The lab relies on a college supported Google Drive account for all of our digital storage. This is a convenient storage solution because 1) all Kenyon students have Drive access via their Kenyon google accounts, and 2) the account does not have any storage cap (i.e., we will never run out of space).

How does it work?

Cloud Storage

Google Drive is a cloud based storage, which means the physical data are stored on Google servers. You can therefore access the data from any web browser and from any internet-connected device. However, this is not a convenient (and sometimes impossible) way to interact with the data under all circumstances. For instance, if you're working on a manuscript you don't want to need to download the file and then be required to upload it when you're done editing. I'm sure you can see that this could quickly lead to version control chaos. Especially, if you were working with a collaborator.

Local App

To get around this issue you can download the Google Drive app (Windows/Mac/Android/iPhone). This will allow you to keep a synchronized local copy of all the files on your computer. Importantly, when a change is made to a file in the cloud, it will automatically be reflected in your local copy. Similarly, when you modify and save a local file, your new version will automatically synchronize to the cloud.