Google Drive is ..??
Google Drive was launched on April 24, 2012 and had 240 million monthly active users as of October 2014. Google Drive is a file storage and synchronization service created by Google.[2][3] It allows users to store files in the cloud, share files, and edit documents, spreadsheets, and presentations with collaborators. Google Drive encompasses Google Docs, Sheets, and Slides, an office suite that permits collaborative editing of documents, spreadsheets, presentations, drawings, forms, and more.
For Google Drive to synchronize files between the user's computer and Google Drive storage, the Google Drive 'client' software must be running on the user's computer. The client communicates with Google Drive to cause updates on one side to be propagated to the other so they both normally contain the same data.
- CLIENT
Google Drive client software is available for the following devices: PCs running Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 7, and Windows 8 with NTFS partitions, or Mac OS X 10.6 (Snow Leopard) or higher; Android smartphones and tablets with Android 2.1 (Eclair) or higher; iPhones and iPads with iOS 5.0 or higher.Newest iterations of Google Drive client software do not appear to work properly under Snow Leopard (OS 10.6), returning a bad GPU message and not allowing the user to access the minibar icon. Replacing the newer client with an older version appears to fix the problem although automatic updates may mean its recurrence.
Even though there is no official client software for Linux, Google Drive can be mounted directly to a Linux file system using gdrivefs or google-drive-ocamlfuse, which are FUSE based file systems backed by Google Drive.Google Drive can also be accessed through Linux via open source projects such as Grive. Google developer Burcu Dogan has created an easy to use client called drive. Google indicated in April 2012 that work on Linux client software was underway, but there was no news on this as of November 2013.
Sundar Pichai of Google said that the Google Drive online storage service would be tightly integrated with Chrome OS version 20.
Google Drive can be accessed offline on the Google Chrome browser via a Chrome app, which can be installed from the Chrome Web Store. Documents, spreadsheets, presentations and drawings can also be viewed and edited offline through standalone Chrome apps. The Google Drive app for Android and iOS supports offline viewing of all file types. Offline editing for documents and spreadsheets is supported through standalone mobile apps.
- STORAGE
Google offers all users an initial 15 GB of online storage space, that is shared across three of its most-used services: Google Drive, Gmail, and Google+ Photos(aka Picasa Web Albums).Users can upgrade their free 15 GB account through a paid monthly subscription plan to get additional storage.[17] Documents using Google Docs native formats (including .gdoc, .gslides, and .gsheet) do not count towards this quota. In Google+ Photos, photos of resolution less than 2048 x 2048 pixels and videos shorter than 15 minutes also do not count towards this quota.Uploaded files in Microsoft Office and OpenDocument formats (with possible formatting changes) can be converted to Google's proprietary formats, and thus can be stored without counting against the storage quota.
As of 13 March 2014, storage plans offered by Google, charged exclusively in US dollar so that any customer outside the US will need to pay exchange charg are as follows: