
Google and Box Announce Partnership - akrolsmir
http://googleforwork.blogspot.com/2016/09/Google-and-Box-partner-to-transform-work-in-the-cloud.html
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noahmbarr
We use Google and Box for work at a 100 person Series C startup.

 _Searching across all the locations for my files is a disaster_ : \- one
Local files on my work laptop (mostly synced via dropbox), \- two Box (mostly
in their web UI, with ~2 folders being "synced" locally), \- three Google
Drive (shared and authored files a like), \- four Email, \- five Slack, \- six
Files stuck in our business systems (like contracts that sit in
Salesforce.com, Jira, etc)

It's an absolute mess. I can't imagine I'm the only one to be annoyed and
losing productivity.

~~~
zyxley
Sounds like we need a startup to connect the services of all these other
startups together.

~~~
navs
But then some companies won't play ball with their own storage services e.g.
iCloud.

~~~
Nullabillity
There's nothing unique about iCloud, so just go with another provider that's
less awful?

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niftich
Box has always promoted this notion that you can make
applications/addons/extensions that use Box as a backing datastore [1]. This
was quite obviously a play at the B2B line-of-business market, which could
conceivably develop cloud-hosted apps [2] that operate on data that employees
upload into Box.

This is to the detriment of those who sell traditional desktop-based line-of-
business apps, including potentially Microsoft Office.

Box could -- for a while now -- open Google Docs documents [3][4] and the
like. I guess now it works the other direction, where Google Docs works on
files that are sitting in Box?

Google Drive, as funny as it sounds, is actually in a different market:
they're the catch-all storage space for Google stuff, while at the same time
marketed at nothing in particular. Meanwhile Box aggressively goes after the
'medium business' market. From this odd partnership, a realistic competitor to
Microsoft and other office-y application makers may result.

[1] [http://readwrite.com/2013/06/06/box-pay-developers-based-
on-...](http://readwrite.com/2013/06/06/box-pay-developers-based-on-app-
usage/)

[2]
[https://app.box.com/services/browse/57](https://app.box.com/services/browse/57)

[3] [https://blog.box.com/blog/how-to-use-google-docs-in-
box/](https://blog.box.com/blog/how-to-use-google-docs-in-box/)

[4] [https://blog.box.com/blog/box-and-google-docs-
accelerating-t...](https://blog.box.com/blog/box-and-google-docs-accelerating-
the-cloud-workforce/)

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grizzles
I like Aaron Levie too. But my thoughts on this can be summarized by quoting
one of the responses to the blog post:

    
    
        Why use Box and not just use Drive?﻿

~~~
foolfoolz
Google drive is terrible for shared directory structures. it's not that box is
better than drive, everyone is better than drive at organizing files

~~~
xapata
I'm fed up with complex director y hierarchies. Namespaces are cool and all,
but flat is better than nested.

~~~
enraged_camel
Flatness can result in much more overwhelming complexity.

~~~
xapata
I suppose that depends on what you mean by complexity. I prefer lists to
trees, in general. After I reorganized my Dropbox into only 1 layer of
folders, I've found it much easier to navigate. But hey, that's just my
anecdote.

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mxuribe
At my day job we are asked to use Box (enterprise), and while it is ok (not
great, but not totally awful) as a solution for sharing/distributing files for
both internal and external recipients (avoiding those emails with huge
attachments)...It absolutely sucks at searching for your files. I starting
using tags - similar to Gmail's excellent labels - with the hopes of finding
my files without getting a ton of irrelevant stuff...but no dice. Searching
for files in Box still so often brings up irrelevant files as to be counter-
productive. Again, Box has its benefits, but point blank, search is broken
within Box...which means for my team and I to find things we can not depend on
search (or tags/labels)...which means we have to depend on old school folder
hierarchies; and all the potential downsides that it brings. My hope is this
partnership DOES bring some of google's search prowess into the Box product.

~~~
cptskippy
I seem to regularly have problems with Gmail's searching. Searching for an
email composed and sent on a device other than the one you're using to search
is a crap shoot. I don't know if it's sync issues but I've had a lot of
trouble trying to find emails I know I sent only to open another device and
find them.

~~~
zachlatta
Have you made sure that your devices are putting emails sent from them in the
right folder?

I had this issue for a while and it turned out that my phone made it's own
"Sent" folder in addition to Gmail's existing one, which completely screwed up
search.

~~~
cptskippy
I only use the Gmail app on Android and the web interface.

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josh_carterPDX
It'll be interesting to see what Dropbox does in response to this. Box has
always been the "business" solution, but partnering up with Google positions
Box better to build on this. I feel like this is really bad news for Dropbox
who has been trying to get into the business market, but are clearly failing.

~~~
baristaGeek
IPO once and for all?

~~~
josh_carterPDX
Box? Yes. Dropbox? Eh.

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nthitz
Interesting! Why not Dropbox? How might this impact Google Drive?

~~~
sz4kerto
I think Dropbox is drifting towards Microsoft (which is not a bad thing I
think). They're collaborating with MS Office.

~~~
haser_au
So are Box:
[https://www.box.com/partners/microsoft](https://www.box.com/partners/microsoft)

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newgre
It drives me nuts to read an announcement regarding $some_product when they
don't spend a single word on explaining what the hell $some_product actually
is. What the hell Google PR???

disclaimer: I work at Google :|

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mahdix
Is this star of the end of Google Drive?

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tgarma1234
Sort of thought that anything you put in Drive belongs to or can be used by
Google according to their TOS. Correct me if I am wrong but that is the main
reason no rational business would ever connect anything to Google if they can
avoid doing so.

~~~
grahamburger
I believe if you purchase Google Apps (like most businesses would) the TOS are
different.

EDIT: In case any one is curious, this page links to both:
[https://support.google.com/drive/answer/2450387?hl=en](https://support.google.com/drive/answer/2450387?hl=en)

