Contacts Live Files Tutorial

Contacts Live Files at a Glance
Uploading Files
Uploading Files One by One
Uploading ZIP Archives
Creating and Sharing File Links
  Creating File Links
  Sharing File Links
  Customizing Link View
Sending Files as an E-Mail Attachment
  Customizing Sender’s E-Mail
Sharing File Folders with Other Users
Organizing Files
  File Folders
  Editing Filename and Description
  Copying and Moving Files
  Deleting Files. Recycle Bin
  Viewing Folder's Content
Version Control
  Checking Files In and Out
  File History
Compressing and Downloading Files
Creating Thumbnails for Image Files

Contacts Live Files at a Glance

Here is your Contacts Live Files main window:

Contacts Live Files toolbar includes the following function buttons:

Folder — lets you manage Contacts Live Files folders. Click to access pull-down menu to add/delete/copy/move a folder and set access rights for a folder and its subfolders

File — lets you organize and manage your files. Click to access pull-down menu to add files and ZIP archives, copy/move/delete files, compress and download, send files as e-mail attachments, and perform file version control operations

View — lets you choose and customize the format in which files are listed in the Files pane. You files can be listed in Grid, List, Thumbnail List, or Thumbnail Tile format. You can customize visible and hidden columns and specify length of a file description text

Tools — click to turn on/off and customize such features as version control and thumbnail creation. Here you can also customize sender's name for outgoing Contacts Live Files e-mails and manage your Recycle Bin — a specially designated folder to store deleted files

Reports — click to run various reports on your Contacts Live Files activity

Search box. Enter keyword or a phrase (e.g. "last report") and click Go to see the list of files where the search word is found.

Clicking on "Available Folders" will display all Contacts Live Files folders. For every folder you can see its access rights for a user who is currently logged in, number of files, and “Shared” checkbox indicating whether this folder is shared with other users. The line at the bottom of the window displays total number of files and folders.

Subfolder indicator. Click “+” to expand.

Upload Files button. Click to upload files to the currently opened folder

Create a Link button. Click to create a link to selected files or a currently opened folder.

Click to select all files.

Sorting indicator. Click to reverse sorting order. Click on a column name to sort (e.g. click “Filename” to sort files by filenames).

File properties icon. Click to open file properties window. Click on the pencil icon on the "File Properties" page to add/edit filename and description.

Click on a file to either open it in a new browser window or save it to your local computer.

Selected file checkmark.

Checked out (locked) file indicator.

Displays total number of files in the current folder.

Indicates current folder access rights for the logged in user.

Click “Shared” to see the list of users who have access to the current folder.

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Uploading Files

Contacts Live Files supports upload of the most common file types and formats. To upload your files, you can either click Upload Files button or click File —> Add File(s)from Contacts Live Files toolbar.

Note: Users with only R (Read) access level to this folder will not see Upload Files button on the files pane; neither will they be able to click File —> Add File(s)

Did you know? You can see the list of all files uploaded to Contacts Live Files in a specified date range, along with the date and time of upload, file size and the user name that performed the upload. Click Reports—> Recent uploads to access the recent uploads report.

How many files can I upload?
The total number of files that can be uploaded to Contacts Live Files is limited by your Contacts Live Files service type and user quota set by a user with administrative privileges in “Users and Groups” service (“Edit User” page, "Quota" tab).

To check your storage space, click Repots —> Storage space usage and quotas from Contacts Live Files toolbar.

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Uploading Files One by One

To add your local files to a selected folder in Contacts Live Files in a standard one-by-one upload, click Upload Files or click File —> Add File(s) from Contacts Live Files toolbar. Browse for files and add optional description. Click Add to upload your files.

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Uploading ZIP Archives

ZIP archive upload allows you to add files from a ZIP-archive to your Contacts Live Files folder. Click File —> Upload Archive from Contacts Live Files toolbar, indicate your local ZIP-file, your file overwrite option and click Upload. All files contained in the uploaded archive will be automatically uncompressed and placed in the current folder.

Note: Only archives of ZIP format can be uploaded to Contacts Live Files.

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Creating and Sharing File Links

Contacts Live Files lets you create file links. Link is the address of a webpage, which lists all files added during link creation process in Contacts Live Files. A link provides an open access to your files; it can be shared with friends or colleagues, or placed in an e-mail, blog, or a newsletter.

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Creating File Links

Follow the steps below to create a file link:

Select files to be listed on a web page when the link is clicked. You can select a folder, any number of files in a folder, or perform file search by a keyword and select search results

Click Create a Link located on the files panel and specify your choice for added files (entire folder or selected files)

Give your link a name. Folder or the first file name is the default link name. Your link name will be listed in “My Links” section in the folders panel

Click on your newly created link name. The files pane displays web address of the link, Delete, Email this Link, and Change Link Address buttons, and the link preview. The link preview is the replica of the webpage accessed by the corresponding link; it contains all the files that were selected during the link creation process:

Click on a file to open it in the new browser window.

Click Change Link Address to give your link a friendly URL - a meaningful word in place of the link address ending (e.g. http://demo.Contacts Live.net/files/animals)

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Sharing File Links

You file link can be copied and pasted on a blog post, web page, etc. Contacts Live also lets you e-mail the link. Click on the corresponding link name in “My Links” section and click Email this Link. Indicate recipients, subject and add optional message in the pop-up form:

Your recipients will see the link below the message in the email body section.

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Customizing Link View

You can customize your file link view; i.e. your file list layout as it appears when the link is opened.

To select your link view, click on its name and select the view from the “Preview” drop down list. The preview window lists your files in the selected format. You can select one of the following views:

Grid — Tabular format displaying filename, type and size in separate columns

List — A convenient option to display large icon along with file name and description at the same time

Thumbnail List — Displays thumbnail (small image) and file description. Great option for photos list where each picture is supplied with annotation

Thumbnail Tile — Thumbnails only are displayed one by one. Perfect to browse large image collections

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Sending Files as an E-Mail Attachment

Contacts Live Files lets you send your file as an e-mail attachment. Select your files and click File —> Send Email. Fill out standard “Send E-Mail” form indicating email priority, recipients and optional subject and message. Enable “Compress attached files” if you want attached files to be compressed and sent as one ZIP-archive. Click Send to send your files.

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Customizing Sender’s E-Mail

When sending you files as an e-mail attachment you have an option of customizing sender’s name and e-mail. By default Contacts Live Files currently logged in user’s e-mail and name is used as a sender.

Click Tools -> Customize E-Mail Sender from Contacts Live Files toolbar. You should see the name and e-mail used currently for outgoing messages displayed on the page. If you would like to change that name and e-mail, click Change and specify new name and e-mail.

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Sharing File Folders with Other Users

Sharing your files with other Contacts Live Files users and user groups is done by setting access rights to a file folder by a user with administrative privileges. Select a folder and click Folder —> Modify Folder. Click on Users and Groups tabs to set/modify access to the folder for users and user groups.

The following are available levels of access to a folder:

Read (R) — a user (user group) can list and read entries in this folder
Write (W) — a user (user group) can add/modify entries in this folder
Folder (F) — a user (user group) can add/modify entries, folders & permissions

When setting access level to a folder, the combination of personal and group access rights will be applied, e.g. if user Ann belongs to a group which has R (Read) access rights, then Ann has an effective permission as in the table below:

Personal Permission

Group Permission

Effective Permission

-

R

R

RW

RW

RW

RWF

R

RWF

Note:

Access rights to a folder do not automatically apply to its subfolders. They need to be set manually by the process described above.

Setting access rights to a folder can be done by a user who has F (Folder) access level to this folder or by an account administrator in "Users & Groups" window.

Did you know? You can find out who else shares your current folder by clicking “Shared” link located at the bottom right corner of the Contacts Live Files window.

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Organizing Files

Files in Contacts Live Files are organized in folders and subfolders. All basic operations are allowed on individual files and folders.

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File Folders

Your files are stored in folders and subfolders. Depending on your access rights set by a user with administrative privileges, you can add new folders to Contacts Live Files, copy, move, or delete folders, and set access rights for other users to the current folder and its subfolders (click Folder —> Propagate Access Rrights to apply the same access rights to every subfolders to which you have Folder (F) permission).

Click Folders in Contacts Live Files toolbar to see the list of folder operations.

Clicking "Available Folders" in folders pane will list all Contacts Live Files folders. For every folder you can see its access rights for a user who is currently logged in, number of files, and “Shared” checkbox indicating whether this folder is shared with other users.

You can also access folders information in Reports —> Folders summary. “Folders Summary” report list all available folders, along with every folder’s total size and number of included files.

Note: Clicking Folder —> Delete Folder will not remove selected folder permanently from the system. The folder and its content will be placed in Recycle Bin, a specially designated folder where files can be restored back to Contacts Live Files or removed permanently.

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Editing Filename and Description

Click properties icon by the filename in Files pane to open “File Properties” pane. Click on a pencil icon to edit filename and description:

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Copying and Moving Files

Files can be copied (moved) to another folder. Select your files, click File—> Copy File(s) (File —> Move File(s)) and select destination folder to copy (move) files.

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Deleting Files and Recycle Bin

To delete files from Contacts Live Files folder, select your files and click File —> Delete File(s).

Recycle Bin

Recycle Bin is a specially designated folder that stores files and folders deleted from Contacts Live Files folders. Click Tools —> Recycle Bin to access Recycle Bin.

Files and folders in Recycle Bin can be restored back to Contacts Live Files by selecting your files and folders and clicking Restore. You can then indicate destination folder where you wish to restore you file. To remove your file permanently from Contacts Live Files, select your file and click Delete:

Note: Folders and subfolders restored from Recycle Bin to Contacts Live Files do not preserve original folder structure — you need to select the right folders manually.

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Viewing Folder's Content

Your files can be listed in Files pane in several ways. Depending on the type of files you can set the most convenient format (separately for each folder). Click View from Contacts Live Files toolbar and select one of the following options:

Grid — tabular format where file attributes appear in different columns, e.g. file name, type, size etc… You can sort the list by any column by clicking its title.

List — a convenient option to display large icon with file name and full content of document description at the same time. Sorting feature is also available in List format.

Thumbnail List — displays thumbnail (small image) and file description. Great option for photo album where each picture is supplied with annotation.

Thumbnail Tile — displays just thumbnails one by one. Perfect to browse large image collections.

Click View —> Customize View to customize File viewing pane and specify the following options:

Select visible columns to be displayed in the Grid format

Enable/disable icons display in Grid and List view options

Number of files to be shown on one page

Number of characters that are visible in file description for List and Grid view options. This restriction might be useful in case of long descriptions to avoid distortion of the file list appearance

Custom options can be applied to the current folder or to all Contacts Live Files folders.

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Version Control

Version control feature allows multiple users to work with the same files simultaneously and keep track of changes. A user can make a local copy of a file, i.e. check file out, leaving the original version in the system for others to view and download. He/she can then modify the local copy and place it back in the system, i.e. check file in. Once the file is checked in, other users can check it out for their modifications.

You need Version Control if you want:

To allow multiple users to work on the same files and avoid collisions

Keep all previous versions of a file safely on your disk and track changes

Avoid filename duplicates in the same folder

You don’t need Version Control if you intend to use Contacts Live Files as simple file storage and sharing system where multiple users rarely work with the same files.

Version control feature is enabled by default. To turn it off click Tools —> Version Control and then Disable Version Control. Click Change by the “Maximum number of old versions” if you would like to change the number of versions that can be stored for each file.

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Checking Files In and Out

If user A and user B have both accesses to edit the same file in a folder, they can use file check in/out mechanism. User A can check a file out (i.e. “lock” it from user B) to safely edit without the risk of collision with user B’s work. A small “lock” icon by a file name indicates that the file is checkout out:

When user A has completed file editing woork, he/she checks it in (i.e. “unlocks it”), returning it to its pre-checked out status, though with added modifications. User B can now edit the file.

Note: User with F (Folder) access rights or an administrator can access files checked out by other users.

To check a file out, select a file and click File —> Check Out.

To check a file in, select a file and click File —> Check In.

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File History

File history displays current and previous file versions and information on added modifications (user, date, modification description):

Every version can be viewed by simply clicking on it.

The maximum number of versions kept for a file is indicated in “Version Control” window.

Note: If the newly uploaded file version exceeds the number of versions stored, Contacts Live will overwrite the oldest version to store the last one uploaded.

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Compressing and Downloading Files

Contacts Live Files lets you create a ZIP archive, which can be downloaded on your local computer or saved to a Contacts Live Files folder. The ZIP-archive can include individual files, folders or even entire Contacts Live Files.

Select files or a folder and click File -> Compress and Download from Contacts Live Files toolbar. Indicate what you would like to add to an archive: selected files, a folder with or without subfolders, or entire Contacts Live Files. Click Compress to create an archive. Once an archive is created you can download it to your local computer and save it in one of Contacts Live Files folders.

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Creating Thumbnails for Image Files

Contacts Live Files lets you create thumbnails for image files of the following types: GIF, JPEG, and PNG. Thumbnail creation is turned on by default. To disable (re-enable) thumbnail creation, click Tools —> Thumbnails from Contacts Live Files toolbar and then Disable Thumbnails (Enable Thumbnails). To update thumbnails (i.e. create them for image files that do not have thumbnails), click Update Thumbnails.

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