Grive Tools

Grive Tools is an open source project that tries to offer an easy-to-use and easy-to-install Google Drive client for the GNU/Linux. It has been designed from the ground up to be used on the Ubuntu Linux operating system.

The application is comprised of two main utilities, Grive Setup and Grive Indicator. While the first one is used to install and setup the main components for the Google’s cloud storage client, the latter acts as an application indicator for Google Drive.

Users will be able to access their Google Drive files

With Grive Tools, users will be able to access their Google Drive files locally and keep them in perfect sync. In addition, it will automatically detecting changes in the local Google Drive folder and upload new files to Google Drive.

It is an independent, community-supported implementation of the Google Drive client for Ubuntu, specifically engineered to make use of the Google Document List API for communicating with Google’s servers.

Integrates with Ubuntu's Unity interface

The program integrates well with the Unity user interface of the Ubuntu distribution, both with Unity Dash and the Unity Panel. It features automatic synchronization of files (Auto Sync), automatic launch on startup, customizable icon theme, and OSD (On-Screen Display) notifications.

Besides Unity, the application also supports the GNOME, KDE, Xfce, Cinnamon and LXDE desktop environments. In addition, the integrated Grive Application Indicator supports both dark and light desktop themes.

It is distributed as binary and source archives for Ubuntu and Debian-based operating systems, through a dedicated PPA repository. Detailed installation instructions can be found at http://www.thefanclub.co.za/how-to/ubuntu-google-drive-client-grive-and-grive-tools

Conclusions

At the moment, the project comes with a handful of limitations, such as the inability to download Google Documents, the Auto Sync function is capable to detecting changes only in your local Google Drive folder, and symbolic links are not recognized.

Other than that, Grive Tools is your only chance for a graphical and working Google Drive on Ubuntu. It supports the English, Spanish, Dutch, German, French, Italian, Portuguese, Russian, Serbian, Arabic, Afrikaans, and Japanese languages.

What is new in this release:

• Setup updated to install Grive 0.3.0 from the Grive Tools PPA.
• Grive 0.3.0 builds created for Quantal, Raring and Saucy.
• Both 32-bit and 64-bit architectures are supported.

What is new in version 1.1 Beta:

• Google Drive Application Indicator
• Auto Sync feature

Requirements:

• Grive