There are many ways to let you share files with your friends and families but the way how folders.io handles it is quite different and interesting.
First, it claims that the web page on folders.io can be treated as your personal temporary file server that serves up your file sharing needs temporarily.
To make a page as your personal file server, simply go to their website and start dragging and dropping the files or folders into it.
Once the files or folders are dropped onto the page, the sharing information with an url appears on the page almost instantly along with a few social media sharing icons next to it.
Share the url with the people you want to exchange files with. When they open the url in Google Chrome, they can immediately see the files you uploaded earlier on your personal web file server. They can download the file right from there, as long as you keep the web file server page open.
Here comes a very interesting feature that can be very useful. If you have the option called "Allow others to upload files to this computer" checked on your web file server page, you actually allow people who have access to your web file server not only download but upload files to you as well. What’s more shocking is that as soon as the files uploaded on the shared page, it gets downloaded to your default Chrome download folder automatically through the web file server page.
You can also view the status of how many times the files have been transferred. And you can view the details by clicking the Details link on the page.
It worked so well and so smooth. And it can be a very effective way for you to share the files with your pair in real time. It would be even better if
- folders.io works on all browsers, instead of only on Chrome, and
- the file transferring can happen via a secure channel, either through SSL, or encrypt the data before transferring.
You can use folders.io to transfer data up to 500MB instantly without even setting up an account with them. But signing up a free account can beef up the quote to 1GB. All data are streamed through their servers without leaving a copy, according to its Privacy Policy, if you only use it to stream files without storing them.
The access link is randomly generated (free accounts) or that you can customize (premium accounts). Unfortunately, these links can’t be password protected at the moment, which may worry someone who are concerned about the data and private. And because of this lack of security assurance, you will need to think twice if you want to use it in business.
But still, even if it’s only for causal file sharing, the service provided by folders.io works so well that is definitely worth the time checking out.
