utterly S.O.L.. I’ve been there myself, and I now operate under the “once bitten, twice shy” method of job/school security.

In Summary

If you need a way to back up files safely, easily, and hastle-free Dropbox is for you. I cannot recommend it enough. I’m going to mention it to my Professors at school, and who knows, it may become standard practice for students. It’s totally worth the 2 minutes to get up and runnin.

Get Dropbox.