Although Google Drive is a useful tool for storing information, recent changes to Michigan Tech’s Google Workspace can result in files disappearing from your “My Drive” unexpectedly. In some cases, these files are unrecoverable. This article outlines steps you can take to avoid losing important files stored in Google Drive.
What has changed?
When Michigan Tech began using Google Workspace for Education in 2012, we were given unlimited free storage space for all of Google’s applications - Gmail, Drive, Photos, etc. In 2021, Google announced that they would soon charge schools for storage above a baseline amount. At that time, we were using over four times the baseline, which would have resulted in a very large yearly cost to the University.
To reduce usage, the University Administration made the decision, with input from various groups across campus, including Information Technology and Alumni Engagement, to discontinue Google Drive and Photos for Michigan Tech alumni, who were by far the largest users of Google storage. In early 2022, existing alumni were notified that their Drive and Photo access would be disabled in January 2023. In addition, students who were set to graduate in the next year were alerted that they would lose access to these services 120 days after graduation, which was already the case for their home directories and Microsoft OneDrive storage. These groups were also given instructions for downloading or transferring their data if they so wished, and a warning that their Drive data and Photos would be deleted shortly after access was removed.
Why are files and folders disappearing unexpectedly?
Some users of Google Drive create folders in their “My Drive” and share them with others, including students. Students then save files and sub folders inside these shared folders. Although it seems as though the student-created files and folders are “in” your “My Drive,” they reside in the student’s “My Drive" but can be navigated to via your “My Drive.” You can see if a file belongs to you by looking at the ownership in Google Drive. In the example below, a user has shared a folder with Gregory Booth, who has put a file in it, alongside a file owned by the user (“me”):
When Gregory Booth graduates, he will lose Google Drive access 120 days later, at which point the file titled “Important data” will disappear from My Drive with no warning to me. Shortly thereafter, the file will be permanently deleted.
Best practices to avoid data loss
Is Google Drive the best place for this data?
The first thing to consider is if your data would best be stored elsewhere, such as in a multidrive share. Multidrive (M: Drive on Windows) data is stored within the Michigan Tech network, is faster to access from on-campus, and is less expensive than Google storage. Most importantly, we control our own backups, so accidentally deleted files are easier to recover, and we are able to recover missing files for much longer than Google’s 30-day limit. The drawback is that it is not as easy to share access, particularly for non-Michigan Tech contributors. If you would like to set up a Multidrive share for your data, please submit a request to IT.
Use a Google Shared Drive instead of My Drive
Google Drive has a feature called “Shared Drives,” formerly known as “Team Drives.” Anyone at Michigan Tech who has Google Drive access can create a Shared Drive, which is not owned by an individual, but by the Michigan Tech Google Workspace itself. When you create one, you are made a “Manager” of the drive, and have control of who can access the drive, and what level of access they have. Because the files and folders added to a Shared Drive are not owned by individuals, they will not disappear if a contributor loses Drive access.
Important: Google’s terminology is confusing here! When you’ve shared a folder in your My Drive to someone else, this is commonly called a shared folder, and is owned by a person. This is not to be confused with a Shared Drive, which is not owned by a person, it is owned by Michigan Tech’s Google Workspace.
Moving existing data into a Shared Drive
It’s easy to set up a Shared Drive and have people add data to it; this will protect the new data. However, if you have existing data in your My Drive owned by students or alumni, that data is in danger of disappearing, and you should move it before the files disappear as outlined in the previous section of this article. There are some considerations to moving this data into a Shared Drive, though. You can only move files and folders from My Drive to a Shared drive if:
- You are a Manager on the Shared Drive the data will be moved into
- You have Editor permissions on any files/folders you are moving
- The files/folders are owned by a user with an @mtu.edu email address
Another issue we have seen is related to using Google Forms and their underlying Google Sheets. Some Google Forms don’t work properly when moved to a Shared Drive:
- Test any Google Forms after moving to a Shared Drive, or copy them to the Shared Drive first, and test them
The method of moving entire folders within your My Drive is straightforward, simply select the folder (right-click it, or click the three dots to the far right of the folder name), hover over “Organize,” then click “Move”:
In the dialog box, click the “All locations” tab, hover over “Shared drives,” hover over the arrow so that it says “View shared drives,” and click the arrow:
You will now see all your available Shared Drives. Select the one you want to move the folder to, or navigate to a folder within one of the Shared Drives, and click “Move.” Google will analyze the folder you are trying to move before actually moving anything, and if everything looks good, it will ask you to confirm the move:
Trouble moving folders
Google is unable to move a folder into a Shared Drive if there are either 25 unmovable items or if 10% of items are unmovable (the limit is the smaller of either 10% or 25 items per folder). If this is the case, the dialog box above will alert you to this. This Google article goes into more detail about the various reasons files within a folder can’t be moved, but the most common reasons we’ve seen are:
- Some of the files are owned by users outside of Michigan Tech (we can only move files within our own Workspace)
- You don’t have “Editor” permissions on the file(s)
- Some of the files are shortcuts to files, and not actual files themselves
- Some of the files are owned by Alumni who have lost access to them - they are invisible, but Google still tries to move them and fails
- Should you have problems moving folders full of files, Google will give you a list of the files it couldn’t move. You can make copies (you will own these copies), and replace the files with your copies. You can also try moving sub-folders instead of one large folder, to narrow down the problem files. Finally, you can contact us at it-help@mtu.edu and we can try to determine if there are any hidden files that are causing the transfer to fail.
Having file owners transfer ownership
It is also possible for the person who will be losing Drive access to change ownership of their files and folders to you. This may not be practical with large numbers of files, though.
Important: Transferring ownership of a folder to you does not change ownership of the files inside the folder! After transferring the folder, every file within it must also be selected and transferred, as well as sub-folders, files within those sub-folders, etc.
Finding files in My Drive that are owned by others
If you are not sure if you have files that may be affected by this issue in your My Drive, you can use the advanced search feature in Google Drive to find them. Simply set the “Owner” to “Not owned by me,” and the location to “My Drive”:
Finally, you can find shortcuts by setting the type to “Shortcuts,” the owner to “Anyone,” and the location to “My Drive”:
