Thursday, May 15, 2014

Google Takeout - our new best friend!

It is that time of year - Seniors are graduating and some of our colleagues are moving on to different jobs.  In the old days seniors could just empty their lockers and staff just had to empty your metal filing cabinet and desk drawers and you could carry the box of stuff to the car.

That doesn't work quite the same in the digital world we now live in. There may be emails you need to keep or drive docs you want to make sure you have.

This post is to help you make that transition from mphawks.org to your personal gmail.com account.  Google makes this very easy with Google Takeout!  You should feel the relief that you don't have to go doc by doc, folder by folder!!

Here is the scoop.

1.  google.com
2.  log on to your mphawks.org account
3.  head over to https://www.google.com/settings/takeout.
 4.  this site allows you to create a downloadable archive of your google items.
take note - I tried to create an archive of a drive folder that had been shared with me. It didn't work. Only the items that were actually copied into my drive worked.
5.  Click create archive in blue
6.  The only ones you will archive are - Drive, calendar and contacts
7.  You can save the zip file on a flash drive - or use the school computer - just make sure you delete the file from the desktop and your server account when you are done with it.

Once the archive is created you still need to get your Google items back in you personal gmail account.

First step is to unzip the folder - just double click on it. Then find the section below that pertains to the things you want to move.

Mail:
YOU CAN NOT IMPORT MAIL!  If you have emails you want to keep you need to forward them from your mphawks.org to your personal gmail account.

Contacts:
1.  open gmail
2.  click on the word gmail in the top left corner - see photo 1
3. choose contacts
4.  go to the bottom of the left panel of options and choose import contacts - see photo 2
5.  Browse - find the file that you unzipped - contacts -highlight the all contacts .vcf file and the contacts should be imported into a file with the date and imported. You can move them from that file as you need them.




Drive:
1.  open drive on your personal gmail account
2.  click the red upload button - photo 4
3.  choose files - find the drive folder  - photo 5.
4.  choose docs by folder. If it goes really slow you may need to do only a few docs at a time.


Calender:
1.  open calendar on your personal gmail account
2.  click on the gear on the left side
3.  click on settings - photo 6
4.  chose calendar at the top of the next page - it is written in blue - photo 7
5.  click on import calendar 1/2 way down the page in blue
6. chose browse and find the folder where your calendar was archived
7.  click on it - open - import





Good luck with this process!!

No comments: