Irfan’s Corner on the Web On Mac, Linux, Grid, Virtualization and Software Technology

Buy Cheap Storage from Google and use it for Online Backup

Today, Google has dramatically decreased prices for the extra storage you can purchase for Google Services like Gmail and Picasa. The current prices:

Apple also provides upgrade options for iDisk and MobileMe Mail, however their prices are significantly more expensive an extra 60GB from Apple will set you back for an additional £59 (~ $100), while Google for 80GB charges only $20!.

So you might think that Apple's iDisk is atleast accessible from everywhere, while Google Storage can't be accessed as a drive? Think again, this is how:

For Mac Users:

Install gDisk. gDisk provides an accessible application for mounting your gmail drive on your mac.

For Linux Users:

The most popular way for Linux users to mount Gmail storage locally is to use FUSE. If your on ubuntu, this is how to do it

sudo apt-get install gmailfs
cp /etc/gmailfs/gmailfs.conf ~/.gmailfs.conf
chmod 600 ~/.gmailfs.conf

Now specify your gmail account credentials in ~/.gmailfs.conf and to finally mount the drive, just type:

mkdir gmail
mount.gmailfs none gmail

For Windows Users:

Just like for the Mac there are applications available like gDrive Shell Extension

~# sudo apt-get install davfs2

sudo mkdir /mnt/idisk

sudo mount -t davfs https://idisk.me.com/$MOBILEMEUSERNAME /mnt/idisk/