# Dvc add external with gdrive **URL:** \ **Category:** Questions\ **Created:** [September 2, 2020, 5:29pm UTC](https://discuss.dvc.org/t/dvc-add-external-with-gdrive/480 "2020-09-02T17:29:20Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 4\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![randywreed](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex035/user_avatar/discuss.dvc.org/randywreed/32/77_2.png) [@randywreed](https://discuss.dvc.org/u/randywreed)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2020, 5:29pm UTC](https://discuss.dvc.org/t/dvc-add-external-with-gdrive/480/1 "2020-09-02T17:29:20Z")
I’m just starting out with dvc. I have a bunch of file and models that are saved on my drive. I’d like to add them to dvc without having to download them and then re-adding them. I thought maybe dvc add --external gdrive:/// but it says it can’t find it. Is this a problem with my gdrive link setup (I am using a service account) or with --external not supporting gdrive? Thanks ---
**Author:** ![shcheklein](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex035/user_avatar/discuss.dvc.org/shcheklein/32/173_2.png) [@shcheklein](https://discuss.dvc.org/u/shcheklein)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2020, 5:37pm UTC](https://discuss.dvc.org/t/dvc-add-external-with-gdrive/480/2 "2020-09-02T17:37:32Z")
Hi @randywreed! Unfortunately, GDrive doesn’t support `--external` yet. But to be honest, I’m not sure it the best option in your case. Could you please clarify, what is the most concerning thing to you in downloading them first- performance/time, or something else (like lack of human readable file names after regular `dvc add`)? ---
**Author:** ![randywreed](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex035/user_avatar/discuss.dvc.org/randywreed/32/77_2.png) [@randywreed](https://discuss.dvc.org/u/randywreed)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2020, 5:46pm UTC](https://discuss.dvc.org/t/dvc-add-external-with-gdrive/480/3 "2020-09-02T17:46:06Z")
I’ve got some models that are 256mb. And a lot of little csvs. But maybe that’s not a big deal. I’ll try it and see how it goes. ---
**Author:** ![kupruser](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/e95f7d/32.png) [@kupruser](https://discuss.dvc.org/u/kupruser)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2020, 11:26pm UTC](https://discuss.dvc.org/t/dvc-add-external-with-gdrive/480/4 "2020-09-02T23:26:50Z")
@randywreed Btw, we know that people sometimes mistakingly use `--external` for such purpose, because dvc doesn’t currently have a built-in feature to transfer/copy data straight to remote/cache, so you have to manually download/`dvc add`/`dvc push` by hand. We’ve been talking about introducing such features for a long time, but just didn’t get to them yet. Here is a ticket [https://github.com/iterative/dvc/issues/4520](https://github.com/iterative/dvc/issues/4520) for it, please like/comment/subscribe to that issue, so you are notified on the progress and so we can see that there is interest from the users 🙂