Imagine the scene: you are sitting in your living room/office/cafe and would like to send a file to someone’s computer who is next to you. What do you do? Email it? Copy it to a shared Dropbox folder? Attempt to configure a shared network connection? With FileDrop, it is simply a matter of dragging and dropping the file to an an-screen dropzone.
FileDrop is a free desktop client for Windows and Mac that makes the file transfer process quick and easy. Once installed, it looks for other FileDrop installations on the same IP (the same WIFI or network) and displays a dropzone on your desktop to drag and drop the file(s) that you want to transfer.
Using it is as simple as installing, granting network access (you will be prompted automatically), and ‘refreshing’ in order to detect other computers. It can take a while to detect other computers initially. Be mindful that both computers need to be on the same network, so if someone by chance is connected to another WIFI network for example FileDrop will not be able to find it.
The verdict:
The best thing this program has for it is the simplicity of it, especially if any of the computers involved does not have Dropbox or something like it, and specifically if you want something quick and easy and you do not want to set up folder shares or whatnot in Dropbox or on a network. It connects Windows and Mac PC’s, so the platform is no problem.
[Thanks to reader Panzer for the tip about this software]
Get FileDrop here (Windows, Mac).
