QUOSA Information Manager

The default location where QUOSA stores its data is C:\Documents and Settings\username\Local Settings\Application Data\Quosa\Data, where username is your Partners (or Windows) username.

In order to synchronize QUOSA data between two computers (e.g. desktop and laptop), you'll need to have access to a networked drive (e.g. your H: drive) on both machines.

When your QUOSA data path points to a network drive, always be sure that you're connected to the drive before starting a QUOSA session. If using the VPN for this, always connect to the VPN before opening QUOSA.

To change the data path to a network drive:

1. In QUOSA, go to Settings > Algorithm Settings...
2. Select the Service tab and click on the ... to the right of the Data directory path field.
3. Browse to the folder on the networked drive where you wish to store your QUOSA data, and click OK.
4. This will return you to the Service tab. Click OK or Apply.

As you complete this process, you'll be asked up to two questions:

1. Destination data directory is not empty. Do you want to remove all files from this directory?
   
   If you're moving your QUOSA data path to where you previously stored your QUOSA data, and you want to keep what's already there, answer No. Otherwise, it's advisable that you locate your QUOSA data in a directory that's already empty.
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2. Do you want to copy all your existing data from [old directory] to the new directory?
   
   If you want to keep whatever data you've already collected, answer Yes.

The change will not take effect until QUOSA is closed and restarted.

If you need to move your QUOSA data to a new computer, you can do so fairly easily (using a networked drive or USB drive) by creating a backup on the old computer and restoring it to the new computer.

This is easier than it sounds. Just follow these steps:

1. From the QUOSA main menu, select File > Create Backup > All Searches & Folders.
2. A message will appear, asking "Do you want to backup all QUOSA folders?" Click Yes.
3. You'll be prompted to select or create a destination folder to save your files. The default folder name is QUOSABackup (MM.DD.YYYY HH-MM), but this can be changed.
4. Select the desired drive as the save location, and click Save.
5. You'll get a series of prompts that indicate "Export was completed successfully. Do you want to open destination folder?" This will happen once for each folder you're saving. Just keep saying No to these messages, until the final prompt says, "QUOSA Backup completed." Click OK.

When you move to the second computer, open (or install, if it's a new computer) QUOSA.

1. From the QUOSA main menu, select File > Restore from Backup.
2. You'll then be prompted to select the location where the backup folder resides. Browse to and select the folder created in step 3 above.
3. If there are folders with the same names in your QUOSA IM already, you will be asked to choose between replacing, merging or creating new folders. If you're following this procedure each time you switch computers, the option you'll want to select is to Replace Folder and All Subfolders.
4. When finished, you'll get an "Operation completed" message. All of your searches, folders, alerts and citations, plus all their subfolders, should now appear in the Organizer Pane.

If you need to access your files from outside of QUOSA, you can export them in their original format (for example, as PDFs) with customizable file naming.

1. Select one or more results in the Results Pane.
2. Right-click on a selected result, and choose Save Selected Articles to Windows Folder...
3. The “Export to Windows Folder" dialog appears:
   
4. Click Browse... and select the desired destination folder.
   
5. Select a file naming option. You can either accept the default (displayed above) or click Create New... or Edit... to customize your own. 
   
6. If you want exported files to replace files with the same file name, check the "Overwrite existing file(s)" box at the bottom of the dialog.
7. Click OK. The Files Saved dialog will appear with the message, “Export was completed successfully. Do you want to open the destination folder?”