Connecting drives

Connect external drives to AI Hub to expand your available storage space for AI Hub projects and conveniently maintain and upload files from your own storage. Organizations can additionally use connected drives as a location to save processed AI Hub files.

About drives

All AI Hub accounts include up to one terabyte of storage on Instabase Drive for AI Hub projects and documents. In addition to the Instabase Drive, AI Hub supports connecting the following types of external storage:

  • Google Drive

  • Commercial & Enterprise Amazon S3

  • Commercial & Enterprise Azure Blob Storage

  • Commercial & Enterprise Google Cloud Storage

Not all drives support the same AI Hub functionality. See the following table for a summary:

Drive typeWorkspace driveOrganization driveDefault drive
Instabase DriveDefault✓
Google Drive✓
Google Cloud Storage✓✓✓
Amazon S3✓✓✓
Azure Blob Storage✓✓✓

Workspace and organization drives

External drives can be connected at the workspace or organization level. Drives connected at the workspace level are available only within that workspace and all members of the workspace can access files on the drive. Drives connected at the organization level are available to all workspaces in the organization and all members of the organization can access files on the drive.

For organization members, the contents of any external drive connected to your personal workspace are available only to you.

While any drive that’s accessible in the workspace can be used as a source of input files, processed files are saved to the workspace’s default drive, unless otherwise specified.

Default drives

A default drive is the drive where all processed AI Hub files in a workspace are stored by default. Processed AI Hub files include Build project files, Converse conversation files, and app run results. Default drives can be assigned at the organization level or the workspace level. The organization-level default drive applies to all workspaces in the organization, unless the workspace has a previously assigned workspace-level default drive. If a workspace has a default drive assigned at the workspace level, this overrides any changes to the organization-level default drive.

All workspaces and organizations, by default, have Instabase Drive as the default drive. The Instabase Drive can’t be removed, but you can change the default drive to another connected drive.

Changing the default drive impacts projects and conversations

When you change the default drive, files stored on the previous default drive are not automatically migrated to the new default drive. In practice, this means that when the default drive changes for a workspace:

  • Any Build projects in the workspace must be deleted or migrated to the new default drive. When members open an affected Build project, they see a dialog that can’t be dismissed. To continue working with the project, members must migrate the project.

  • Any existing conversations in the workspace become limited to previously uploaded files. Members can continue to view their conversation history and converse with any files already added to the conversation. To upload new files, members must create a new conversation.

Connecting drives

When connecting external storage, the connection isn’t validated. This means you can successfully connect a drive to AI Hub, then later encounter an error when attempting to perform file operations on the drive. Until drive validation is fully supported, it’s important to correctly input all drive configuration details.

Organization admins can connect organization drives.

  1. In the header, click the initials icon and select Settings.

  2. Select the Drives tab.

  3. Click + Add Drive.

  4. Select a drive type.

  5. Follow the configuration steps for the selected drive type:

In organizations, workspace members, including organization admins, can connect workspace drives. Community accounts have a single workspace, so all drives are workspace drives.

  1. From Workspaces, select the workspace.

  2. Click Data Sources to open the data sources panel, then click the + icon and select Workspace drive.

  3. Select a drive type.

  4. Follow the configuration steps for the selected drive type.

You can also connect workspace drives directly from the file picker when uploading files to a conversation, project, or app. If you select Browse external drives and no drives are connected to the current or selected workspace, an Add drive option displays.

Google Drive

You can connect a Google Drive and upload files from your own and shared drives on the parent drive. In addition to standard file types, AI Hub supports uploading some Google-native file types, specifically Google Docs (.gdoc), Google Sheets (.gsheet), and Google Slides (.gslides).

To connect a Google Drive:

  1. In the drive selection dialog, select Google Drive.

  2. Enter a name for your drive.

  3. Click Connect to Google Drive.

  4. Select and sign in to the Google account with the Google Drive you want to connect.

  5. Click Allow to grant AI Hub the necessary permissions (see, edit, create, and delete).

Amazon S3

Connecting to your Amazon S3 bucket requires an AWS IAM access key with the following permissions:

$s3:DeleteObject
>s3:DeleteObjectVersion
>s3:GetObject
>s3:GetObjectAcl
>s3:GetObjectVersion
>s3:PutObject
>s3:PutObjectAcl
>s3:PutObjectVersion
>s3:ListBucket
>s3:ListBucketMultipartUploads
>s3:ListMultipartUploadParts
>s3:AbortMultipartUpload

When connecting Amazon S3 as a drive, the following settings are available:

SettingRequiredValue
Name your driveRequiredA name for the connected drive.
DescriptionOptionalA description of the connected drive or any relevant details.
Access key IDRequiredYour AWS Identity and Access Management (IAM) key.
Secret access keyRequiredYour AWS IAM secret key.
Bucket nameRequiredThe name of the S3 bucket to use for file storage.
RegionRequiredThe region code for your AWS account, such as us-east-1.

For a full list of region codes, see the AWS Regions and zones documentation.
Path to driveOptionalA file path to a folder in the S3 bucket where the desired input files are found. Leave empty to accept default (root).
Server-side encryption typeOptionalSelect the server-side encryption type.

- None: (Default) No server-side encryption.
- SSE-S3: Use Amazon-managed server-side encryption of files.
- SSE-KMS: Use Amazon Key Management Service (KMS) for server-side encryption of files.
Server-side encryption KMS key IDVisible and required if Server-side encryption type is set to SSE-KMS.The Amazon resource name (ARN) for the KMS key.
See the AWS Finding the key ID and key ARN documentation for more information.

To connect an Amazon S3 bucket:

  1. In the drive selection dialog, select Amazon S3, then click Next.

  2. Enter a name for your drive and, optionally, a description.

  3. Enter your access key ID.

  4. Enter your secret access key.

  5. Enter the name of the S3 bucket.

  6. Enter the AWS region of the bucket.

  7. (Optional) In the Path to drive field, define a file path to a specific folder within the bucket.

  8. (Optional) Select a server-side encryption type. If selecting SSE-KMS, also enter the server-side encryption KMS key ID.

  9. Click Add.

You can update your drive’s security credentials if needed. On the drive’s card, click the Settings (gear) icon, and select Edit configuration. Make any changes then click Update.

Azure Blob Storage

When connecting Azure Blob Storage as a drive, the following settings are available:

SettingRequiredValue
Name your driveRequiredA name for the connected drive.
DescriptionOptionalA description of the connected drive or any relevant details.
Container nameRequiredThe name of your Azure Blob Storage container.
Auth methodRequiredThe authentication method to use when connecting to your storage. Available options are connection string and service principal.
Connection stringVisible and required if Auth method is set to Connection string.The connection string for your Azure storage account.
Service URLVisible and required if Auth method is set to Service principal.The endpoint for the Blob Service registered to the container’s storage account, such as https://<storage account>.blob.core.windows.net/
Tenant IDVisible and required if Auth method is set to Service principal.The tenant ID for the service principal.
Client IDVisible and required if Auth method is set to Service principal.The client ID for the service principal.
Client secretVisible and required if Auth method is set to Service principal.The client secret for the service principal.

To connect an Azure Blob Storage container:

  1. In the drive selection dialog, select Azure Blob Storage.

  2. Enter a name for your drive and, optionally, a description.

  3. Enter your container name.

  4. Select an auth method.

    1. If the selected auth method is connection string, enter the connection string.

    2. If the selected auth method is service principal, enter the service URL, tenant ID, client ID, and client secret.

  5. Click Add.

You can update your drive’s security credentials if needed, though you must remove and reconnect the drive to change the authentication method. On the drive’s card, click the Settings (gear) icon, and select Edit configuration. Make any changes then click Update.

Google Cloud Storage

When connecting Google Cloud Storage as a drive, the following settings are available:

SettingRequiredValue
Name your driveRequiredA name for the mount.
Bucket nameRequiredThe name of your Google Cloud Storage bucket.
Path to mountOptionalA prefix to mount all files in the Google Cloud Storage bucket. Leave empty to accept default (mounting to root).
Server-side encryption typeRequiredThe following server-side encryption types are supported:

- GCS AES-256: Uses Google-managed server-side encryption of files.

- GCS KMS: Uses Google Cloud KMS for server-side encryption of files. When selected, a valid server-side encryption KMS key ID is required.
Server-side encryption KMS key IDVisible and required if Server-side encryption type is set to GCS KMS.The Cloud KMS Resource ID.
See the Google Cloud Getting a Cloud KMS Resource ID documentation for additional information.
Upload the private key file for your Google Cloud Storage service accountRequiredThe credentials for your Google Cloud Storage service account. Upload the credentials as a .json file. See Configuring a service account for details.

To connect a Google Cloud Storage bucket:

  1. In the drive selection dialog, select Google Cloud Storage.

  2. Enter a name for your drive.

  3. Enter your bucket name.

  4. Select a server-side encryption type.

    1. If the selected type is GCS KMS, enter the server-side encryption KMS key ID.

  5. Click Upload from device to add the private key file for your Google Cloud Storage service account.

  6. Click Add.

Configuring a service account

Connecting Google Cloud Storage as a drive requires a Google Cloud Storage service account. The Google Cloud Storage documentation is the most up-to-date reference, but the general process is as follows:

  1. From the Google Cloud console, create a Google Cloud Storage bucket with uniform access control. For improved security, create it as a private bucket.

  2. Create a service account in Google Cloud’s Identity and Access Management (IAM) system.

  3. In the Google Cloud console, create a key pair for the service account, selecting JSON as the key type.

  4. Download the JSON credentials file for the service account.

  5. Assign the service account the Storage Admin and Storage Object Admin roles for bucket access.

    For more details, see the Google IAM permission documentation.

  6. Find the Client ID for the service account (available on the Service accounts page).

  7. Using a Google Workplace administrator account, search for the service account’s client ID, and grant the service account access to the Google Cloud Platform OAuth scope www.googleapis.com/auth/cloud-platform.

    For more details, see the Google service account documentation.

Assigning default drives

Organization admins can assign workspace and organization default drives. By default, Instabase Drive is the default drive for all organizations and workspaces.

A drive must be connected at the organization level to be an organization default drive.

To assign the organization default drive:

  1. In the header, click the initials icon and select Settings.

  2. Select the Drives tab.

  3. On the drive’s card, click the Settings (gear) icon.

  4. Select Make default drive.

  5. Click Set as default drive.

To assign a workspace default drive:

  1. From Workspaces, select the workspace.

  2. Click Data Sources to open the data sources panel, then locate the drive’s card and click the Settings (gear) icon.

  3. Select Set as default drive.

  4. Click Set as default drive.

Removing connected drives

If you no longer want users to be able access a drive you previously mounted, you can remove it.

To remove an organization drive:

  1. In the header, click the initials icon and select Settings.

  2. Select the Drives tab.

  3. On the drive’s card, click the Settings (gear) icon.

  4. Select Remove.

  5. Click Remove to confirm.

To remove a workspace drive:

  1. From Workspaces, select the workspace.

  2. Click Data Sources to open the data sources panel, then locate the drive’s card and click the Settings (gear) icon.

  3. Select Remove.

  4. Click Disconnect to confirm.

Disable Instabase Drive

Instabase Drive is the default storage option for organizations. After connecting another drive, organization admins can disable the Instabase Drive to hide it from members’ view. The same limitations apply as when removing a drive.

To disable Instabase Drive:

  1. In the header, click the initials icon and select Settings.

  2. Select the Drives tab.

  3. On the Instabase Drive’s card, click the Settings (gear) icon.

  4. Select Disable.

  5. Click Disable to confirm.

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