Collaboration
Editing Together
Editing Together
Any number of people can edit one page at once. There is no lock, no checkout, no merge dialog.
Getting in
Click the pencil button in the right rail to enter edit mode. Editing is what connects you to the collaboration session: people who are only reading a page never join it, so they cost nothing.
The editor stays read-only for a moment while it pulls in what everyone else has already typed. It unlocks as soon as that first sync lands (and after three seconds regardless, so a slow connection never traps you).
Who else is here
The bar above the toolbar shows the session:
| What you see | What it means |
|---|---|
| Status dot, hover for the label | ”Connected”, “Syncing”, or offline with changes saved locally |
| ”2 collaborators” | Other people editing right now |
| Colored initials | One avatar per collaborator, hover for the full name |
More than three people, and the extra avatars collapse into a +N chip.
Inside the text you get their cursors: a caret in that person’s color, labelled with their name, and their selection highlighted as they drag over it. Colors are assigned per session, so the same person may be teal today and purple tomorrow.
How conflicts are resolved
They are not resolved, because they do not happen. The document is a CRDT (a data structure that merges by construction), so two people typing in the same paragraph, or in the same word, both end up with the same result. Nobody overwrites anybody. You will never be asked to pick a winner.
Undo is yours alone. Ctrl/Cmd+Z walks back your edits, not your colleague’s.
Going offline
Lose the network and the editor keeps working. Your keystrokes go into the local copy of the document and the status dot switches to offline. When the connection comes back, your work and everyone else’s merge automatically. Publish is unavailable while you are offline and returns once the editor has reconnected.
Publishing
Live editing is not the same as publishing. Your typing syncs to everyone in the session immediately, but readers see the last published version until you click Publish (Cmd+P). Publishing writes the page and records a version. See Page History.
Discard (Cmd+D) throws away everything since the last publish, after a confirmation, and returns you to the published page. The discarded draft is kept in Page History. Discard is unavailable while someone else is editing the page, because their changes are in the same draft; the button says who. While you have unpublished work, a small dot sits on the edit button in the right rail.
When collaboration is switched off
An administrator can start the server with ENABLE_COLLABORATION=false, and the app also carries on if the collaboration service fails to start. In that state pages can still be read, commented on and restored from history, but the editor cannot load a page for editing: edit mode opens without the page’s content, and Publish stays unavailable, so nothing typed there can replace the published page.
Being told what changed
Your notifications are in your Notifications channel, the first row of the sidebar’s Chat list. Its number counts the notifications you have not read yet, and it updates the moment one arrives. Click it to open the channel.
Each notification is a card. Its first line says what happened, with the page, space or channel it is about as a link. When it is about a message (a mention, a reply, a message in a page’s chat, a direct message), the card also shows the start of that message under the name and picture of the person who wrote it, and where it was said. You are told when:
| What happened | Who is told |
|---|---|
| A page you watch is edited or gets a new child page | Everyone watching the page or its space |
| A page’s chat or one of its inline comments gets a new message | Everyone who chose All new messages there, which a watch on the page or its space starts you at |
| A page is added to a space you watch, or the space is edited | Everyone watching the space |
Someone mentions you with @ | You, if you can open the channel |
| Someone replies in a page’s comment thread you started, replied in, or follow | Everyone following the thread, unless they chose Nothing there |
| Someone asks for access to a space you manage, or your own request is decided | The space’s managers, or you |
| A nexus admin opens a sealed page you are named on | Everyone named on the page |
The bell at the top of a page’s tray chooses what a page’s chat tells you (Comments). A reply in a thread in a Chat channel is not a notification, unless it mentions you: those threads are in Threads in the Chat list, where Chat is part of your licence.
You are never told about something you did yourself, and never about a page you can no longer open. If you lose access to a page after being told about it, the notification says You no longer have access to this page. and no longer links to it.
Open is on each card; point at the card for the rest. On the keyboard, Tab moves from card to card, landing on Open, Enter opens it, and the left and right arrows reach the rest of a card’s links and buttons.
| Action | What it does |
|---|---|
| Open | Goes to the page, space or message it is about |
| Unwatch | Stops the watch that caused it. Only shown when a watch caused it |
| Pin | Keeps it however old it gets. Unpin lets it go with the rest |
| Delete | Removes it from your channel |
Reading the channel marks it read, as in any channel; there is no separate “Mark read”. Use All and Mentions at the top to show everything or only the times someone mentioned you. Your administrator decides how long notifications are kept; pin one to keep it for good.
A direct message with yourself
Everyone has a direct message with themselves, listed in the Chat list under their own name with you beside it: among your direct messages where Chat is part of your licence, and just below Notifications where it is not. Only you can read it. Post in it like any channel to keep links, drafts and reminders to yourself.
Next: Comments.