Share Library & Workspace
Collaborate on your reference library with team roles, shared folders, invitations, and real-time syncing across collaborators.
Share references with your team
Collaborate on a shared reference library with your team. Invite members to a workspace, share individual folders with granular permissions, and work together in real time.
What is library sharing?
Paperguide uses a workspace-based sharing model. When you create a team workspace, every member gets access to the shared Reference Manager library based on their workspace role.
You can also share individual folders with people outside your workspace. Folder sharing supports direct email invites and share links, so you can collaborate with co-authors, students, or external reviewers without adding them to your team workspace.
Inviting team members
Use workspace membership when you want ongoing access to the full shared library.
Open workspace settings
Go to your workspace and open the workspace settings or member management panel.
Invite by email
Click Add Member, enter the email address of the person you want to invite, and select their role: Owner, Editor, or Viewer.
Assign role
Choose the role that matches what the member should be able to do. The invitee receives an email and must accept the invitation before they can access the workspace library.
Roles and access control
Workspace roles control what each member can do across the shared library. Use owners for team administration, editors for active collaborators, and viewers for read-only access.
| Permission | Owner | Editor | Viewer |
|---|---|---|---|
| Add references | ✅ | ✅ | ❌ |
| Edit references | ✅ | ✅ | ❌ |
| Delete references | ✅ | ✅ | ❌ |
| Share folders | ✅ | ✅ | ❌ |
| Manage members | ✅ | ❌ | ❌ |
| Change roles | ✅ | ❌ | ❌ |
| View library | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ |
Sharing folders
Share individual folders when you do not want to expose the entire workspace library. This works for both internal collaborators and people outside your workspace.
Email invite
Enter the recipient's email address, choose a permission level, and send the invite. The recipient receives an email and must accept the invitation before the folder appears in their Reference Manager.
Share link
Generate a shareable link with a specific permission level and send it through email, chat, or your project notes. Anyone with the link can redeem access, and you can revoke the link at any time.
Share links expire after 30 days. If you need to stop future access before then, revoke the link from the folder sharing settings.
Folder permission levels
Folder permissions let you control how much each collaborator can do inside a shared folder.
- View — read-only access to the folder and its references
- Add Notes — view references and add notes or highlights, but cannot edit or delete references
- Edit — full write access to add, edit, and delete references in the shared folder
Shared with me
When someone shares a folder with you, it appears in the Shared with me section of your Reference Manager. You can review the invitation, accept it, or reject it.
Shared items are grouped by source. Personal shares appear separately from organization shares, and shares from organizations you do not belong to are marked as guest shares so you can see where access came from.
Real-time collaboration
Changes sync across collaborators in real time, so everyone sees updates without refreshing the page. When someone adds a reference, edits a note, or moves a folder, Paperguide pushes that change to connected collaborators immediately.
This makes shared libraries practical for live teamwork. Multiple researchers can organize sources, annotate papers, and maintain the same project library at the same time without waiting for manual sync.
Only workspace owners can manage members, change roles, and remove members. Editors can share folders but cannot invite or remove workspace members.