Make the most of your holiday gifts and time at home with Google Drive

Chances are that many of you lucky readers will be unwrapping new computers, mobile phones, and tablets this holiday season. Here are a few quick tips on how you can smoothly transition all of your stuff from old devices to new ones using Google Drive.For laptops & desktops First, you’ll want to get all your files from your old computer into Google Drive. To do this, download Drive for Mac or PC on your existing computer. To upload your...

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Your favorite apps, with Google Drive (Holiday Edition)

For the second installment of our Apps in Google Drive series, we’re giving things a holiday twist with apps that can help you out with some (last-minute) personalized gifts. Once you install one of the third-party Drive apps below, you can use them to create a variety of one-of-a-kind gifts: your pug on a mug, your very own holiday song, or a video of this year’s biggest moments.CafePress: Create a personalized gift using pictures stored in Google...

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Introducing the Save to Drive extension, plus enhancements to images

The new Save to Drive Chrome extension gives you a few new ways to capture content from anywhere on the web and store it neatly in Drive. After you install the extension, you can click on the Drive extension icon to save: an image of an entire page or an image of the visible pagethe HTML source code a Web archive (.mht) Or you can right-click on images or links to files and save them directly to Drive.After you save using the extension,...

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5,000 new stock images in Google Drive, thanks to you

A few months ago, many of you submitted ideas on how we can expand the selection of stock images in Google Drive to add to the categories that you’re most interested in.Thanks to your suggestions, 5,000 new photos of nature, weather, animals, sports, food, education, technology, music and 8 other categories are now available for your use in Docs, Sheets, and Slides. More than 900 of these photos were selected directly from your submissions -- we really appreciate your help!Thanks again for your submissions, and keep the ideas coming on the Google...

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Edit spreadsheets on the go with the Drive mobile app

You’re making your list, you’re checking it twice—and now you can do it from anywhere.Just in time for this year’s holiday season, you can edit Google Sheets on your mobile device, just like you can with Google Docs. From the Drive app on your iPhone, iPad or Android device, you can create a new spreadsheet or edit an existing one. You can switch fonts, resize columns, sort data, and more. And just like on your computer, you’ll be able to see other...

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Gmail and Drive - a new way to send files

(Cross-posted from the Gmail blog)Since Google Drive launched in April, millions of people have started using Drive to keep, create and share files. Starting today, it’s even easier to share with others: you can insert files from Drive directly into an email without leaving your Gmail.Have you ever tried to attach a file to an email only to find out it's too large to send? Now with Drive, you can insert files up to 10GB -- 400 times larger than what...

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Some new ways to get stuff done in Google Drive

In case you haven’t noticed them already, here are a handful of small updates that will make it easier to find, organize, and view stuff on Drive.Search by person: Can't remember the name of a file but know who shared it with you? Now Drive search auto-completes people’s names making it easier to find the stuff you’re looking for.View Google Earth map files: You can now open, preview, and interact with Google Earth files (.kml and .kmz) right inside...

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Co-write a song, tell a shared story with the Gone Google Story Builder

We love hearing about all the different ways people use collaboration in Docs - from creating shared grocery lists to co-authoring full length novels. In the past, we even created a few of our own stories showing how you can go Google, whether you’re writing an 80s hit or crafting the perfect invite list. Now, anyone can create their own story about collaboration with the Gone Google Story Builder. Make your own personalized video featuring the characters,...

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Share your stuff from Google Drive to Google+

With Google+, you can share what you want with just the right people. That might be pictures from your weekend apple picking adventure or an article from your favorite new blog. Starting today, you can also share the stuff you create and store in Google Drive, and people will be able to flip through presentations, open PDFs, play videos and more, directly in the Google+ stream.(click the image above to view a presentation in the stream) To...

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Research pane updates: quick access to your stuff in Docs, Slides & Drawings

A few months ago, the research pane was added to Docs to make it easier for you to search for and add web results, images, quotations, maps, and articles to your document. Starting today, the research pane is also available in Slides and Drawings, and searches now include your stuff in addition to web results.With the research pane, you can now quickly find and use your stuff: include part of a presentation stored in Drive, insert an image from...

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One click to Docs, Sheets, and Slides

Google Drive is a place where you can create, share, collaborate and keep all your stuff. Of course, there are times you want to start a new document right away–say, to take notes in class or prepare a last-minute presentation for your boss.To make it even easier for you to create stuff quickly, Documents, Spreadsheets, and Presentations–now called Docs, Sheets, and Slides–are available as apps in the Chrome Web Store. Once installed,...

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Less is more

Ever wanted more room to get stuff done in Google documents? Click the new button in the upper right corner of your screen to enter Compact Mode, and everything above the formatting menu will collapse and give you another inch or so to work with.You can also now quickly take menu actions by typing in the new search box. For example, if you type in “Picture,” you’ll see different options for adding graphics to your document.Posted by Arnav Shah, Software...

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Table improvements and easier formatting in documents

Starting today, it’s easier to work with tables and to make formatting changes in Google documents. You can now select any grid of cells in a table, which makes it much easier to make table formatting changes, like bolding just a single column. Copy-and-paste of table cells is also improved. For example, you can copy a single word into many cells simply by highlighting those cells before you paste.Or if you copy multiple cells from one table to...

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Edit charts in Google spreadsheets with just a click

Charts tell the story of our data, so we often spend a lot of time getting the formatting just right. That’s why we wanted to make that process quicker and easier in Google spreadsheets. Instead of opening the chart editor dialog to make formatting changes, you can now click directly on the part of the chart you want to modify to change things like the colors, legend, and labels.You can now also resize and move the chart around to make room for other...

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Google Drive is the new home for all your Google Docs and more. Get started.

Several months ago, we launched Google Drive: one place to create, collaborate, share and keep all your stuff. If you’ve used Docs in the past, Google Drive is the new home for all your files and folders including your Google documents, spreadsheets, and presentations.This means all your files that were previously stored in Google Docs will now be available in Google Drive. If you haven’t already started using Google Drive, you’ll see a message to...

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Google Drive: Updates for iOS and Android

(Cross-posted from the Official Google Blog)Every day, more and more people are choosing to live online and get things done in the cloud. Helping to make this experience as seamless as possible, Google Drive is one place where you can create, share and keep all your stuff. Drive is available on the web, as well as Mac, Windows and Android and iOS.Updates for iOSStarting today, if you’re using the Drive app on your iOS device you can...

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Google spreadsheets, now with discussions

Getting things done with others would be much easier if everyone was sitting right next to you. But since that’s rarely the case, we’re always updating Google Drive to make it easier to collaborate with others, no matter where you are or who you’re with.Today we’re bringing the discussion functionality that’s already in documents and presentations to spreadsheets. If a cell has a comment in it, you'll see an orange triangle in the upper right corner...

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Lock down cells with Protected Ranges in Google spreadsheets

Editing with others in real-time makes it easy to get stuff done in Google spreadsheets in only a matter of minutes. But with so many people working in the same space, it’s possible to modify a section that a collaborator didn’t intend to be touched. That’s why, today, we’re updating the Named Ranges feature in spreadsheets to let you also protect them.To get started with Protected Ranges in a shared spreadsheet, highlight the cells you’d like to protect, right-click, and choose Name and protect range from the menu.Click through the presentation...

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450+ new ways to make your Google presentations pop

Good design is an important part of getting your point across in a presentation. Over time we’ve added a bunch of features to help you bring a little something extra to your decks, like slide transitions and animations, thousands of free stock photos, and a growing collection of templates.Today, creating eye-catching presentations gets even easier, with more than 450 new fonts to choose from. (flip through the presentation below to see them in action)To...

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Offline updates and a quick look back at June

Summer brings fun in the sun (in our hemisphere, at least) and a bunch of updates to Google Drive. A few weeks ago at Google I/O, we announced a couple of highly requested features: the ability to edit Google documents offline and a Drive app for iOS.When you enable Docs offline in Google Drive, you can create & edit Google documents and view Google spreadsheets, without being connected to the internet. Today we updated the offline experience so it looks the same as when you’re online - except it’s filtered to show just your offline docs. Here’s...

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Announcing your two most requested features: offline document editing and Drive for iOS

In April, we introduced Google Drive, a place where you can create, share, and keep all your stuff. Today at the Google I/O conference we announced two new ways to get things done in the cloud: offline editing for Google documents and a Drive app for iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch.Offline document editing No internet connection? No big deal. With offline editing, you can create and edit Google documents and leave comments. Any changes you make...

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Hang out – live on air – with the Google Drive & Docs team

Cross-posted from the Google Enterprise blog. Editor's note: Hangouts On Air are live video chats, interviews, or performances that are broadcast to Google+. We’ll host these broadcasts from time to time on the Google Enterprise Google+ page to give you the inside scoop on our business and products. Last week, we hosted our first Hangout On Air from the Google Enterprise Google+ page with Jonathan Rochelle, Director of Product Management, Jeff Harris, Google Docs Product Manager, Teresa Wu, Google Docs Community Manager, and Eric Brunnett, Director...

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Google Docs: May in Review

April showers bring May flowers, along with a bunch of new features and updates to Google Docs. In May we launched the research pane which makes it easy to look things up and insert quotes, images, and maps into documents without ever having to open a new browser tab. And we also made some other improvements over the last few weeks, like:the addition of five new themes (Color Strip, Inspiration Board, Lesson Plan, Steps, and Wave) to Google Presentations. the...

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Find facts and do research inside Google Documents

Today we’re introducing the research pane—a new feature that brings the web’s wealth of information to you as you’re writing documents.The research pane taps into Google Search directly from Google documents, so whether you want to add a cool destination to your itinerary for an upcoming trip to India or you're looking for the perfect presidential quote for a political science paper, you don’t even have to open a new tab.You can access the research...

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April in Review: New fonts galore and other fresh features

In the past month we’ve made updates both big and small to Google Docs, and today we’re announcing one more: web fonts in Google documents. Often the best way to get your point across is to present your idea in a creative, captivating way. Today, we added over 450 new fonts to Google documents to make it easier for you to add a little something extra to whatever you create. To use these new fonts, click on the font menu and select “Add fonts” at...

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Introducing Google Drive... yes, really

(Cross posted from the Official Google Blog)Just like the Loch Ness Monster, you may have heard the rumors about Google Drive. It turns out, one of the two actually does exist. Today, we’re introducing Google Drive—a place where you can create, share, collaborate, and keep all of your stuff. Whether you’re working with a friend on a joint research project, planning a wedding with your fiancé or tracking a budget with roommates, you can do it in...

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March in Review: Improved charting, expanded language support, and Apps Script updates

Another month and another batch of improvements to Google Docs. We recently debuted a new spell checker that gets smarter and grows with the web, and we’ve also turned on a few features that let you do more with Docs.New charting options We’ve added a bunch of new ways to make richer charts in Google spreadsheets. You can now control the opacity of an area chart, set fonts to be bold or italic, and label sections of your charts along the axis.These...

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Spell checking powered by the web

One of my early projects at Google was to improve the suggestions that are made when a query is misspelled in Google Search. The neat thing about that system is that it’s adaptive: our suggestions get smarter and smarter based on the words Googlebot sees as it explores the web.But search isn’t the only place where I make spelling mistakes! And that got me wondering: could we take this adaptive technology and use it to make spell checking better...

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Improved discussions, search scanned text in PDFs, and more

Fresh on the heels of adding discussions to Google presentations and the ability to edit within the Google Docs Android app, we’ve been hard at work on a few other new features to enhance your Google Docs experience. All your comments--in one tidy placeWe just added the discussions feature to Google drawings, and today we’re making it even easier to see a log of all of the comments that have been made whether you’re using drawings, documents, or...

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Collaborate and edit anywhere with the updated Google Docs for Android

As I was sitting on the ferry commuting to Google’s Sydney office this morning, two thoughts occurred to me. First, Australia is beautiful. If you’ve never been here, you really should visit. And second, it’s amazing how productive I can be with just my Android phone and an Internet connection. I was responding to email, reading news articles, and editing documents--just like I do at the office. Only the view was better!We want to give everyone the chance to be productive no matter where they are, so today we’re releasing a new update to the Google...

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Great presentations start with great discussions

Back in October, we released a preview of a brand new version of Google presentations, designed to make it easier to share ideas with others. We've been busy polishing the app based on your feedback and today we're excited to enable the new editor for all new presentations.We’re also introducing a number of performance improvements and making it easier for you to collaborate by bringing the discussion feature you’ve used in documents to presentations.With discussions in presentations, you’ll be able to: Comment on a shape or an entire slide to...

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Our team's new Google+ Page

As our product and team have evolved over the past few years, we’ve enjoyed sharing news and notes with you on this blog. In turn, you’ve voiced your experiences with our products via blog comments, forum posts, tweets, and more. Hearing from you every day motivates us to build better products - that’s why we wanted to give you another more interactive place to join in on the conversation.Starting today, we’re launching a new Google+ page dedicated to Google Docs. We’ll share info about feature launches, tips and tricks, behind the scenes snapshots,...

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January in Review: Styles, Sparklines, Google+ sharing, and more

One of the best things about working on web apps like Google Docs is that it gives us the flexibility to frequently bring you new features and improvements. Starting this month, we’re going to make some small changes to how we communicate what’s been happening in the world of Docs. Instead of writing blog posts for each and every minor update, we're going to try bundling them together monthly to give you a detailed overview of our favorite features...

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Updates to Google Docs app for Android: Offline access and improved tablet experience

There may be times when you don’t have an Internet connection on your Android device, but you still want access to a file you’ve saved in Google Docs. Now you can select any file in Google Docs to make it available offline. So regardless of whether you’re connected to the internet, you’re always connected to those files. Even better, Google Docs automatically updates your offline files when you’re on Wi-Fi. You can also manually update files anytime...

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