Bibledit allows several users to work on one Bible at the same time.
At present there is a basic system called "synchronization", where USFM files are synchronized with Bibledit's data.
For the future a more advanced system is planned.
We will now demonstrate how to setup and use a basic system for collaboration, using synchronization.
Take the project of Bibledit which you wish to work on with several people.
Export this project to USFM files and store these files in a certain directory. As an example we will export them to directory /mnt/server/bibledit.
Once this has been done, the directory /mnt/server/bibledit contains a number of USFM files, like Genesis.usfm, Exodus.usfm, and so on.
On each of the workstations that will work on this project, do the following:
Create a new project in Bibledit, and import the files from /mnt/server/bibledit into it. In the Import dialog, choose the "Link to them" option. This will signal Bibledit that the project's data must be linked to these files on /mnt/server/bibledit.
Bibledit will now synchronize its data with these files at certain times.
Settings for when synchronization will occur can be made in the menu, Preferences, Synchronization.
Manual synchronization can be done through the menu, Project, Synchronize.
The synchronization system cannot handle a situation very well where several people are working on one book. It tries to make the best of it though.
Every time a synchronize event occurs, if there were changes in Bibledit's data, they will be written to the files. And if there were changes in the files, they will be imported into Bibledit's data.
If a certain book gets changed in both the files and Bibledit's own data, a clash occurs. The user will be notified of it. Human intervention will be required to resolve the issue. The clash can be resolved through the menu, Project, Synchronize. Details of the problem can be viewed there, as well in Bibledit's logfile. If there is a clash, three buttons appear. One button will show the differences between Bibledit's project and the file linked to. The other buttons allow the user to resolve the clash by either importing the data into Bibledit or exporting it to the linked file.
If a change occurs in a certain book in Bibledit's data, and that book happens to be displayed in the editor, it will close and reopen so that the changes are reflected in the editor too.
If the files at /mnt/server/bibledit go offline, Bibledit will continue with its own data, and synchronize again when the files are back online.
This same system of synchronization can also be used to let Bibledit work on files stored in a Paratext project. The setup is basically the same, except that no project is exported from Bibledit, and that it imports files from a Paratext project directory.