Multiple users of one computer

tthomas
I am new to zotero, and so far it looks like a great tool. I have recommended that my students check it out to use. We have a class set of laptops that are shared with other classes from time to time. If my students establish a zotero library, will their library be usable by anyone else who uses the same computer at a different time? They are concerned about this, as students sometimes have little concern for the work others have done, and a library that is readily available could be altered without the owner's knowledge. Am I missing some obvious place to lock the library so that each new user must establish his/her own library?
  • olaf@work
    HI tthomas,

    there has been discussion on the forum (see: http://forums.zotero.org/discussion/2266/ ) about that topic. There is no easy way to use different librarys in zotero. And although I would apreciate this feture a lot, it seems there wont be the feature on the way.

    For your purpose the best work-around could be to give every student his own firefox profile on the laptop. Every profile has its own library.

    greetings
    olaf
  • tthomas
    Thanks so much for your response. I will work with my students to create their own profiles. They love the idea of having one and are already thinking about which persona they'll use -- zebra or Ed Hardy or whatever. I wish they were that concerned about what we're actually learning!
  • anders_royce
    Separate profiles will work, but if they all log on to the computer under the same username, I believe the databases would still be accessible to anyone who uses the Zotero preferences to link to a particular individual's database (though I suppose there might be a way to password protect Firefox profiles). Another option would be to set Zotero to save data to a USB drive from the advanced tab of the preferences window. That way each student could keep all their Zotero data on their own thumb drive.
  • adamsmith
    well, but that requires quasi-criminal energy (i.e. finding the other person's profile, linking her/his folder to "your" Zotero, messing with the data) rather than lack of concern.
    And if you're concerned about purposeful vandalism (which I wouldn't be), the whole set-up with shared personal Laptops is useless.

    tthomas - Firefox profiles do not, I believe, have pictures. It sounds like you want to use separate Windows profiles - which will work, too, but take up more HD space - if possible, I would actually consider this the better solution. They are safer and easier to handle. Also, that way all of your students' work, rather than just their Zotero folder, will be "safe" (provided the 'no-criminal-energy' assumption as per above).
  • Bionatsci
    Firefox profiles do not, I believe, have pictures
    http://www.getpersonas.com/en-US/

    As of 3.6 they can have.
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