Hello! This will probably be the first real Five Minute Tutorial I've written with respect to time, but I think it's a topic worth writing a few words about. Many of us who use buzztouch on a regular basis also use DropBox as well, and often in conjunction with our app development. So, it makes sense to provide a bit of detail on what we're often saying in the Forum. In a nutshell, DropBox is cloud storage. What this means is that the folks at DropBox have purchased a bunch of servers and storage, hooked them up to the Internet, and essentially give you access to them to store your files. They do this by having you install a small application on your PC, Mac or iPad/Android device, allowing you to choose which folders to sync to DropBox, and then doing their magic! That folder is then available literally anywhere in the world you have an Internet connection and a browser. How cool is that?! What? You don't have DropBox? Well then head over to this URL right now and sign up! http://db.tt/bQP3pdT [Full Disclosure : If you use that link, I'll get some extra space at DropBox for FREE! Thanks!] Oh yeah...did I mention that DropBox is FREE! Yep! Your first 2Gb of space is absolutely free, and you can get up to 18Gb total, FREE, in 500MB increments by referring others to DropBox. Like by using this link: http://db.tt/bQP3pdT OK, now that you have DropBox, here are some ideas on how to use it in conjunction with your buzztouch app development: * Source Files Available Anywhere: I keep all my buzztouch files in DropBox. I have the DropBox application installed on my work laptop, my home PC, and my Mac. So, I can literally work on my buzztouch apps on any of those devices. I can do some work on it at home, save it, and then have those changes available to me if I wish to continue playing with it at work. It's like having a giant USB key in the sky available to me all the time! * Share Folders with Other DropBox Users: DropBox gives you the ability to share folders and files with other DropBox users. I can create a folder and share it with you. When you are on your system, and look at your list of DropBox folders, you'll see that shared folder. Anything I put it in it will show up on your device, and anything you put in it will show up on mine. Automagically! * Share Files with Anybody: DropBox provides each user with a Public folder. You can put a file in that folder, right click on the file, select "Copy public link," and you'll have a direct link to that file you can provide anybody...be they a DropBox user or not! That's an amazingly easy way to share tons of stuff! * Link App Media to DropBox: Let's assume you have images or documents or other media that change often in your app, and you want to provide a URL link to them instead of putting them in the app itself. DropBox is perfect for this! Just use the public folder, get the link, and put it in your screen configuration section. Then you can update it anytime, anywhere! * Link App JSON to DropBox: Same theory as above. If you have a file with JSON in it that you want to use to help define your app, and which is linked via the Screen Data URL, just create the file, grab the link, and paste it into the section of your app. Easy peasy! * Change App Configuration Data URL Location: Currently the configuration data file for your app lives on the buzztouch servers. But let's assume that you want to move it so you can make changes to your app and not impact your users. Just copy your current configuration data file, paste it into a file on DropBox, grab the public link, and paste that link into the Configuration Data URL of your app. Now, instead of your app checking buzztouch.com for updates (configuration data), it'll go to DropBox! The whole online vs. offline app thing is beyond the scope of this tutorial, but check out my other Five Minute Tutorials for a discussion. * Backup Files: DropBox is a cheap way to back up your files. Just put the files you want in your DropBox folders, and let the program do the rest! No doubt there are a TON of other ways to use DropBox, and I've probably simplified most of these, but I just wanted to get you thinking about the various ways to use it. One caveat about sharing folders before I close. When you put a file into a DropBox folder, it makes a COPY of that file and moves it up to the cloud. So, there is a local copy of your file that takes up space on your local device, and a copy in the DropBox cloud that takes up space. Two files. If you have DropBox installed on more than one device, like I do, then you get a copy on each of those devices. That all takes up space. And let's say you and I share a folder called Pictures. If I put 100MB worth of pictures in that folder, it will take up 100MB of disk space on my PC, 100MB of my DropBox space, AND 100MB on your PC and 100MB of YOUR DropBox space. Keep that in mind, because sharing bites into your alloted space, and you can run out quickly. OK...my five minutes are up. Hopefully you learned something new today, and that you see the utility of a service like DropBox. Pretty much everything I wrote here also applies to SugarSync, Cubby, and many other cloud storage services. I find it hard to imagine my life without DropBox...I literally use it all day, every day! In fact, this very tutorial is being stored on DropBox! Mark

Nice Mark! only problem I ever had with dropbox was streaming mp4 files to an app...I had trouble with MP4's only playing halfway through and causing error...when I hosted the same exact file on my server it streamed fine (This was on Android) Also, if Dropbox users have a successful app they may be warned about too much accessing and be asked to upgrade...i have never experienced this personally. Anyway, awesome as always!

Thanks a lot I'm definitely gonna try to use this with my BT apps

Thank you for writing this up, Mark! Keep these coming! I recently went over my Dropbox limit and had to pay for it. But Dropbox is worth it. It works everywhere on every device.

Go for it Absentia, super useful, don't know how I lived without Dropbox either.

Nice tutorial Mark! Hey Susan, how much do you have to pay when you go over?

Hi Susan, Did you go over the 2gb free space limit? Or the amount of users accessing the public files?

A lot of people use dropbox as a server and host websites on it. I only got into it recently, but now use it almost daily. If you haven't already done so, get an account through the links above!

In my Buzztouch & Dropbox article I advice against sharing folders. (At least do it selectively) Every time you agree to share a folder it counts against your Dropbox account. It someone has a GB or two your free online storage is gone. Fred

@ianjamespiano: I mostly used it up myself. I do have a small shared folder for some family documents. I started saving everything in dropbox and I don't clean up drafts very well.

Thanks Susan :)

@EVERYBODY - Thanks for the great, supportive comments! @ianjamespiano - That totally makes sense about streaming video/audio, and bandwidth overages. We forget that it's just storage...not a high performance server for us! I can see them throttling bandwidth and/or asking us for more money. @Fred - My workaround to your problem is to ask people, when the files I have shared are done syncing, to move the files OUT of the shared folder, thus freeing up space on my account. That way I can continue to be the loving, sharing person I am! @Susan - Did you know you can recover files you've deleted in the past? Can do it through the web interface. Mark

VERY useful. Love ya work mate.

Thanks GoNorthWest ! I used your link ! :-)

Thanks, @tsdurai!

hey Mark, couple of questions, 1) Does using Dropbox links take space away from your app. (for example: i have 100 images in my BT_Doc vs. having 100 images in Dropbox) Is the app going to be the same size either way, or is Dropbox an advantage with limiting your app size? 2)Does the user have to have internet connection on their device to see images or html docs from dropbox? or is there a way the app can cache stuff like images?

Mark, i've followed your advice and have m4v files on dropbox. But when I copy the public link from them and put in in URL to load section of a custom URL screen, the Android app does notihing - just goes to a blank new screen - video shows. If I put this same url into my web browser it downloads the m4v then opens a screen on the computer to play it. Am I neglecting something? Steve

Hi Cono, Quite a bit late on the reply, but here it is: 1. Yep, it'll reduce the overall size of your app, since you won't be including the various media you're linking to in the app itself. 2. Users will require a network connection to get the data the first time. But, it "should" cache the content for next time. Hey Steve, Nope, you're not missing anything. There have been issues with getting video to work on Android, so it's not related to DropBox. Wish I had an answer for you! Mark