Library
About Library
The library contains files and links of interest to community members.
To view the library, click on the library tab.
All content view is the default library view. It shows all library
content, ordered by most recently modified first. This way one can quickly
find out what is new in the library, without traversing folders. To sort the
view alphabetically, click on the drop-down box in the feature toolbar and
select the desired sort, either Created to sort resources by most recently
created, or Title to sort in ascending alphabetical order.
If a file or a link is associated with a folder, the folder name will be listed after the title in a colored label.
Folders
Folders help one group library resources in thematic or logical units. Even though presently a resource can only be associated with a single folder, ECS treats folders as labels, or tags.
Folder list on the right side shows the hierarchy of folders. Next to each folder title is a number indicating how many resources (files or links) are stored in that folder. The number is not comulative, it only shows items associated with that specific folder, not its sub-folders.
The number next to All content indicates how many total resources are in the library.
Click on a folder name to show items associated with that specific folder. The list will only only show resources associated with that folder, not its sub-folders.
To create a new folder, click on Add link above the folder list, provide the
folder title, and optionally, description. The title will appear in a list of folders, while the description will be visible above the list of files once a user is looking at the folder. The description will also appear as a tool-tip bubble when a user hovers over the folder name in a list of folders.
To create a sub-folder, select a parent folder first, and then click on Add.
To edit a folder, click on the folder name, and then choose Edit link from
folder list toolbar.
To delete a folder, click on the folder name and then choose Delete from the
folder list toolbar. Deleting a folder does NOT delete files associated with
it – it simply removes the label from those files, and they are still visible
in All content view.
To add an item to a folder (or better said, to associate a resource with a
folder), drag an item from the list and drop it on the folder to associate it
with. To remove an item from a folder, choose Remove label from item’s
context menu (while in the ‘all content’ view), or drag an item and drop it over All content label.
Library Content
Files
A file is any binary file – text, Word, PDF, Image – uploaded to the
community library. One can upload one or more files at once to the library. To
upload a new file, either drag the file from your computer and drop it over
the file list on the web page, or choose Add file from the feature bar. You
may upload multiple files at once – the only limitation is that an individual
file should not be larger than 10MB.
NOTE Drag and drop uploads and multiple file uploads require a modern web browser; obsolete web browsers like Internet Explorer 8 or older do not support this functionality.
Community members can download any file in the library. To download a file,
open a file’s context menu and choose Download.
In addition to the file itself, one can define additional informative
properties (meta-data) for each file. To define additional properties,
choose Edit in the file’s context menu.
Title is a user-friendly descriptive title of the file. The title can be as long as needed.
Description lets one enter the document abstract or a description of the uploaded file. This description is indexed by ECS, and a well-written description will help users locate the file easier.
Authors is a publication author or authors, if the uploaded file is a publication.
Source describes a publication source.
Date published is the date the publication is originally published. Note
that the Details dialog will automatically show a separate date of file
upload; these two dates are not related.
Each file is accessible through a unique URL. Open View
details dialog in the context menu to copy the unique URL of a file. Sending
this unique URL to your colleagues will allow them to download the file
directly, without opening a web browser, logging in to ECS and browsing to the
file.
Links
One can add links to resources of interest in the library. Members visiting the library can click on the link to be taken to the web resource. Links are nothing more than usual web hyperlinks, just like one would add to own browser favorites section.
To visit a resource the link points to, click on the link title to open its
context menu, and then choose Open to open a link in the same browser
window.
To add a link, select a folder and click Add link in the feature bar. You can either include or omit the leading protocol designator (http:// or https://) – if you omit it, ECS will automatically add it when displaying the link. Add a description and a human-friendly title to make the link more useful to other members.
To edit a link, choose Edit from the context menu.
File Versioning
To create a new file version, click on the Check out in the context
menu, then download the file to make changes.
Once you are ready to upload the next version of the file, choose Check
in and upload the new version of the file. Anyone who downloads the file from
that moment on will receive the latest version. Even users who received the email notification for any of the previous versions will get the latest version when they click on the link in the original email message.
If a file has more than one version, you can see all previous versions by
clicking on View history link in the View details dialog.
To make the previous version active, so that any click on a download link
downloads it, go to the file history, select the version you want to
activate and click on Activate button.
While the file is checked out, no other user will be able to upload another
version of it until the user who checked the file out uploads it, or cancels
the check out. A community leader can also cancel the check out by choosing
Cancel checkout in the context menu.
With ECS file versioning it is not possible to compare changes between revisions – the mechanism simply stores each file in the library and uses the latest stored file as a source for all downloads.
Moving Files
One can move a file to another folder by dragging and dropping the file onto the target folder in the folder hierarchy window.
Commenting on a File
To comment on a file, select Comment from the context menu.