Google Colab help for students

# Cell 1: connect Google Drive  (ours, documented API)
from google.colab import drive
drive.mount('/content/drive')
# Colab asks you to allow access, then prints:
#   Mounted at /content/drive

# Running the cell again prints:
#   Drive already mounted at /content/drive; to attempt
#   to forcibly remount, call
#   drive.mount("/content/drive", force_remount=True).

import pandas as pd
# The source checks for a 'My Drive' folder inside
# the mount point, so your files sit under it:
df = pd.read_csv('/content/drive/My Drive/class/grades.csv')

The messages are quoted from Google’s google.colab source code, which also refuses a mount point that already holds files ("Mountpoint must not already contain files") or contains a space.

# Cell 2: upload from your laptop  (ours, documented API)
from google.colab import files
import pandas as pd

uploaded = files.upload()      # pick the file in the dialog
name = list(uploaded)[0]       # the name Colab really saved
print(name)                    # e.g. grades (1).csv
df = pd.read_csv(name)

# Uploading grades.csv twice saves the second copy as
# "grades (1).csv", so read_csv("grades.csv") would quietly
# read the OLD file. Using the returned name avoids that.

In the source, files.upload() returns "A map of the form {<filename>: <file contents>}", and a name that already exists is saved with a number in brackets before the extension. That is where "grades (1).csv" comes from.