Controlling the View in Drive

by Allen Wyatt
(last updated January 2, 2014)

The purpose of Google Drive is to store files so that you can easily work with them. Drive provides two different ways you can look at (and work with) the files you've stored or created.

  • List View. Shows a vertical listing of all your files, sorted by whatever column you select. (The colums are Title, Owner, and Last Modified.) You open a file by clicking on its title.
  • Grid View. Shows small thumbnails images for all your files, organized both horizontally and vertically (like a grid). You can sort using a control at the upper-left of the grid area. You open a file by double-clicking on it.

You switch between the two views by using the Switch to List or Switch to Grid buttons, near the upper-right corner of the Drive screen. (See Figure 1.)

Figure 1. Switching between views in Drive.

Just click one of the buttons and the view immediately changes. As you work with the differing views, you'll discover that Grid view takes a bit longer to display than does List view, particularly if you don't have a fast Internet connection. The reason is because Drive needs to generate the larger preview thumbnail images used in Grid view. Thus, if you have many, many files in Drive or if you have a slower Internet connection, you may want to work more with List view than with Grid view.

Author Bio

Allen Wyatt

With more than 50 non-fiction books and numerous magazine articles to his credit, Allen Wyatt is an internationally recognized author. He is president of Sharon Parq Associates, a computer and publishing services company. ...

MORE FROM ALLEN

Changing AutoFilter Drop-Down Arrow Colors

The drop-down arrow used at the top of columns by AutoFilter can be difficult to see. Here's a way you can reduce the ...

Discover More

Phantom Counts

Two common worksheet functions used to count things are COUNT and COUNTA. Not understanding how these functions treat ...

Discover More

Assigning a Macro to a Keyboard Combination

Macros are a great way to expand what you can do with the data you place in Excel. You can make those macros even handier ...

Discover More
More DriveTips

Adding Shared Files to Drive

When you are working in Drive, the program makes it easy to see the files to which you have access. Normally, shared ...

Discover More

Getting a File Count

Want to know how many files you've got stored in Drive or in a folder or two? There is no built-in tool to get the info, ...

Discover More

Working with Text Files

One of the most plain-vanilla types of files you can store in Drive is a text file. Here's how to work with the content ...

Discover More
Comments

If you would like to add an image to your comment (not an avatar, but an image to help in making the point of your comment), include the characters [{fig}] in your comment text. You’ll be prompted to upload your image when you submit the comment. Maximum image size is 6Mpixels. Images larger than 600px wide or 1000px tall will be reduced. Up to three images may be included in a comment. All images are subject to review. Commenting privileges may be curtailed if inappropriate images are posted.

What is two minus 1?

There are currently no comments for this tip. (Be the first to leave your comment—just use the simple form above!)

Links and Sharing
OUR COMPANY
OUR PRODUCTS
OUR AUTHORS
OUR SITES
 

Copyright © 2019 Sharon Parq Associates, Inc.