Group Sync | Network Storage
I'm testing if Zotero will be right for my research group (government) and want to find the most cost effective means to improving our citation management. Zotero has been amazing for my personal use, but I am completely novice to the syncing and group management aspect of Zotero.
We have network storage with 1 TB available. Therefore, it wouldn't make sense to sync (store?) to a paid cloud service if I can use our network storage drives. I have searched Zotero for information on this, but I seem to keep finding things pre-Zotero 2.0 from like 2008.
(1) Is there Documentation I'm just not finding that discusses this, I would think, common situation in research facilities?
(2) If there is not documentation, can someone explain to me if I should be looking at Sync options or merely Storage options? For instance, if I set my preferences to not Sync group content and set my storage options (Advanced tab) to the network drive, will this store group content (attachments) on my share (S) drive? Will this keep the attachments accessible to the rest in my group that also have access to the S drive? Or am I completely off the mark and need to approach this differently?
(3) Is there another thread I missed that discusses this topic? Feel free to redirect me to alleviate my ignorance.
We have network storage with 1 TB available. Therefore, it wouldn't make sense to sync (store?) to a paid cloud service if I can use our network storage drives. I have searched Zotero for information on this, but I seem to keep finding things pre-Zotero 2.0 from like 2008.
(1) Is there Documentation I'm just not finding that discusses this, I would think, common situation in research facilities?
(2) If there is not documentation, can someone explain to me if I should be looking at Sync options or merely Storage options? For instance, if I set my preferences to not Sync group content and set my storage options (Advanced tab) to the network drive, will this store group content (attachments) on my share (S) drive? Will this keep the attachments accessible to the rest in my group that also have access to the S drive? Or am I completely off the mark and need to approach this differently?
(3) Is there another thread I missed that discusses this topic? Feel free to redirect me to alleviate my ignorance.
Using the option described by you under 2) is strongly adviced against. The Zotero database is not designed to be accessible by multiple users at the same time. Best case it will lock down and don't work for other users. Worst (and pretty likely) case it will get corrupted.
Depending on your needs and capabilities you have four main options:
1. Do not share documents in your groups, just metadata. That's free with Zotero.
2. Store your attachments not with Zotero, but as "link to files" (as opposed to "store copy of file). You can keep the folder with all linked files on the network drive. You may be able to use the Zotfile plugin to facilitate the process. http://www.columbia.edu/~jpl2136/zotfile.html
3. The entire server side code of Zotero is open source and it's generally possible to run the entire sync operation on your server, but it's pretty advanced and you need someone who really knows what s/he is doing. No support is provided by the Zotero team for this option, but some community documentation exists: http://www.zotero.org/support/dev/dataserver_setup
4. Use Zotero storage after all.
Under my Group Libraries, the option for "Attach link to file ..." is not available (it is available under My Libraries). Is this what Dan was getting at?
I assume that when I attach a link to the file on, say, my S drive (network share), that it should point to that file for anyone in the group? Then in that case, anyone in the group should have access to the file through that associated link? But as pointed out, the option is not available for groups. So option 2 is not really usable? This seems, to me, the best approach if there is a way to get it to work. Otherwise, option 4 would be the most efficient (but require getting budget approval).
Maybe ZotFile will help with this, but is there an easy way to attach files as a link like the drag-and-drop methods? Currently I either drop from a URL or from a file in my Explorer window (I assumed this still stored the file and was not a link, but I could be wrong). Or is the way to keep things as a link is to store the files manually onto the network share and then go through the process of attach-as-link and selecting that stored file? Or does the drag-drop from Explorer create a link instead of storage?
It's still theoretically possible using the "add link to current page" function while having an item saved on the Network drive open in FF, but I don't see how to turn this into a usabel workflow.
An alternative would be to, instead of using a group, just share a single account in your entire working group. Those of you who want to maintain a separate, private Zotero account could use separate FF profiles.
The only real risk for corruption is if you place the zotero.sqlite (or the zotero folder containing it) on a location where it's accessible for more than one computer at once - i.e. on a network drive, dropbox etc. - thus my warning against your original option 2).
But what you would do is to have multiple users edit separate locale copies of the database and then sync them - which would merge edits and query you in the case of conflicts. The sync is designed to prevent corruption. (I hope the difference is clear - if not ask before you do something risky with your database).
The only downside I can see for using a single account is that people can't easily move items between the group library and their personal library.
The only feasible way to deal with switching between this "group" account and any personal account they might want to set up is to use multiple FF profiles, right? I think it would be neat (though, maybe not that desired) if Zotero had the option for having multiple accounts in one profile (maybe with a log-in or at least a "select which account to access"). Even better, just have them all in the Collection tree, but separated (like the separation between My Libraries and Group Libraries). I know for one that I would like to have access to my personal libraries and work libraries from work, but I don't really want to have to load my work libraries when I sync the account at home (currently I just keep their content filed under separate folders).
You mentioned keeping file attachments -as links to files- on the network drive. If the Data Directory is set to the network drive, does it matter whether it is stored or linked? The attachments aren't being synced, only the metadata is. I'm thinking about what would keep things the easiest, since the drag-and-drop for attachments defaults to storage, not linking, right?
That's the reason I keep going on about links. You keep the zotero folder where it is and sync metadata. That gets everyone the citations. To get everyone the attachments you keep the files in one folder (with or w/o subfolder as you like on the network drive) and store them as "link to file" in Zotero - you'd do that probably using zotfile, but manually doing this will work, too.
This option will take more effort than simply using Zotero storage - e.g. there is no option to use drag&drop for links to a file, automatically attached pdfs and snapshots are stored and not linked and you'll have to deal with that manually or via zotfile - there is a reason people pay for the zotero storage.
At my institution there are several research groups using (1) webdav storage supplied by the institute for personal libraries and (2) one paid Zotero account which supplies storage space to several group libraries.
So everyone has their own personal library, the attachments of which are synced using Webdav. And everyone has access to one or more group libraries, owned by the paid Zotero account. These groups use the storage space that comes with that account. No hassle with multiple profiles, and users don't have to buy their own storage for their Zotero accounts. The technical knowhow needed for this setup is limited to setting up a webdav server with personal folders for every user.
Once you have a WebDav, using it with Zotero is very simple:
http://www.zotero.org/support/sync#webdav
There are some scripts on setting up webdav on your own server on the forum and, I believe, on some blog, but I can't vouch for them and don't know where they are offhand.
And no, there's no hidden pref/about:config option that toggles the attachment behavior.
So the folders look something like "4P53QT72"? These folders should all be inside a "storage" directory, which should be inside another directory that also contains a "zotero.sqlite" file. Use this top-most directory as you backup directory in these instructions