In Depth: Essential tips for every Dropbox user: "
For those not already familiar with Dropbox it's an ingenious file-sharing and synchronising service that works across any operating system, including PCs, Macs and even the iPhone.
Available from www.dropbox.com, you can set up a free account that gives you 2GB of storage space, or get a 50GB Pro account for $9.99 a month.
Once installed, Dropbox appears as a folder called My Dropbox within your Documents folder. But this is no ordinary folder: whatever you copy into it is automatically uploaded to the Dropbox server. Install Dropbox onto another computer, log on using the same details and the files will automatically be downloaded onto that computer too.
Leave it logged in and, no matter which machine you're using, whatever you update on your Dropbox will be saved on all your other devices as well. This means you can leave those easy-to-lose USB sticks at home and still have the most up-to-date versions of the files you're working on to hand, provided you've saved them into your Dropbox folder.
Even if you haven't installed Dropbox onto the PC you're working on, you can still access your files by logging into your account on www.dropbox.com, where they appear as files that can be downloaded from the site. (Bear in mind, though, that this method lacks the automatic synchronisation option and you'll have to remember to upload any files you've worked on back onto the Dropbox site yourself.)
Secure sharing
There's no need to be worried about security, either: Dropbox uses very secure AES-256 encryption over an SSL-encrypted channel to share and save your data. Just make sure you use a strong password!
The only slight worry we can think of is the fact that you're entrusting your documents to a cloud-based app that, despite its burgeoning popularity, could disappear overnight. However, provided you also back up your files at home, this shouldn't be a problem.
The beauty of Dropbox lies in its simplicity. It just works quietly in the background. Even if you aren't online when you make changes to a file in your Dropbox folder, when you connect to the internet, Dropbox will detect the file changes and update the document.
But don't be fooled by that simplicity – the app may only synchronise files, but people are using it in many different ways. From working on collaborative projects to hosting websites and remote controlling BitTorrents, Dropbox's functionality knows no bounds. We'll explore a few of these possibilities here.
Collaborative projects
As well as sharing files across computers, you can use Dropbox to share files with other people. In fact, because Dropbox is so accessible it can often be a better solution than a network share.
It also keeps a revision history, so you can see who added what and when – meaning that tracking the collaborative process is done for you automatically. You can even go back to previous versions of files and restore them if a mistake is made or a file is overwritten (see the 'Undo history' box, below).
Your Dropbox account lets you share files in two ways: with everyone in the world (by putting your file(s) into the Public folder in your My Dropbox folder) or with chosen individuals who can also add files to the shared folder.
To share a folder with specific people, log on to the Dropbox site, go to the Files tab and click on 'Create a new folder'. Right-click on the new folder and choose 'Share this folder'. Next, send an email to the people you'd like to collaborate with. Those with Dropbox accounts will have the folder appear in their Dropbox if they accept the invitation, and those without are prompted to sign up.
Store all documents
Dropbox is all very well as a USB stick replacement, but you still have to remember to copy your documents into the My Dropbox folder. One solution is to keep the master files saved only in your Dropbox folder, but it can quickly become a mess of image files and documents. It would be nice to keep all your files in the folders you'd usually put them in, without having to copy them somewhere else for synchronising.
Well, provided your Documents folder doesn't take up more than the storage space available in your account, you can put it into your Dropbox in its entirety. To do this, right-click on your Documents folder, choose 'Properties' and move its location into your My Dropbox folder. This means you can carry on working as before, while having your entire Documents folder available wherever you go.
However, in the unlikely event that Dropbox disappears, this means all your files could also be lost. Plus, should someone get access to your Dropbox account, they could delete it all (although the undelete function does mean you could get it back again). Provided you keep a regular backup of your files elsewhere, the benefits may still outweigh the possible costs.
Synchronise programs
Wouldn't it be handy if the Firefox browser on your laptop had all the same user preferences, extensions, bookmarks and themes as your PC? Wouldn't it be satisfying if any changes you made to your Firefox profile were automatically changed on all the computers you worked on?
If you have Windows Vista or 7, then with the help of Mklink you can do just that. The Mklink function is essentially a shortcut creator, where you can create a file that points or links to another file or directory on a different part of your computer.
The difference with Mklink is that it creates these 'hard links' or 'symbolic links' at command-line level, so programs that wouldn't accept normal shortcuts can use them. Couple this power with Dropbox and now you can sync programs as well as files.
Take Firefox as an example. All your personal data (browser settings, bookmarks, history and so on) is saved as a profile, which is typically found at this location: C:\Users\[your PC name]\App Data\Local\Mozilla\Firefox\ Profiles.
Once you've ensured that Firefox isn't running, select this folder and copy it into your Dropbox, then delete the original folder. Open a command prompt (type cmd into the Search box on the Start menu) and type mklink. You should see a series of the commands available to you along with a description of what they do.
Now, using the 'J' command to create a directory hard link, enter: mklink /J %APPDATA\ Local\Mozilla\Firefox C:/ dropbox/Firefox. You'll need to change the address lines to where your Firefox profile and Dropbox are located.
Repeat this process on all your PCs (you'll need to have administrative rights) and whatever you do to Firefox will now be mirrored wherever you go and whatever PC you use.
This basic process can be applied to any program you wish: you could store your Thunderbird mailbox on Dropbox to have your emails available everywhere, or use it to store your game saves so you never need to repeat a level.
Store passwords safely
Secure passwords are difficult to remember. That's why more and more people are using open source programs such as KeePass to manage their passwords.
KeePass lets you generate long, complicated and unique passwords for each of your logins and remembers them for you. This means you only have to know one long secure password (for the KeePass login) to increase your online security exponentially.
However, if you're on a different computer to KeePass then you can't find out what your password is and you can't log in to that essential site. The solution is to use Dropbox to store both KeePass and your password archive.
If you're worried about security, KeePass (and, for that matter, Dropbox) uses the same security that banks and the military use to send and store their data: AES 256-bit encryption. So provided your KeePass password is a secure one, a criminal won't get any joy from your archive file.
Encrypt your data
Are you still worried about how secure Dropbox is, despite the site's many assurances? Do you want to synchronise sensitive data across all of your computers?
By using Truecrypt, you can create an encrypted drive that's accessible from any computer. This is a file of a fixed size that looks like a normal file but acts like a drive partition. You can hide other files within the volume of this file and it disguises their size and the data that they contain.
To add Truecrypt protection to your Dropbox, download the program from www.truecrypt.org/downloads, double-click on the '.exe' file and choose to extract it to your My Dropbox folder. This puts the portable version of the app into your Dropbox.
To create the encrypted file, open the 'Truecrypt.exe' file and click on the 'Create a volume' button. Choose 'Create an encrypted file container', then 'Hidden Truecrypt Volume' and lastly 'Normal Mode'. Give your file partition a name, choose AES encryption, set the size of the file (the outer volume) and create a username and password. Any encryption is only as strong as your password, so choose a long, complicated one. Now click 'Format'.
You need to do the same again to set the inner partition size – where you'll put your files. You also need to leave room for some decoy data, which is placed between the inner and outer volumes to give the impression that this outer layer is the real encrypted drive. Choose a very different password for the inner volume so it isn't compromised if the outer layer is accessed.
To open your partition, start Truecrypt, click on 'Select file…', choose your file and click 'Mount'. After entering your password, you can drop files in here to encrypt them.
Note that it's best only to access it from one machine at a time to prevent conflicts.
Portable Dropbox
There are still some situations where it may be useful to carry Dropbox itself around with you – say, if you can't install Dropbox permanently on a public PC that you use often. Step forward DropboxPortable, which is available from here.
Once you've successfully installed it you can get access to your Dropbox files from pretty much anywhere you fancy. So, why not carry the files on a USB stick instead of a portable version of Dropbox?
Well, imagine you need a work file you haven't put in your Dropbox, such as an image for a presentation. If you've shared a folder with a colleague then they can drop it into your shared Dropbox folder – so when you plug your USB stick into the computer at your destination it'll be downloaded automatically and end up sitting on your USB stick waiting for you.
This means that you can be on the train to a meeting while your presentation is having the finishing touches added to it back at the office.
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"(Via TechRadar: All latest feeds.)
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