Why I have to chose Dropbox over Google Drive. Or do I?

[kiicki]

I would prefer to use Google Drive since I prefer to have everything in one place and it works well with my Gmail account. 

I prefer Using Microsoft Office and Excel Over Google Docs and Google Sheets, but Google forces you to use Doc and sheets. 

Before we gets started, I do have the Dropbox and Google drive installed on my PC.

Here's what's my problem with Google drive.

 

1. 

When opening an Excel file via Google drive (Browser) it will automatically convert your Excel file to a Google sheets file. It doesn't matter if you are just viewing it or if you're going to edit it.

At this point you will have two files. Every time you click to view or edit you Excel file, Google will create a new sheet. Which means entering Excel file 10 times thew Google Drive browser will automatically create 10 sheets files.

This makes the whole folder look like a mess, and you would have to delete the "Older" sheets that you don't need.

(Google will not create a new sheet if you view or edit your Excel file thew Google drive desktop, only thew browser)

2.

Sharing Excel files with Google drive is a pain.

The reason is because the viewer can't see the full Excel using a Google drive link.

Dropbox does show the Excel as it should be. A example will be below. Both are the same file (Excel)

 

Google Drive:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B4dHoLiIs-rxOUljQ1lfRXlRcHM/view?usp=sharing

 

Dropbox:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/p1039htb8fibz93/Propylene%20Glycol%20%26%20Vegetable%20Glycerin%20prices.xlsx?dl=0

 

As you can see, Google drive doesn't view it as it should be.

For Google users you would need to open it with Excel or Google Sheets to see the file as it should be.

For people that doesn't have a Google account, you won't have the option to open it with Excel or Google Sheets. You would have to download it, and then open it with Excel or a third party app.

 

This is really frustrating since not everyone has a Google account or Excel.

Dropbox doesn't require you to have a Dropbox account or a Google account to view the Excel file as it should be. Dropbox doesn't require anyone to install add-ons to your browser to view a Excel file as it should be.

Some might ask, why don't you just use google Sheets and google drive will work for everyone?

I prefer working with Excel for various reasons. I don't like to be forced to use Google sheets so people can view my Excel file thew Google drive.

it would be great if google could view a Excel file like Dropbox without add-ons or require people to have a Google account.

It would also be great if Google didn't create a new Google sheet every time I view my Excel file thew the Google drive browser. That part just doesn't make any sense. It doesn't take a long time before my Folder is stacked up with multiple same files. I think we all wants a clean folder without confusion.

 

If there is a solutions for my problem, please let me know. I would really prefer to use Google drive as my cloud storage, since I use Gmail.

[ShadowCaptain]

Oh I see *shrugs*, I personally don't use either, and just keep all my files on my own NAS, and if anybody wants the file I just email them directly

 

If dropbox solves your problem, then use dropbox? I am not sure of your issue?

[Samppa221]

How about onedrive? Excel is microsoft's program and so is onedrive.

[kiicki]

Oh I see *shrugs*, I personally don't use either, and just keep all my files on my own NAS, and if anybody wants the file I just email them directly

 

If dropbox solves your problem, then use dropbox? I am not sure of your issue?

I often share my files with people on forums, so Email won't work that well. There's is no problem using Dropbox. it's just that since i use Gmail, it would be much better to also use my Google drive so I would have everything in one place. How I see it, there are just some few issues that prevents me to use Google drive. If I can find a solution for it, Google drive would be much better for me.

[kiicki]

How about onedrive? Excel is microsoft's program and so is onedrive.

That wouldn't change to box. Using One drive or Dropbox wouldn't do anything. My goal is to have everything in one place, which Google drive does with my Gmail. using One drive would be the same as I use Dropbox. Wouldn't do me anything, since Dropbox shares Excel files without any problem.

[kiicki]

k use dropbox then

Well, if it's not possible to fix the issue I'm having I would have to use Dropbox.

[Ariito]

Do your work on normal word/excel paste it all into docs/sheets = automatically updated to your google drive

 

As for your work on word and excel save them to your HDD 

 

For sharing give them the google docs/sheets link instead

[kiicki]

Do your work on normal word/excel paste it all into docs/sheets = automatically updated to your google drive

 

As for your work on word and excel save them to your HDD 

 

For sharing give them the google docs/sheets link instead

I do work on Word/Excel and paste or save it to my Google drive Desktop. But Google will create a Sheets version of that Excel file. This means double the files. 

Which is unnecessary. Sharing Sheets works great, but I would need to convert my Excel file to Sheets every time I do a change.

I just find it much better to use Dropbox and share my Excel file. No more files will be created and my folder is sorted.

Maybe one day Google will decide to not create a new Sheet every time I edit or just view a Excel file. At least they should delete the older sheets.

Also hoping they will fix how people view the Excel file you created. As it is for now, you would either need to open it with Excel, Sheets or a third party app.

Dropbox doesn't require any of this things and you will be able to see the full excel.

What i mean by full excel is the links I provided in the post. You can see the difference. Also People that don't have a Google account won't be able to open the Excel file I shared with Google drive, with another program Dropbox doesn't require you to be logged into anything to see the full Excel. And since I post Excel's on a forum, I need to consider that not everyone has Excel or Google account even though the majority of us have it.

[kiicki]

I found the problem. Opening a Excel file in Google drive will show you the preview. When selection "Open with Excel" Google drive will make a temp file. The temp file should automatically been deleted after closing Excel.

 

This only gets deleted if my Excel isn't in a folder for some reason. When I have my Excel in a folder in Google drive, The temp files doesn't get deleted automatically. I had to pause and then resume Google drive so it will sync, so it recognized that I closed Excel. 

 

I have no idea why this only happens when the Excel file is in another folder in Google drive, but doesn't happen if it's not in a folder.

 

So when opening a Excel file with Google drive will not make new Sheets. It will only make a temp file which should automatically been removed after you close the Excel. I guess it's a minor bug.