These days everyone uses Google for almost everything – emails, school assignments, group projects, etc. Google Drive, as many students will know, holds all sorts of useful tools for collecting information, working with data, and sharing stuff externally.
Attach other emails to your Gmail mail
If this sounds confusing, it’s not. You’ve probably encountered situations where you want to forward multiple messages related to a single topic to one recipient without having the hassle of forwarding separate emails. Well, you can now send those multiple messages as attachments! All you have to do is write an email to one recipient (or even to many recipients), and attach the set of supporting emails that they can open on their end. Check out how to below:
You can also select the emails you want to forward and click the 3 dots above (as show in the image below) and click on the option “Forward as attachment”.
Unfortunately, you’ll only be able to use this feature if you’re a GSuite user (S$8.80/month). Google is rolling this functionality over 15 days (on 9 December and 6 January) so if you’re a GSuite user, don’t fret if you don’t see it yet.
Edit a PDF in Google Docs
If you need to edit a PDF as a Word Doc, then first upload the file to your Drive, and then Right-click (or Ctrl-click) the file’s name on the Drive which will give you a list of options “Open with”. Select “Google Docs” from that list, Drive will convert your PDF into plain text and open it as a new Google Doc for you (if the PDF has weird formats or tables, the text does come out messy though).
Look at different versions of your document on Google Docs
Google Docs lets you look back on older versions of a document, in case you need to see or restore your work from an earlier point. In the document itself, under “File”, go to “Version History” and a new window will pop up indicating the different times the Doc has been edited, and what the edits were.
Annotate a PDF in Google Drive
If you’re on a Mac and you use Preview to annotate your PDFs, then you may want to know that you can also do it on Google Drive via DocHub app (and share it with everyone without email attachments). Just Right-click (or Ctrl-click) the file’s name on the Drive, and this time, “Open with” DocHub which will let you annotate the file. Once you’re done, you can save it back on Drive!
Convert your files into other formats with Drive
If you want to convert, say a .wav file into an mp3, or a TIFF into a BMP, then you can use the CloudConvert app that’s connected to Drive. The process is the same as the two actions listed above – except select “Open with” Cloud Convert. The service is free for up to 25 minutes of file converting a day, with a max filesize of 1GB.
Search for images in your Google Drive
In addition to searching for text within PDFs, Drive can also find images in via a keyword search. Just type in the search box on op – “robot”, “sunset” or even colours like red – and then click the arrow icon in the search box and change the “Type” to “Photos & images.” It uses the same AI engine to search for your Google Images, after all.
Delete large files if you’re running out of space
You can let Drive identify your biggest files so you can clear them out of your storage (if you need to). Find the “Storage” icon on the left side of the screen and click the area directly beneath it, where your current storage limit is displayed. All of your Drive files will then appear in order of their size, starting with the largest.
Send faxes via Google Drive!
Some of you may not even know what faxes are, but if you do need to send one (to somewhere like Japan or the Singapore government) then click the big “New” button on the Drive’s upper left corner. Select “More, and “Connect more apps”, and search “HelloFax” – then follow the instructions to authorise the service! To send a fax, simply right-click any document, PDF, or text-y files within Drive, and select “Open with” and “HelloFax”. Then select “Fax document” and fill out the appropriate fields! HelloFax is free for 5 faxes a month.
Now you know how to use Google to its full(er) potential, go forth and teach it to your classmates!
