For those of you familiar with software like Microsoft Office or Open Office then Google Docs should have you feeling right at home, you can even save your work to familiar office file formats. For those of you who aren’t then you’ll be learning more about all the tools available to you for free via the internet that Google Docs has to offer which can also be worked on offline as well. These include:
Google Drive – This is where you can store any files and will also contain the documents you create with Google Docs.
Document – This is Google’s word processor, it’s used to create documents such as written letters. Unlike word processors from the past, todays word processors can include several other things in it like images, tables etc. along with the usual tools to change fonts, their size, colour along with checking spelling and grammar.
Spreadsheet – Mainly used for analyzing data in a tabular format, they’ve almost entirely replaced any paper records in the office used for things like book keeping. Through the use of rows and columns you can easily make sense of the data at hand and perform complex calculations really easily. The real beauty comes to play when you need to change some of the data as it re-calculates everything on the fly. Another great feature is the use of charts to demonstrate your data in a beautiful way visually.
Presentation – Using its presentation module you can use Google Docs to create powerful slide presentations, using images, videos and text which like its word processor can have the font, size of font and colour changed along with giving emphasis to it by putting animations on it as well.
Drawing – Although it’s not as powerful as some of the more complicated programs out there this useful app will allow you to draw all kinds of useful little graphics to be either used on its own or inside of some of your other documents.
Forms – For me this is one of the neatest applications that Google Docs offers, you can easily put together questionnaires/surveys that you can publish like any of the other documents you create using Google Docs to the internet. It’ll keep track of all the answers for you and you can use other tools to get statistical information from the data gathered as well.
Register
The first thing you’ll need to do is register for a Google account if you haven’t already done so. Since most of the Google accounts from other services like Gmail, Google+, etc. should work already. If you haven’t you can go to https://drive.google.com where you can sign up or login if you are already registered. Once you’ve registered you’ll need to download some software to install on your computer and within minutes you’re ready to go.
Google Drive
The Google Drive is your starting point, before you can work on a document you either need to select it or start a new one and this is where you’ll come to do just that. Before we go there though, let’s examine different parts of this web page.
- This is where you get to choose what type of file you’d like to create. By clicking on the up arrow button on the right you’ll be able to upload files to your Google Drive, this can be files you’ll work on using Google Docs or just any type you’d like to store on the net. By clicking the create button you’ll receive a drop down menu with the options to create a new Google Doc. There are also a number of other apps that you can either add-on to the apps or ones that run totally separate, you can see them by clicking on the Connect more apps at the bottom. You can also create new folders here as well.
- Once you’ve created new folders using the Create button you’ll have options associated with that folder from a drop down arrow that’ll appear as you hover over the folder itself or by right clicking a file or folder as well and they are:
Open – this will simply open the folder up for you and display its contents- Open with – this will give you two options:
- Manage apps – This will show you existing apps installed and allow you to see what files they’ve created or can use along with more information on the app as well.
- Connect more apps – Here’s another option for you to look for and install additional apps be it add-ons or standalone apps.
- New folder – Self-explanatory, will create a new folder under its parent.
- Create – This is just like the Create button minus the new folder option and is here just for convenience.
- Share – The share expands to two options both of which take you to the same screen where you can share to the web and will give you a link to give out to the people you’d like to see it or invite people by email instead.
- Add star – By adding a star to your folder or your documents you’ll have easy access to them on the Starred folder which used to be called favourites.
- Details and activity – This will open a pane to the right giving you a detailed history of everything that was done with the folder or file.
- Move to… – When you have other folders created and would like to move the file or folder selected along with its contents to another one.
- Rename… – If you made a typing mistake or just want to change the name of the folder or file.
- Change color – You can add colour to your folders so that you can easily identify them without having to read them.
- Mark as unviewed – Unviewed files or folders will appear with bolder text to let you know if you want to change a viewed one back to unviewed simply click here.
- Download… – This will allow you to download all the contents of the folder to your computer and will give you options on what type of file type you’d like to create, for example a document could be in HTML format, word format, rich text file, plain text etc.
- Remove – To delete it and send it to the trash which gives you a chance to recover it if you don’t empty it that is.
- View authorized apps – Will display the files application which can use it.
- Make a copy – Makes a copy of the selected file
- Submit to template gallery – Depending on the file you might be able to submit as a template making it quicker for you to create new files by starting from it.
This will give you the current location of the folder you are in starting from the root and moving its way down.- This is a document that was created and which resides inside of the folder selected.
- When you have a file selected you’ll be presented with options at the top where you can share it, move it to a different folder, delete it, preview it and with the more drop down menu have the same options you would when right clicking on it.
- You can also rearrange the files by a number of ways by using the drop down arrows, they’ll give you other options to choose from when clicked like Owner, Last modified, Last edited by me, Last opened by me and Quota used.
- Since Google is primarily a search engine it only makes sense that they bring this option to the Google Drive so you can search for documents instead of browsing through all the folders, might become more handy when you have a number of files and folders though.
- You can also use advanced criteria when searching for documents by selecting from the options presented from this drop down menu, your selections will be added to the search bar which you can remove by hovering over them and then clicking on the “x”.
- Once you’re ready to search click on this button or alternatively just hit the enter/return key.
- The settings drop down will present you with a number of options:
- Display Density – This section gives you 3 options to choose from Comfortable, Cozy and Compact. Comfortable is the largest of the settings and each one below shrinks them.
Settings – This option will present you with another window where you can control a few options and some also are linked to more options as well. You can set your language and time zone here and by following the links you’ll be able to get more storage for a price if you need it. You can also edit your Google+ and Google account settings by following their links as well, if you need to change a password then this is where you’ll want to go.- Upload settings – Will present you with 3 options that you can enable or disable here:
- Convert uploaded files to Google Docs format – enabled this will automatically convert files of known types to an equivalent Google Doc format if one exists.
- Convert text from uploaded PDf and image files – this will convert text in pdf and image files so that you may edit them.
- Confirm settings before each upload – This option will prompt you for a confirmation before applying any changes.
- Manage apps – This is the same as the manage apps from above that you can access by right clicking and going under the open with option. You can get more information here on the application along with seeing its associated files.
Keyboard shortcuts – Will display a list of all the shortcuts available for you to use.- Help – The help option will give you a window which you can drag around inside of the webpage, it’ll give you a list of suggested articles and also the ability to search for some as well. There is the option to send feedback here as well.
- Disable offline – If you’ve enabled offline capabilities which we’ll talk about next, then this is where you can disable the function.
- The left pane here is used to navigate through your Google Drive from its root the My Drive folder which will contain your files and folders that you create. Beneath that is Shared with Me, Starred, Recent, Trash. These are shortcuts that can be used to find certain documents under the matching criteria. Shared with me will show the documents that people shared with you, Starred the documents that you’ve applied a star to by right clicking it and selecting it from the menu. Recent will be the latest documents you’ve used and Trash will contain files you’ve deleted. You can also use the more option if displayed to show you the Offline and All Items options, Offline will allow you to turn the option on if you haven’t done so otherwise it’ll show you your offline documents, along with the last time they were synchronized. By making your files available offline google will periodically push a copy of the file to a location on your computer so that you can work on it when there’s no internet. All Items will show you everything inside of every folder together.
The Connect more apps option will present you with a box that will list a number of apps you can install to your Google Docs. Some of these apps run separately and others work in unison with other apps as add-ons. There are help files available for the apps but as I’ve discovered they are lacking in this department as there are apps I’ve installed that I can’t figure out how to use.
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