Since version 4.6.0, the Iptanus File Upload plugin can send uploads to Google Drive. Files that your visitors upload are transferred to a Drive account of your choosing.
Connecting a Google Drive account
First you need to name the account and give the plugin access to it. Open the plugin’s Settings in the Dashboard:
The Google Drive Uploads option shows as not activated, with a Press here button beside it. Pressing it opens a new page or tab, which asks you to choose a Google account and then tells you that “Iptanus File Upload Plugin wants additional access to your Google Account“:
Press Continue. The page closes, the approval finishes, and the setting reads “Activated”:
If the page does not close when you press Continue, and you see something like this instead:
close the window and start again with the Press here button. The second attempt normally goes through.
Sending a form’s uploads to Google Drive
Add the attribute gdrive=”true” to the plugin’s shortcode. If you prefer the Shortcode Composer, open the Interoperability tab and switch on Upload to Google Drive:
The four further options
- The destination folder — the gdrivepath attribute, or Google Drive Path in the composer. A folder that does not exist yet is created when the first file arrives. With no path set, files go to the root of the account.
- The user data — the gdriveuserdata attribute, or Include Userdata in the composer. If your upload form collects user data, it is written into the file’s Drive description:
- The local copy — the gdrivelocal attribute, set to “delete” or “keep”, or Local File Action in the composer. It decides whether the file stays on your own server once it has been transferred.
- Duplicates — the gdriveduplicates attribute, or Trash Duplicates in the composer. Google Drive is happy to keep several files of the same name in one folder; with this on, any earlier file of that name is sent to the bin, so only the newest survives.
Once Google Drive uploads are switched on, every file uploaded through the plugin is transferred to the account you connected.
If you have questions, problems or suggestions, please contact us.
The Iptanus team
Hi,
When using the pro version to upload files to Google Drive, when a user uploads a file does it go directly to Google Drive, or is it uploaded to WordPress then copied to Google drive?
I’m looking for a solution where the uploads go directly to Google drive and are not stored in wordpress.
Hi, there is an option in the shortcode to delete the local file when it is transferred to Google Drive. So files will only be kept to Google Drive.
Regards
Nickolas
Thanks for your reply Nickolas.
How would you say the delay is between a file being submitted through the upload button, and the file being uploaded to Google Drive?
My concern is that the file will be submitted to the website and the automated email will arrive notifying of the upload before the file is uploaded to the cloud.
Also is the functionality the same with OneDrive?
Thanks
Yes what you say might happen, because of the way the plugin transfers the files to Google Drive. A file is first uploaded to the website. Then the plugin transfers it automatically to Google Drive. The transfer is done as a background process and it may time time. The time is not fixed (because web servers do not have a reliable scheduling mechanism). It might take a few seconds, or hours. Usually it takes some seconds.
However this delay means that the user will get the notification email about the file being uploaded to the cloud, but the file will not be there yet.
There are some workarounds:
1. Activate ModSecurity Restrictions option in plugin’s Settings. This makes transfer process to start immediately after the file is uploaded. It will work reliably (in combination with the notification email) for small files (e.g. less than 10MB). For larger files it may cause lags to the website. Nevertheless, you can try it.
2. Make the plugin send the email right after the file is finally transferred to Google Drive. This will make sure that the file is there when the user receives the file. However it requires customization of the plugin.
The same happens with OneDrive and Dropbox also.
Regards
Nickolas
Hi,
I’m interested in your plugin. But I want to ask if It also list the form submitters’ information in Google Sheets or if the form record submitted has a hyperlink to the uploaded images or videos.
Looking forward to your response.
Hi, the plugin keeps in the database metadata about each uploaded file (who uploaded it, when, path of the uploaded file etc.). So this information exists.
However, I do not quite understand what you want to do. Can you explain in more details?
Regards
Nickolas
Hi,
Have the WordPress File Upload the option to be integrated in form build plugins? Thanks.
Hi, not really, because you cannot have a form inside another form. However the plugin allows to add custom fields on the upload form, so it can substitute any other form plugin.
Regards
Nickolas