How many of you store your school documents (homework) in the cloud?  If you ask what cloud I am talking about, you are missing out on a powerful tool. The Cloud is simply a place on the internet to store your files.  Where are the files?  They could be in any number of server farms Google maintains across the United States.  Where is no longer important.  What is important is that you can access your files from any device (PC, netbook, smart phone, etc.) that has internet access.  For example, you can create a document on a PC in a computer lab here at HCC and save it to the cloud.  Later that evening you can edit that document from your home PC.  The next day you can access the document from the computer lab, print it out and turn it in.  No more lost or faulty thumb drives.  And I hope none of you are still using floppy disks to transport your files! You can covert Microsoft Office documents, spreadsheets and PowerPoints to Google Docs when you upload them.  This conversion allows you to edit these files in the cloud you do not have to download files to your PC to edit them. If you convert your files to Google Docs format when uploading, you have unlimited storage.  Otherwise you have 1 GB of free storage.  This is plenty of room unless you store lots of pictures.  How do you get started?  Review either of the two documents below based on how you choose to use Google Docs. Use Google Docs as a Flash Drive (if you already own Microsoft Office and prefer to maximize compatibility) Create a new Google Document (if you don't own Microsoft Office or want to create documents without using it), Don't know how to access your HCC Gmail account?  Here is how:  http://halifaxcc.edu/StudntRe/Email/pickmail.htm Once you start using the cloud you will wonder how you ever survived without it.