Windows Live SkyDrive |
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| Developer(s) | Microsoft |
| Initial release | August 2007 |
| Stable release | Wave 5 (Build 16.2.2907.1020) / November 29, 2011 |
| Type | File hosting service |
| Website | |
Windows Live SkyDrive, initially called Windows Live Folders, is a free-of-charge file hosting service that allows users to upload files to a cloud storage and then access them from a Web browser. It is part of Microsoft's Windows Live range of online services, and uses Windows Live ID to control access to files, allowing users to keep the files private, share them with contacts, or make the files public. Publicly-shared files do not require a Windows Live ID to access.
The service offers 25 GB of free personal storage,[1] with individual files limited to 100 MB.[2] The service is built using HTML5 technologies, and files can be uploaded via drag and drop.
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On its launch, Windows Live SkyDrive, known as Windows Live Folders at the time, was provided as a limited beta available to a few testers in the United States.[3] On August 1, 2007, the service was expanded to a wider audience. Shortly after, on August 9, 2007 the service was renamed Windows Live SkyDrive and made available to testers in the United Kingdom and India.[4] As of 22 May 2008[update] Windows Live SkyDrive was available to 62 countries and regions.[5][6] On December 2, 2008, the capacity of an individual SkyDrive account was upgraded from 5 GB to 25 GB, and Microsoft added a separate entry point called Windows Live Photos which allowed users to access their photos and videos stored on SkyDrive. This entry point allowed users to add "People tags" to their photos, download photos into Windows Live Photo Gallery or as a ZIP file, as well as viewing EXIF metadata such as camera information for the photos uploaded. Microsoft also added full-screen slide show support for photos using Silverlight.
Windows Live SkyDrive was updated to "Wave 4" release on June 7, 2010, and added support for Office Web Apps, offering versioning support. In this update, due to the discontinuation of Windows Live Toolbar, the ability to synchronise and share bookmarked Web links between users via SkyDrive has also been discontinued. However, users are still able to use Windows Live Mesh to synchronise their favorites between computers, although the "cloud" storage component of the bookmarked Web links is no longer available. This feature replaces the previous Windows Live Favorites service.
In June 2010, users of Office Live Workspace, released in October 2007[7], were migrated to Windows Live Office. The migration included all existing workspaces, documents, and sharing permissions.[8] The merger of the two services is a result of Microsoft's decision to merge its Office Live team into Windows Live back in January 2009[9], as well as several deficiencies with Office Live Workspace, which lacked high fidelity document viewing and did not allow files to be edited from within the web browser.[10] Office Live Workspace also did not offer offline collaboration and co-authoring functionality — instead documents were "checked out" and "checked in," though the service did integrate with SharedView for real-time screen sharing.
On June 20, 2011, Microsoft overhauled the user interface for Windows Live SkyDrive, built using HTML5 technologies. Microsoft also doubled the file size limit from 50MB to 100MB per file, as well as adding new features such as caching and hardware acceleration, support for HTML5 videos, Quick views, cleaner arrangement of photos, infinite scrolling. This update also brings together the different entry points for SkyDrive, such as Windows Live Photos and Windows Live Office, into one single interface. Files and folders shared with a user, including those in Windows Live Groups are also accessible in the new interface.[2]
On November 29, 2011, Microsoft updated SkyDrive to make sharing and file management easier, as well as HTML5 and other updates. This update also allowed users to see how much storage they had (and how much they had used), a feature that had been removed in the previous update as part of the redesign.[11]
On December 3, 2011, Microsoft released a SkyDrive for iPhone/iPod Touch app, and a SkyDrive for Windows Phone app, which are available in the App Store and Windows Phone Marketplace respectively.
Microsoft added Office Web Apps support to SkyDrive in its "Wave 4" update allowing users to upload, create, edit, and share Microsoft Office documents directly within a Web browser. Users can create, view and edit Microsoft Office Word, Excel, PowerPoint and OneNote documents within the Web browser. In addition, Office Web Apps on SkyDrive also allow multiple users to simultaneously co-author Excel directly within the web browser, and co-author OneNote documents with another web user or the desktop application. Users can also view version history of Office documents stored on SkyDrive.[12]
Users of recent versions of Microsoft Office (for Windows or Macintosh) can use the desktop applications to simultaneously edit documents stored on SkyDrive. This is a collaborative real-time editing suite as multiple users can use combinations of desktop applications and the web apps to simultaneously edit a document. SkyDrive enables this feature that otherwise requires a sharepoint server and the full professional versions of Microsoft Office to better compete with a similar feature in Google Docs, which requires using the web app.
Windows Live SkyDrive integrates with Windows Live Hotmail which allow users to:
Windows Live SkyDrive integrates with Bing's Save & Share feature, allowing users to save search histories into a SkyDrive folder.
Each group within Windows Live Groups are provided with 5 GB of storage spaces on SkyDrive to be shared between the group members. Group members are allowed to access, create, modify and delete files within the group's SkyDrive folders, as well as other functionalities that SkyDrive provides.
It is possible to subscribe to RSS feeds of the content of public folders. The feeds contain preview images of the added files—either a thumbnail of an image or an icon representing the file type—and links to the file download pages.
Entire directories can be downloaded as a single .zip file with SkyDrive.
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