Only a few short years ago, syncing files was a complicated proposition. Now, it’s substantially easier, to the point that online backup to the cloud is a real possibility. But the 800 lb gorilla in the room is Dropbox. Dropbox is a free service that allows you to sync files between a number of computers, sync to the cloud, and share public files. It has two components: a desktop client for Mac, Windows, and Linux, and a great web interface for accessing your files from anywhere and sharing files.
First go read this piece on Dropbox from Rands in Repose, who reviews the basics of Dropbox and the case for what makes it so compelling. Having done that, Dropbox is a fantastic idea for law students.
Law students have a lot of value in the documents they put in their computers. Notes, outlines, practice exams, and flash cards are almost invaluable to a law student. If you put them in your Dropbox folder, and that folder is on both a laptop and a desktop you leave on all the time, it’s a pretty safe bet that you will never lose everything.
You also get to the point where you need to share things you have created. Eventually a friend will need an outline or you’ll decide to share some notes with a study group. Dropbox makes it really easy to share a folder with a group by inviting them via email or publish a file publicly by putting a document into a public folder.
Dropbox is a fantastic service that saves you data, syncs it to all your computers as seamlessly as anything else on the market and allows you to collaborate with small groups, even if they don’t have Dropbox (you can even publish basic photo albums). And any service that provides both easier collaboration and piece of mind to law students for free is worth looking into.
