Why move your company’s file server to Google Drive? However, IT administrators that are able to help their organizations adapt to this structure are able to see a reduction in time managing files and documents and an increase in employee collaboration in which the Google Drive platform seeks to provide. Google Drive’s user-driven permission structure is not a 1-to-1 match to the file server permissions structure and often a paradigm shift from the traditional security methods IT admins are used to. If you’d like more granular control over users’ sharing permissions, explore third-party applications like BetterCloud. The extent a user is able to share files in Google Drive is managed by Administrators via the Google Apps Admin console.

Users then have the option to share files and folders with others through Google’s sharing permissions. Unlike a traditional file server hierarchy in which all files and folders fall under the central “Network” Domain File Server, Google Drive files and folders are created similar to how a user would create a personal document on their local hard drive. Google Drive is a file system of user-owned files / folders that are mapped in a web-like structure to other user accounts via Google’s sharing permissions.

What is google drive for