.gddoc are just pointers (it points to the URL of the GDoc) to the actual .gdoc files stored in Google Drive. The only way you can save them locally is by converting it to some other format (e.g. MS Office) and then backing those up.
.gddoc (and .gdoc) are meant to be used with Google Drive web and not alone as “files”.
And yes, you can make backups of folders and delete original folders but not with Google Drive-type files inside of them.
Yes, unfortunately it does answer my worst expectations.
I wasn’t aware of and It does not make sense to me that gdoc files would not be copied locally as are the other files. This surely is possible and would indeed be a real asset.
Converting from gdocs is not the ideal way as they will not be kept as “gdocs”.
I would suggest that this information (that only pointers to and not actual copies of gdocs are synced) should be mentioned and warned in the insync product’s page in your web.
Clients will appreciate and be thankful for this information as they will not to loose gdocs files as I have by ignorance.
@Jose_Lourenco It is not possible to get the Google Doc raw format as it’s proprietary to Google. The best way to “save it locally” is to download as HTML but that’s not 100% Google Doc compatible either so you will still lose document fidelity.
Unfortunately, until Google opens up the GDoc format, it’s not possible.