The last time we recommended a piece of software was back in January 2005 – not that many people had heard of Skype back then but it went on to become one of the most used application on the net. In fact its difficult to think of the internet now without Skype for free telephoning.
With the new system set up for the journalists now working behind the scenes on barganews.com some more exciting and ground breaking software has been used, tried out and tested over the past couple of months, most of which is probably too specialised and not really of much use to the casual reader but one which has very quickly become central to the running of this site could also be of interest to many of our readers out there and so we thought we would point you in that direction. – you can download Dropbox here
We have gradually been adding “cloud computing” to the arsenal of tools at our disposal … bear in mind, cloud computing is not new. Most of us are using the cloud already, through services like Hotmail, gmail, Flickr, Blogger and Facebook. It’s business that has been slow in the take-up but one service that has really shone out and made the running of the site so much easier is Dropbox.
The giornaledibarganews is a fusion between three separate offices in Barga Vecchia and various groups of people using computers running Windows, Mac and Linux operating systems and various cell phones. All of which now have Dropbox installed on them.
Dropbox, a free service that lets people bring their documents, photos and videos anywhere and share them easily, announced today that more than 25 million people have joined Dropbox and are using it to save more than 200 million files every day. These files are available from any computer, smartphone or iPad.
People around the world are using Dropbox to share pictures with family, write papers for school, tackle projects with teammates and even coordinate disaster relief.
“Dropbox transforms the way people create and share their life’s work,” said Drew Houston, CEO and co-founder of Dropbox. “Whether that’s designing buildings, writing music, or raising a family, we’re focused on making it effortless to have your files wherever you need them, on any computer or phone. With this first step, we’re excited to reach new people around the world and delight them with all the ways Dropbox can simplify their lives.”
“Computers should make your life easier, not harder,” said Arash Ferdowsi, CTO and co-founder of Dropbox. “We’ve spent hours sweating every tiny detail of Dropbox so you never have to think about it – it just works. Flawlessly synchronizing thousands of files per second across every operating system and mobile phone platform is an enormous technical challenge. We’ve built an incredible team to do this at a global scale.”
How Dropbox Works
Dropbox makes all your files available to you from any computer or phone. It’s as easy as adding any doc, photo or video to your Dropbox folder. You can start working at the office and finish from home without ever needing to think about where your files are – they are always with you.
Joining Dropbox is easy: installing the software here (free for Windows, Mac and Linux) creates a special folder on your computer. Anything you add to this Dropbox folder will automatically save to all your computers and to the Dropbox website. You can also invite people to share any folder in your Dropbox, which makes Dropbox perfect for team projects or sharing photos with family or friends – it will be as if you are saving straight to their desktop. The Dropbox mobile apps (free for iPhone, Android and BlackBerry) let you take your life on the road. And because Dropbox preserves earlier versions of your work, you can go back in time to fix mistakes or even undelete files.
Dropbox offers 2GB of space for free, enough for thousands of documents or hundreds of large photos, and you can easily upgrade to a Pro account with up to 100GB.
Story of Dropbox
Dropbox was founded in 2007 by Drew Houston and Arash Ferdowsi. Frustrated by working from multiple computers, Drew was inspired to create a service that would let people bring all their files anywhere, with no need to email around attachments. Drew created a demo of Dropbox and showed it to fellow MIT student Arash Ferdowsi, who dropped out with only one semester left to help make Dropbox a reality. Guiding their decisions was a relentless focus on crafting a simple and reliable experience across every computer and phone. Drew and Arash moved to San Francisco in fall 2007, secured seed funding from Y Combinator, and set about building a world-class engineering team. In fall 2008, Sequoia Capital led a $7.2M Series A with Accel Partners to help bring Dropbox to people everywhere.
– download Dropbox here
L’ultima volta che abbiamo raccomandato un software era il gennaio 2005, quando ancora in pochi avevano sentito parlare di Skype, che è poi divenuta una delle applicazioni più utilizzate in rete. Adesso c’è una nuova tecnologia che i giornalisti di Giornaledibarganews stanno usando, un sistema che agevola il loro lavoro ma che può essere interessante anche per i loro lettori.
Si tratta del “cloud computing”, una tecnologia che permette l’archiviazione di dati e la loro condivisione in remoto, cioè fuori dal proprio computer. Su un cloud, una “nuvola” ospitata su un server. Il cloud computing non è una tecnologia nuovissima e inconsapevolmente l’avete già utilizzata se frequentate servizi come Hotmail, gmail, Flickr, Facebook e Blogger.
Comunque questo sistema si è aggiunto all’arsenale dei nostri strumenti, e pensiamo che possano trovarlo interessante anche i nostri lettori.
Si tratta di Dropbox, un servizio gratuito che può essere utilizzato su tutti i sistemi operativi e anche sugli smartphone, tanto che per la nostra redazione ed i nostri collaboratori è divenuto uno dei mezzi privilegiati per “passare” informazioni, anche in virtù del fatto che in questo modo si azzerano le distanze tra i diversi uffici e luoghi da cui lo staff lavora.
Ma non siamo i soli: proprio oggi Dropbox ha annunciato che sono più di 25 milioni gli utenti che lo stanno utilizzando per salvare e condividere oltre 200 milioni tra documenti, foto e video ogni giorno, file che restano sempre disponibili da qualsiasi computer, smartphone o iPad.
Aderire Dropbox è semplice: l’installazione del software (gratuito per Windows, Mac e Linux) crea una speciale cartella sul tuo computer. Tutto quello che viene aggiunto a questa cartella verrà salvato automaticamente su tutti i computer collegati e sul sito web Dropbox.
Si possono anche condividere le cartelle invitando altre persone ad “entrare” nel proprio dropbox. Dropbox è quindi perfetto per progetti sviluppati in team o per la condivisione di foto con la famiglia o gli amici. L’applicazione mobile di Dropbox (gratis per iPhone, BlackBerry e Android) ti permetterà di vedere i tuoi documenti anche lontano dall’ufficio.
E poichè Dropbox conserva le versioni precedenti dei vostri lavori, si può tornare indietro nel tempo per ritrovarne le versioni precedenti. Dropbox offre gratuitamente 2 GB di spazio libero, abbastanza per migliaia di documenti o centinaia di foto di grandi dimensioni, e si può facilmente acquistare una cartella “pro” che può contenere fino a 100 GB.