I work at a company with 60+ persons, and we have just bought Endnote to have common reference platform. I knew that there were some problems with the single-user editable library and the read-only library before we bought it, but when I now write the user instructions, I really don’t know how to structure read/write in a good way. So my question is how have you done at your company/institute? Do you keep local versions that are automatically copied to a master library or? The solution suggested by Thomson to leave it to a secretary who should add it does not work.
It is decided on a lab by lab basis at our institution.
All Labs have a shared drive specific to their lab. Many labs have two folders on that shared drive. One Read/Write access for all, the other Read-only for all. The Read/Write version and subdirectories are copied each night and replace the copy in the Read-only folder by IT’s script.
Labs range in size from 5 to 25. Large labs tend to have EndNote open the read-only by default and manually open the Read/Write when they are managing/adding to the library. Small labs rarely have a big problem and tend to just point to the Read/Write library unless it is locked by another user, and then switch to the Read only or ask the person who is using the write version, to close it, if they need it.
The other important point to consider is where you have your users point to for the installed styles, connections and filter folders. We have changed the default from the C drive Program folder to shared folders on our Network. This makes adding/pruning the styles over time, and avoiding having to adjust the individual work stations if a journal style changes, needs correction or adding something that many users request. this is an option during the msi installation or a regedit change after installation.
our group (5 persons) has a shared network drive on a unix server, all users have read/write access.
I have copied my EndNote library to this shared drive. When I have opened this shared EndNote library and my colleague wants to open it simultaneosly she gets the EndNote message “File is already open for writing and cannot be opened again.”
As I think I explained, but perhaps not very well, once a library is open as read/write (RW) by one user it cannot be openned by another user until the first user closes it. That is why we have a second copy of the library and DATA folders which is set to Read Only (RO) and the library and folders are copied from the RW location to the RO location each night.
People only routinely open the Read/Write version if they need to add new records or edit existing records. So users have it set to automatically open the Read only version (which warns you that it is “read only” when you open it) and only switch to the other library if they need to “write” to it (and run around the lab to identify who has it open if it gives the error message that it is already open).
If you want multiple users to simultaneously be able to add/edit records, you may want to consider using the EN Web facility (but it currently doesn’t have all the bells and whistles like attached PDFs etc) or another referencing package (Thomson’s Ref Manager has simultaneous user access I believe) or perhaps Zotera.
I’ve found this thread useful as a starting point but I still have some questions about how best to update a shared master library. I work in an office with 5 EndNote users, so there are often occasions when several of us want to use the shared library at the same time. When we do use the library, we all need to add records and correct typos/duplicates in existing records, so setting one library as Read Only would probably not be effective.
Is my best option here to set up EndNote Web? And are there some simple resources that explain how to set it up and why it would be advantageous to use it instead of regular EndNote? I don’t care about attached PDFs, I just want our users to have access to the same library for CWYW and to be able to add to that library or fix its records.
I think our IT gropup did provide it to me some time ago, and I can rummage or ask for it again. Prefer to do that off forum. - It overwrites all the new files and folders, I think, in the middle of the night. If you create a new library it also updates/adds it, if in the RW folder (to the RO folder). Users opening the RO version get the “locked” warning. As long as both enl and DATA folder are updated at the same time, there is no danger. Infact - the .enl file can be totally empty. it is the DATA folder and subfolders that keeps all the important information.
you can PM me with your email, and I will try to get it for you.