Community Meeting I, 4:00 p.m. CET, 07 March 2024

[ELN-uzun]

Dear eLabFTW Users,

exciting news! Our first Community Meeting is scheduled for March 7, 2024, at 4:00 p.m. CET. This bi-monthly gathering is your chance to connect with us, learn about the latest features, ask questions and share your feedback.

In the first session, we'll be introducing the latest features of the newest eLabFTW release, Version 5.0.0. We are looking forward to walk you through the enhancements and improvements - we also provide you an open floor for questions. Whether you have inquiries about the latest version or want insights into upcoming developments, this is your chance to get answers straight from the source.

We encourage all participants to share their thoughts, feedback, and questions prior to the meeting. Your input is invaluable in shaping our discussions and ensuring that we address your needs effectively. Please feel free to leave your comments below this announcement. We'll review them ahead of the meeting to make sure we address as many as possible during our session. Thank you for your contributions in advance!

Save the date and join us for an interactive session where we'll shape the future of eLabFTW together!

Zoom-Link for the first meeting: https://zoom.us/j/98585145484?pwd=TlA2TzZDb3JLWE0zaWk1WUIvZXZCUT09

Best regards,
Hüseyin Uzun

[alexander-haller]

Possible topics from me/us/our users (pick 0-n 😃 ):

• Multiple teams per user (remaining caveats to be aware of)
• Admin remove user from team? (with the upcoming add existing user to team)
• Transitioning between teams for a user and how to best do transitions of only some experiments
• Future plans for table calculations or similar features in the TinyMCE editor
• Pruning/Anonymize for accounts to be deleted (current best workflows?)
• Future scaling: What settings should belong on the team level and what settings belong to the instance level
• Agree to new TOS/Privacy Policy/etc.. for local users

[garrettcurley]

Some ideas arising from our use:

• a lot of empty "real estate" on the experiment pages. Would it be possibe to make the "body" always be present, say on the right-hand side? Displayed like a notebook page maybe?
• the word "Experiment" seems too specific. "Notebook entry" might be more appropriate? Especially for theoretical calculations, meeting notes, etc.
• add the possibility to insert an uploaded CSV file into body as a sortable table?
• in the English version at least, when viewing an item in the Resources, it displays "Database > Viewing an entry". To be consistent with the word "Resources" and the word "item" in the API, it could say "Resources > Viewing an item"?
• In Experiments or Resources, it would be nice to be able to sort by creation date or last modified date
• Can the "Rating" column be optional? We don't see the need for it.
• What are the ideas for managing a shared notebook (experiment) entry, e.g. an experiment performed by multiple users? In a paper notebook, experimentalists would sign their names on the cover, and then sign or co-sign individual pages.
• EXIF metadata in photos seems to be preserved (when the photo is downloaded from eLab). Would it be possible to display the full EXIF metadata?
• could metadata or tags be added to uploaded files?
• could the Scope filter include groups? In general, is it possible to filter by group? Most of the time we just want to see the work within our group.

Thanks

[NicolasCARPi]

Thanks Garrett!

[nighthog80]

Some Ideas

• for users who are members of multiple teams : option to see only the experiments of the team they are currently logged in to
• for team admins who are also using eLabFTW as users : possibility to enable/disable admin powers when not needed. a bit like doing sudo in a terminal
• enable users to create their own categories (or similar) to sort their experiments into projects. i.e. higher-level tags
• look&feel : possibility to add a team/university logo on the site

[NicolasCARPi]

for users who are members of multiple teams : option to see only the experiments of the team they are currently logged in to

You'll want to update ;) #4908

[JohannaBaldus]

Hi,

here a wishlist from our lab:

Create Experiment by linking: It would be nice if I could generate a new experiment from within an experiment in a way that they are already linked to each other. In a similar way, this is done in some webpage systems. E.g. I have an experiment for which I use a sample. I then want to create another experiment describing how the sample will be prepared. It would be nice to just mark the name of the sample and then click something which then starts a new experiment and puts a link to this one at the markt position in the old experiment.

Use IDs directly: Sometimes titles of resources and experiments are very similar and it would be good to just be able to use the IDs direkly to link items (e.g. #ID).

Extra fields: They could be very powerful, but it is difficult to work with them presently. It would be good if one could generate a table with all extra fields in column format. Ideally one could also select which columns are shown and export this selection as CSV. (For Experiments as well as recources.)

Update of Link: Lets say I have linked a chemical and change the name. Then it would be nice it the linked name in the text would also change (the one that has been entered using #...).

Insert with title: I like the funktion that you can insert the content of an experiment or a resource into an experiment. It would be nice if not only the main body would then be entered but also the title. (At the moment I use this to collect things I need to print for the wetlab work, eg, a protocol, buffer recipies and some stock solution together. Maybe there is a better option?)

Scheduler: In our lab we have 15 bookable resources, therefore the calender is really crowded. The only way to work with it is to select the equipment of interest which is of course good. I have a couple of suggestions for improvements: 1) Have an option to show only my own bookings. 1b) Have a possibility to integrate this view in my personal calender (Outlook, Thunderbird, Google, ...) 2) Be able to select more than 1 resource to show in the calender (This is useful, as we have three shakers and it would be useful to see their bookings together, but not with everything else, as it is too full.) 3) Allow the admin the option to book for someone else (To use the NMR machines in our group one has to submit a booking request to the admin (me) and I distribute the time. At the moment in the calender all these bookings are then associated with me although I book for someone else).

Change things directly from table: When I klick on experiment (or resource) I see all experiments together with their status, category and tag. It would be nice, if one could change some of these things directly from the table without the need to open the experiment and edit it. Ideally I would like to change status, category and tag directly from this overview page.

[NicolasCARPi]

It's in one hour!

[Cs137]

Many thanks for this well organised and informative meeting! ❤️

[NicolasCARPi]

Thanks Hüseyin for the organization and moderation :)