Upgrade StorageGroup syncing to own, private storage
For private group uses, a private file storage solution would be essential, for legal and privacy reasons. There is an earlier closed thread about this at http://forums.zotero.org/discussion/9485. As sean suggested, I opened a new thread for this, as I did not find an open one.
Would it be possible to get an update on the status of this feature request? In the earlier thread the developers argued that technically it can not be achieved with WebDAV, but the discussion seemed to indicate that one direction to consider for getting such a feature would be to base it on private installations of Zotero File Storage. Would that be a feasible strategy?
Please do not argue that the private storage option for groups is not necessary (that argument consumed most posts in the earlier thread) - some people and institutions think that it is and really need it to make Zotero a viable standard for the groups in their organizations, so it would be nice to focus on how it could be done. If Zotero developers are not interested in doing it, maybe they could give an idea of how someone else could do it.
[Please accept my apologies if this matter has been taken up again somewhere else and I just missed it.]
Would it be possible to get an update on the status of this feature request? In the earlier thread the developers argued that technically it can not be achieved with WebDAV, but the discussion seemed to indicate that one direction to consider for getting such a feature would be to base it on private installations of Zotero File Storage. Would that be a feasible strategy?
Please do not argue that the private storage option for groups is not necessary (that argument consumed most posts in the earlier thread) - some people and institutions think that it is and really need it to make Zotero a viable standard for the groups in their organizations, so it would be nice to focus on how it could be done. If Zotero developers are not interested in doing it, maybe they could give an idea of how someone else could do it.
[Please accept my apologies if this matter has been taken up again somewhere else and I just missed it.]
The Zotero server code is now available in full (it has been for a while as I note in that thread):
http://www.zotero.org/support/dev/dataserver_setup
so it's theoretically possible to run your local instance of the Zotero server, but Zotero does provide no support for getting local server instances to work (though there are some non-Zotero people on the zotero-dev listserv who frequently answer questions on that). This is a relatively demanding solution technically, though.
Since you're only interested in storing files locally and storing metadata with Zotero doesn't seem to be a concern, you can also use links to attachments on a local server. Depending on your set-up it may even be possible to automate that using the Zotfile extension. I haven't explored that in depth, but my guess would be that this is only feasible if all users in the group are using the same family of operating systems (i.e. *nix or Windows).
Finally, note that it would be possible to have everyone in the group share a single user account and use a local WebDAV version. That should be relatively easy to do.
(And no one in the other thread argued that there are no legitimate reasons for storing files locally - there obviously are privacy, security, and even legal concerns in many cases. We just argued that there are also legitimate reasons why this isn't easily possible for groups and that there aren't any sinister reasons for that).
WebDAV support for group libraries isn't really on the near-term roadmap, though we are planning to support linked files in groups with per-library relative paths, at which point, if you were willing to use linked files, you could use some other central store that everyone in your company had access to (which could probably even be WebDAV, with some help from the OS). A "solution similar to Zotero" that supports WebDAV file storage for group libraries is a pretty specific request, so I'm not sure what you'd find, but if you're willing to pay for a commercial solution, you could also possibly just pay someone (perhaps us) to build this functionality into Zotero.
We'd need any storage solution that allows our files to be kept on our secure servers. WebDAV is just the solution that zotero partly supports now so that's why I mentioned it. Any solution that allows us to sync the stored files on the company secured servers would work. We can live with storing the group item data externally as that won't contain anything company confidential or copyrighted.
The only thing I worry about with linked files is that creating the items and linking the files will take extra time. One of the things I like most about Zotero is the ability to save files to the library really quickly, rename files from the item header and move things around simply. I'd worry that some of those steps would be lost or take longer once the file was only linked to the item rather than part of it.
Paying for it is a possible option but it'd take a while to get the budget for it (as would buying commercial software, which as you say don't quite do the same things, it's the simplicity and functionality of Zotero that makes it so attractive. Not the low cost).
Our IT team is global and very competent so if there are technically demanding solutions to the problem (that don't compromise functionality to the end user, who won't have the skills to change setups, fix bugs etc) then I can probably get someone on it, but if those solutions require consistent IT support to maintain and manage whatever the solution is then there'd be less support as no one likes to take on extra work.
but nobody has taken it up as of this writing.
I've created an issue proposal on freedom sponsors in case anyone wants to contribute a bounty to try to move this along. The page is
https://freedomsponsors.org/issue/661/rfp-zotero-dataserver-dataserver-for-the-zotero-client
Do i understand correct, that it is possible to create a debian/ubuntu package (or another format that is easy to work with for most people) from the source code of zotero to get your own server (that you can install whereever you like)?
So basically if we get enough people donating for that someone could build and maintain that package for amount x?
You'd also have to use patched Zotero versions, but those are pretty minimal changes, so if you have someone to maintain the server, it'd be easy enough to maintain those.
Note, though, that the problem isn't just the money but also to find someone to do it--recruiting good developers is harder than you may think it'd be.
If you don't think that deb would be the right way to go - what would in your opinion be the best solution?
This link (posted earlier) does not help ..
http://www.zotero.org/support/dev/dataserver_setup
Can you point me to the source repo?
https://github.com/zotero/
There are various discussions, instructions, and links to more info&repos on zotero-dev, too.
edit: Dan deleted the page linked to above because it was outdated to the extent of being misleading and since server installation is probably better hosted by the people who actually are going through the trouble of documenting/maintaining it.
It seems like there is no way to change the sync server URL via Zoteo GUI now, but if you open about:config, there will be a few parameters that contain 'sync' in their names and URLs in values.
Having a few accounts with some shared group libraries, with all of the data synced entirely via a private network sounds an extremely useful idea for lots of organizations. Would be interesting to know about someone's experience in doing so.
https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/zotero-dev
You're right, though -- at least at this time, this also means using a (lightly) patched client (that's on purpose, so that the alternate version is logged clearly for any error reports).
https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topicsearchin/zotero-dev/subject$3Aserver/zotero-dev/MEwLaptJIzI
https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topicsearchin/zotero-dev/subject$3Aserver/zotero-dev/TFA7FKGxZHE
https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topicsearchin/zotero-dev/subject$3Aserver/zotero-dev/tF1M3FZ-GLk
If anyone knows anything else, it would be just great if you could share! Running a custom private Zotero sync server in a local network would be just a paradise for my team!