How to collaborate

After you have clicked on ‘+ Create a new item’ and opened the publication form scroll to the bottom of the page. Click on ‘Generate private link’ to create a URL that gives users access to the content you have included in this item. You can create a private link to data, to a link file or to a metadata only record.

The private link can be shared with anyone whether they have a figshare account or not.

Once your collaborators have downloaded the files you have shared with them go back to the publication form. Placing your cursor on the cross above the link will make the word ‘disable’ appear. Clicking this will then ask you to confirm that you are about to disable the link. Clicking ‘Yes, disable’ will permanently disable the link.

No, once a link is disabled you can still generate a private link, however the URL will be different.

A project is a collaborative space for figshare users to privately store and share their research files with other users of their choosing. You can access other project members' files and they can access yours. Project members must have a figshare account irrespective of whether it is an institutional account or not. Projects also allow you to publish items of your choosing from the project.

The project manager is the creator of the project and has the ability to invite new members into the project. The project manager also determines who is a collaborator or viewer (see How do I invite people to join a project?), and has the authority to remove members from the project.

Navigate to the Projects tab and click on ‘+ Create a new project’. Your project must have a title but all other fields on the left hand side are optional. You can provide a description, list the funders, and allocate storage.

Always select group storage for two reasons:

1. It doesn’t affect project members’ individual storage levels. For example, if you have an initial allocation of 10GB for personal use you can add 50GB to a project and still retain your 10GB of personal storage. This also applies to all project members.
2. When a project member leaves the group their files stay with the project and ownership changes to the project manager. If the former project member needs a copy of the files, the project manager can generate a private link (see Quick sharing above) to give access to those files.

From the draft project page you can invite people (on the right hand side) by searching for their name, full email address or ORCID, or by clicking on ‘invite new users’ (recommended).

When you click on ‘invite new users’ a box appears for you to fill in including the person’s name, email address and what role you want them to have in the project. There are two roles:

This is the recommended method as it aids disambiguation of users with the same name.

1. Collaborators - these members can upload files, download other members’ files and make/view comments.
2. Viewers - these members can view uploads and view comments only.

From the My data tab find the item/s you want to move into a project and tick the box to the left of the item (which will turn the box green). Click on ‘Actions’ above, then click on ‘Move to/from project’. This will bring up a list of projects you are part of and give you the option to select one project only to move the item/s into. Select the project and click ‘Submit’.

You will receive an email from the project manager advising you of the name of the project you have been invited to. This will prompt you to login to OPAL. When you login to OPAL there will be a message in your Activity tab asking you to ‘Join project’ or ‘Decline’. Once you have joined the project it will appear in your Projects tab.

If the project has been set up with group allocation of storage, the ownership of files uploaded by a project member will transfer to the project manager allowing the project manager full access to modify the files.

If the project has been set up with individual allocation of storage, the ownership of the files stays with the project member meaning they take their files with them when they leave the project.

For more information on the difference between group and individual allocation of storage in projects see the question above - When creating a project should I choose individual storage or group storage?