Is the study asset root for all users on the same Jatos server the same

Marion

Dear reader,

First of all I would like to thank the people who made Jatos and made it available to whoever likes to use it. I think it is a great piece of software and it makes programming a study so much more easy !

I noticed that on the jatos server of my university, two users could not import the same experiment. The user that is the second to try and import the study gets the message: "The study <studyname> you're trying to upload already exists but you aren't a user of it. You can always import this study in another JATOS instance (e.g. you local instance), clone it there, export it, and import it here again."

My guess is that all users use the same study asset root, so the main folder for the study, is already taken.

Can you confirm this? Is it possible in the future to change this in such a way that each user gets their own study asset root folder? No hurry for this, as the error message gives a work around.

Thank you in advance, kind regards,

Marion

kri

Hi Marion,

Great that you like JATOS. It's always nice to here that people find it useful. Did you try version 3.6.1 already? There are some nice things for admins.

And about the study asset root: Yes, you are correct, all studies share the same study asset root folder. And I'm aware of the problem. In the past, when JATOS was used on smaller instances, it wasn't a big problem but with larger installations it is getting annoying. There is always the workaround that you can just clone the study and re-import (as the error message states) or just rename the study's asset folder in the study properties and re-import. Although possible it's always an extra step and especially new users of JATOS might not understand it right away.

I'm also thinking about solutions for this. I'd like to use your idea, each user gets their own study assets root folder, but it's not as easy as it sounds: multiple users can be member of the same study (have the same rights on this study). Which user would get the study's assets in their study assets root? Although we could define some kind of 'owner' user (probably the one that first imported the study) and all user that were added later as members become 'secondary' users. That would also mean that only the owner could delete a study. That would have the additional advantage that an admin has better control over the size of the study assets folders and enforce some quotas.

Another idea I had is to let JATOS decide the study assets folder's name and not the user (with the study properties). JATOS could use some kind of UUID that is guaranteed unique as the study assets folder name. That way there can't be a folder name conflict anymore during study import. This way has the advantage of being easy to implement but has the disadvantage of being user unfriendly since the folder names won't be very human readable and the users won't easily find the proper study assets folder during development of their study (where is folder 79d0a52a-d5d3-4461-9d9b-6fd9f386c04a again?).

Another point to remember is backwards compatibility: an old JATOS version should be easily updateable without any study asset folder shifting by the admins. So whatever we introduce we should be able to put it into some kind of algorithm to move the old study assets root folder to the new location during update.

Those are my thoughts so far. I'm undecided. What do you think?

Kristian

Marion

Hi Kristian,

Thank you for your quick and clear reply. I wasn't even aware that multiple users can be members of the same study, thanks for pointing that out as well. Regarding your question: I understand the dilemma. I think I would prefer the option of one person being the owner (and being the only one that can delete the study) and the other members only having viewing rights on study assets and data (?). In an ideal world you would be able to give different rights to different "members".

For my situaton at this moment I am quite comfortable with the clone option and I think it is wise to take your time before deciding on which features you want to offer and in which order. Perhaps other people on the forum have thoughts about this ?

Best, Marion