Hi, Gang.

Does anyone have any experience using Google Drive to provide public access to pdf files?

We want to make our both our local newspaper back issues and volumes of our local high school yearbook available via our website. Our webhost does not want these documents stored on its server, but we can store them elsewhere and provide a link to the documents from the website. We have enough space on DropBox, but the documents load very slowly and don't appear to be searchable in any way (the docuements are ocr-scanned searchable pdfs). I'm loading 150 years, a year per document, of a weekly newspaper and the entire collection is less that 100 GB, so the files are not that big. 6-700 mb on average.

I am looking into Google Drive, which seems reasonably-priced, but I have no experience with it at all. i am looking to provide read-only acess to anyone connecting with the link on the website. Will my documents be searchable? Might I expect Google Drive to be faster than DropBox? Any other suggestions on how I make this dream o' mine work?

Thanks in advance (a pun of sorts--or close enouogh to one-- because the local newspaper is called The Advance).

Bob

Bob Barringer, PhD

Director

The Schultz-Holmes District Library

407 S. Lane St.

Blissfield, MI 49228

517-486-2858

blissfieldlibrary.org

Facebook: @blisslibrary