Like most people today, I prefer to save the majority of my files on cloud storage services, especially the work attachments I get in my emails. This helps me access my work files no matter where I am. For the past few days, I’ve been looking for a simple way to save all my attachments automatically to my Dropbox account so that I don’t have to upload them every time I receive an email. I did try IFTTT to see if I can create a recipe but it didn’t allow me to save the attachments in my Box or Dropbox account. It did save the copy of the email as text files, but that’s it.
Finally I found what I was looking for, in the form of Kloudless for Google Chrome.
What is Kloudless?
Kloudless is a very useful Google Chrome extension that allows users to integrate multiple cloud storage services in Gmail and move files from Gmail to cloud storage services and vice versa. You can even create rules that allow users to upload email attachments to Dropbox or any other selected cloud storage service automatically.
Let’s take a look at how you can setup Kloudless and integrate it with your Gmail account.
Setting Up Kloudless
Using Kloudless is really simple and straightforward. Just go to the Chrome Web Store and install the Kloudless extension for Google Chrome. Click on Add to Chrome button and authorize the extension to access your browsing, google accounts and cloud services data. They need access so that they can easily move files from one service to another.
Once installed, it will automatically open Gmail and you will notice a new option appearing in your Gmail interface, right next to your name. Click on it and it will ask you to setup Kloudless which is really simple and straightforward.
After you click on Get Started, it will ask you to authorize the application to access your Gmail account.
It will open a new window with Kloudless settings where you will be shown three different tabs: Account, Apps and Add-ons. The account tab will show you the Gmail account from where you want to transfer your files. After authorizing your Gmail account, click on Apps tab. In the Apps tab, the app will show you all the services they support. Currently, Kloudless works with Dropbox, Box and Google Drive. Just select your desired service and authorize it as well.
Here is the most interesting part: you can set up rules to automatically move or copy your attachments from your emails to different cloud storage services. Click on Add New Rule and select the type of attachments you want to move to your cloud storage account. You can select attachments from specific people, have specific keywords, etc.
After customizing the type of attachments, just select the folder where you want to copy the attachments.
Another useful feature of this extension is that it adds a new option to your attachments as well. When you open any email with an attachment, you will see a Copy/Move option that will allow you to transfer that specific attachment to Dropbox or any other cloud storage service.
Adding Files As Attachments from Cloud Storage
If you want to email any file that is saved on your cloud storage service, you can attach it to any email in Gmail. The extension adds Kloudless icon right next to the attach files option that allows users to attach files from Dropbox or any other supported cloud storage service.
When the recipient receives the email that contains the files you attached using Kloudless, they can view them without downloading the file right in their browser.
Conclusion
Kloudless is a very handy extension especially when you want to create backups of your attachments automatically. It can help users save time as it automatically uploads the files to your selected service. However, there are some minor problems with the extension. One problem I noticed is that you have to login and authorize your accounts twice before the option shows you the cloud storage service from Gmail compose window. But this should not stop you from using Kloudless as it is still in beta stages and sending feedback to the developer about known issues will help them improve the extension. Apart from that, I didn’t come across any issue with the extension.
The folks over at Kloudless will also release the same extension for Outlook as well. That will be very useful for all those people who use Microsoft Outlook as their default email client.