Our team is using a shared laptop to collect data via Interviewer, and we were wondering if there is a way for multiple users to access partially completed/in-progress protocols within the app. Currently, while each of us can sign in on the laptop as a user with our own institutional login credentials, the Interviewer app (and the data stored within the app) only shows up for one of us.
Is there a way for multiple users to sign in individually and still access the same app and the same within-app data? Our IT team hasnât been able to resolve this and recommended we reach out to you directly for any ideas.
Thanks for your question, and welcome to the community.
This is an interesting problem. By default, Interviewer keeps its data in a special âAppDataâ directory that is defined relative to the user account that installed it. However, it should be possible to install it globally, which might mean that all users share a single instance of the app.
I donât have a computer running Windows available for me to test this on, so you might have to bear with me while I work out a way to try this out. I will get back to you as soon as I can.
Okay, so having looked into this a little further, it seems that the app data directory is always scoped to the user account that is running.
The only way to have your user accounts share data would be to manually link them together (by creating something called a âsymlinkâ). I doubt your IT department would want to do this, as it would be time consuming and potentially result in security issues.
Two suggestions that might help:
Ask your IT department for a dedicated âinterviewâ user account that can be shared by all staff. This account could be locked down with additional security to reflect that it is used by multiple individuals.
Use Fresco to conduct your interviews. This will allow all users to visit the same instance of Fresco in their web browsers. Data will be stored in the cloud, and shared automatically.