Official Google Cloud Blog: A new activity stream in Drive shows you what’s changed

A new activity stream in Drive shows you what’s changed

Tuesday, January 14, 2014

Posted by Ian Gunn, Google Drive Interaction Designer

Drive makes group projects easier because everyone can share files and work together. But in today’s busy world, it’s tough to track the changes to all your shared to-do lists, budgets and presentations, especially when content changes so often. So starting today, you’ll notice a new activity stream in Drive – a single, easy-to-view place to review every action taken on your files and folders.

When you open Drive, click the ⓘ button in the top right corner and the activity stream will appear, showing you who has taken action on files and folders in My Drive. You’ll see a rundown of what your team has been doing, such as editing and commenting on team notes, adding a new spreadsheet, renaming a presentation, sharing with your boss and more.

It’s also easy to only see what you’re interested in. Select any file or folder and the stream will change instantly to show information relevant to just that item.

And last month it became easier to take quick actions on your folders like rename, share, organize and more with a new drop-down menu at the top of each shared folder. Below this menu you'll see the entire folder hierarchy so you can jump to a different folder with a single click. And you can see profile pictures to help you understand exactly who has access to the shared folder.