Over time, with a little neglect coupled with potential laziness, your Google Drive can amass tons of files, then turns into a mess to find anything. This article will show you how to organize your Google Drive so that you find everything fast, to make sure everything stays in order.
You can Organize Your Google Drive Files into Folders
One of the easiest and best ways to organize Google Drive is for you to create category-specific folders. Like, you can have created separate folders for pictures, documents, projects, or for other descriptions to help in locating files.
From the Drive homepage, click on the “New” button, this can be found in the top left, then click on “Folder.”
Type a name for the specific folder, then click on “Create.”
From here, you can drag the files you want to add directly into the new folder you created.
If you have a few files in other folders already and you are looking to relocate these, don’t worry. Select the files, right-click on them, then click on “Move To.”
Make your way to the destination folder, click on it to open it, then select “Move” to transfer all the selected files to that folder.
You could use a Naming Convention
You can try to use a naming convention; this will help you easily differentiate files/folders from each other. After you notice, you are starting to accumulate more items in your Drive, thoughtful names can help save you from opening several files when you are trying to find a specific one. Having multiple spreadsheets with ambiguous names isn’t a helpful way to find anything when you are in a pinch.
If you want to change a file or folder’s name, right-click on a file or folder, then click on “Rename.”
Give the file/folder a short as well as a descriptive name, then click on “OK.”
Remember to maintain a consistent as well as a descriptive naming scheme to make it obvious where you can find specific items, and to indicate what the actual file contains.
You can Delete the Files You Don’t Need
After you move and sort your important files into more distinguishable folder categories, there might be some leftover duplicate or unnecessary documents in the Drive. This is when you have the ability to delete those potentially unneeded files which are hogging up space.
All that has to be done is highlight the file, right-click on it, then click on “Remove.”
The Drive doesn’t provide you with a confirmation prompt when you delete files, however, it does give you the chance to undo the delete. Click on “Undo” to reverse the action.
If you miss the opportunity to click “Undo” after you remove a few files, click on the “Bin” located in the menu bar, after it opens, right-click on the files you want to restore back to its original location, then click on “Restore.”
The previously deleted files will return to the Drive from where they were deleted.
You can Create Symbolic Links to Files and Folders
Google Drive has a hidden shortcut that allows you to create a symbolic link of something in a completely different place. Without taking up any additional storage. Google stores only the original file copy in the cloud, then it displays a separate version wherever you have linked it.
If you delete or remove a symbolic link, all the other versions go with it, yes, the original included. To safely remove only one link, you have to first unlink it through the “Details” pane. To do so follow:
To begin, click on a file or a folder, then use the keyboard shortcut Shift + Z to open the special context menu.
Make your way to the folder where you want to link the file or folder, then click on “Add.”
To get rid of a symbolic link, right-click on it, then click on “View Details.”
In the “Details” pane that opens, click on the “X”, it’ll be next to the location you want to unlink.
Be careful to delete only the link rather than the whole file is linked. Delete the original file, then the link will automatically disappear as well.
You can Star Important Files and Folders
Starring essential files/folders in Google Drive works the same as starred emails. When you star something, the Drive will add it to a special “Starred” section that you can easily access directly using the menu pane on the left side.
Right-click on a file or a folder, then click on “Add to Starred.”
To view the starred items, you have to click on “Starred” in the pane on the left of the screen.
The item stays in its current place, the Drive essentially creates a symbolic link. Like the one we did in the previous section to the original that will show up in “Starred.”
You can Color-Code Your Folders
By default, Google Drive designates grey for all of the folders. While folder color might not be a make-or-break detail, if you want to, you can color-code them to recognize a folder easier and to make it stand out from all the other folders. There are 24 colors to choose from to add a little pizzaz to your Drive.
Right-click on a folder, hover over “Change Color,” then select from one of the colors displayed.
The folder will then change to the color you’ve chosen. The option is available for every folder in the Drive.
No matter how disorganized your Drive is, it can quickly be put to a stop, you can clutter and whip everything back into a nice and organized structure. The days are gone when you are overwhelmed every time, you open your Google Drive and see the mess that has developed over the years, you can sort it out using these tips.
If you liked this article (or if it helped at all), leave a comment below or share it with friends, so they can also know How can you Organize Your Google Drive.
