When a workspace is new, everything fits in a handful of folders. The trouble starts months later, when "Documents" holds four hundred files and nobody can find anything. The fix isn't a perfect system — it's a consistent one that everyone understands at a glance.

Start with broad top-level folders

Keep your root tidy. Three to six top-level folders is plenty for most teams. Think in terms of areas of work rather than file types — group by what the work is about, not whether it's a spreadsheet or an image.

• Projects — active work, one subfolder per project
• Resources — templates, brand assets, reference material
• Archive — finished work you want out of the way but not deleted

Name things so they sort well

Folders and files sort alphabetically, so put the most important word first. For anything date-driven, lead with the date in YYYY-MM-DD format — it sorts chronologically on its own, with no extra effort.

Archive instead of delete

When a project wraps up, move its folder to Archive rather than deleting it. Storage is cheap; lost work is not. An archive keeps your active space uncluttered while preserving everything for later reference.

Review on a schedule

Put a recurring reminder — quarterly works well — to sweep through your active folders and archive anything that's done. Ten minutes every few months keeps the whole workspace healthy indefinitely.

Synchronization keeps the same set of files identical across every device you've connected. When you change a file in one place, that change is detected, sent up, and pushed back down to your other devices — usually within a couple of seconds.

Only the changes travel

FileEnergy doesn't re-upload an entire file every time you save. It compares the new version to the last known one and sends only the parts that changed. For large files with small edits, this is dramatically faster and uses far less bandwidth.

What happens with conflicts

If the same file is edited on two devices before either has finished syncing, you get a conflicted copy. Rather than guessing which edit wins and silently discarding the other, both versions are kept — one keeps the original name, the other is marked as a conflicted copy so you can compare and merge them yourself.

Selective sync

You don't have to keep every file on every device. Selective sync lets you choose which folders live locally on a given machine while the rest stay safely in the cloud, available on demand. This is handy on devices with limited storage.

Sharing is the heart of collaboration, but it's worth a moment's thought before you hand out access. The goal is to give people exactly what they need to do their work — no more, no less.

The three access levels

• View — the person can open and read a file but can't change it. Best for finished documents you're distributing for reference.
• Comment — they can add notes and suggestions without altering the content. Ideal for review cycles.
• Edit — full read-and-write access. Reserve this for active collaborators who are genuinely working on the file.

Share folders, not loose files

When several files belong together, share the folder once rather than each file individually. Anyone added to the folder automatically sees new files you add later, which saves you from re-sharing every time.

Links with limits

For one-off sharing, a link is often simpler than adding someone by name. You can set a link to expire after a date, or make it view-only, so you stay in control even after the file leaves your hands.

Feedback that lives next to the work is feedback that actually gets acted on. Comments let reviewers point at a specific spot, ask a question, and have the whole conversation stay with the file forever.

Anchor comments to context

Whenever possible, attach a comment to the exact paragraph, cell, or region it's about. A note that says "this part is unclear" pinned to the right place is worth ten vague messages sent separately.

Resolve, don't delete

When a comment has been addressed, mark it resolved rather than deleting it. Resolved comments disappear from the active view but remain in the history, so you can always see what was discussed and why a change was made.

Keep review cycles short

Long review threads tend to stall. Agree on a clear ending — for example, "all comments resolved by Friday" — so feedback converges instead of drifting indefinitely.

Everyone overwrites something important eventually. The good news is that you rarely lose anything for good — FileEnergy keeps a history of saved versions, and you can return to any of them without affecting the others.

Viewing the history

Open the file's version history to see a timeline of saved states, each stamped with a date and the person who made the change. You can preview any entry before deciding whether to restore it.

Restoring is non-destructive

Restoring an old version doesn't erase the newer ones. Instead, the version you pick becomes the current file, and what was current a moment ago is still sitting in the history. If you change your mind, you can roll forward again just as easily.

How long history is kept

Version history is retained for an extended period, so even a mistake you don't notice for weeks is usually recoverable. For files that matter, it's still worth keeping an independent backup as well — see the backup guide for more.

Reaching for the mouse for every small action adds up. Learning even a few keyboard shortcuts makes navigating your files feel instant. Start with the ones below and add more as they become second nature.

Navigation

• g then h — jump to home
• / — focus the search box from anywhere
• j / k — move down and up a list

Working with files

• r — rename the selected item
• x — select, then act on several items at once
• ? — open the full shortcut reference at any time

It's a common misconception that keeping files synced means they're backed up. The two solve different problems: sync keeps copies identical, which means a deletion or a bad edit propagates everywhere. A backup keeps copies separate, so you can recover from exactly those mistakes.

The 3-2-1 rule

A time-tested guideline for keeping data safe:

• 3 copies of anything important
• 2 different types of storage
• 1 copy kept somewhere separate from the others

Following this means no single failure — a deleted folder, a broken drive, a lost laptop — can take out everything at once.

Automate it

A backup that depends on remembering to run it will eventually be forgotten. Schedule backups to run automatically so the safety net is always there without any effort on your part.