11/14.09 "Following"-- In Zotero, you can designate those group members (or anyone in system, actually) you want to “follow”; when they do that to you they are listed as your “follower.” This is supposed to bring notifications of updates, &c by anyone you’re following. It doesn’t seem to do that yet, tho' Laura has some indication it may be coming. What IS there now is that it seems in the message center only those you are “following” seem to be listed in the drop down “contact” list that you can use to quickly send messages w/in system. So,all of us should be sure to ask to “follow” the others in group, for easiest use in communication. A bit cumbersome (ought to be a way to ask to “follow” all group members, maybe there is and we haven’t found it yet). But easy enough to do in a small group.As new people join, you can then just add "follows" for them one by one. Quick way to check--on your own profile page, it says "how many you are following" and "how many are following you." The first should be one less than the total in group, i.e. following everyone else except yourself... So…Please follow me, and the others too. I’m following you!

11/14/2009 - As of now the following doesn't do much; as far as I can tell, right now it just serves as a sort of bookmarking tool, so you can follow people or groups whose work you're interested in. There are supposed to be additional plug-ins to enhance this feature sometime in the future; I guess the Zotero admins are working on it. However, one feature that will be updated quite soon is a timestamp on posts on the discussion boards, and a group notification that a new post has been made. A Zotero admin gave me the heads-up after I posted on a support forum, and he said that he would let me know when the changes were taking place... hopefully very soon.

11/14/2009 - Also, a quick word about folders and duplicates. Please, when you are uploading materials, only upload them to your specific upload folder, that is a subset of the group folder. This will help a lot when it comes to organizing things into subcategories. When it comes to duplicates, Zotero will block a duplicate only when the the same user is trying to import the same document into the library. It will NOT block a duplicate if the document has either been slightly modified (ie: I was able to upload a duplicate because I changed the classification of a document from "book" to "thesis") or if the same document has been added by a different user. Just something to be aware of.

11/16/09 Great first upload, Tom! Everyone should notice how effectively Tom used the "notes" to enter comments, page refs to specific charts or things we can actually load in later, follow-up references, &c for several items. NB, this can be initially confusing for others reviewing: on the "recently uploaded" list, these all show up as separate items, which looks cumbersome. And in the website "group library" view, if you look in Upload-TN folder where Tom put all these, the note entries don't show up at all, and there is no indication they exist! So this can be confusing--the recently uploaded list, and the group library list, seem in conflict. Happily, however: in the actual zotero screen (not the web page) when you look in Group Library you see these notes neatly accompanying the main item, there's that little plus sign indicating something is "in" it, and when you open that you see the note(s). So in the working library, it's very legible and handy, easy to organize. When you put an "item" in another folder, as we'll do, it takes all the notes, attachments, etc. along with it, automatically. Bottom line: As useful as the web-interface is for a quick overview, and group communication, most of the real interaction with the library should be in the working Zotero window, not the web site, which is where we have full access to the detailed libraries, both the "my library" on our own computer, and the "group libraries" in the Cloud... Mike

I did notice how the notes show up and that may be cumbersome. especially when more people are in putting and with more detailed notes as we fine tune the research. That said, I think the notes will be critical. There are some 500 page tomes with three relevant pages. If we are going to put that in the library then we should have found those 'three pages' and, it would follow, identify them. That makes this first stage of 'identifying our source's little more than that. My plan is not to do it with web sites (other than monsters like the LOC) because the local ones especially seem pretty easy to navigate.

I meant to say that the first stage of identifying sources is a LOT more than that.

Hi everyone, There was an issue raised about how to properly see all the folders one document has been assigned to, as it may pertain to more than one category, and there is a very easy way to do this! To see all the collections an item is in, select the item and then hold down the “Option” key on Macs or the “Control” key on Windows or the “Alt” key on Linux (I'm not sure if any of you are working on a Linux OS, but just in case - also, is anyone fluent in Python? I know that many of the plugins are written in that language, and it could be helpful. Anyway...). This will highlight all collections that contain the selected item.

Another quirky thing---trying to catch up on the group discussions, I found they were laid out differently when I went back to the Menu. I just discovered it's because I posted in them and they're arranged by latest activity! Duh. I find these texts dense and hard to read. Can we double space? or just change the font?

12/09, Mike: Hmm. I notice that the Group Discussion threads on the main page now carry a "last post" notice, which I don't think was there before. Useful for quick view of who is most recent post-er. But...a little counterintuitive what is being referenced, unless it's just buggy: I just posted a new one in "Group Discussion," and it notes it but says "last post--Laura Morris." Checking in this group, before sending this note, it says on top "last post: Michael Frisch," though in fact the last post there is a reply from Doug. Perhaps the "last post" is referencing who made the comment to which others "reply"? But if so, how is this different than the name to left, which seems to be the initiator of the thread. Is every post on a thread necessarily a "reply", indented, to that initial message? or can you start a main one within the same discussion thread? Not sure how, if so. Which leaves me at a loss as to what is being referred to in "last post," since in the instances I can see the name listed is NOT the name of whoever in fact sent the last post visible on the thread.... Hmm... // Mike, 12-09

HMMMM. let's see how this is noted. t

New subject, but while i have your attention. I added a half dozen titles to my library, my uploads and the hard times library today. but, again, no mention of them on list of newly added items. am i missing something? t

Also, my upload file on the web site (as opposed to my computer) is empty. ????? t

I have found that the synch button does not work on my computer because i don't have Zotero 2.0b7.6 installed. When trying to install it i am warned to back up my library/uploads. how do i do that? t