Kota guide
What Kota is
Kota is a shared folder you can open on the website and on your computers. Put a file in it on one computer and it appears on your other computers and on the website a moment later. Share a folder with someone and it appears in their Kota too.
Kota keeps earlier versions of your files, and when two people change the same text file at the same time, it combines both changes instead of keeping only one.
Signing in
Go to Sign in. There are two ways, and the first time is also how you make your account:
- Email: type your address. You get an email with a link and a six-digit code: open the link, or type the code on the page.
- Nostr: if you use Nostr, sign in with your browser extension, your signer app (Amber or another; scan the QR code or tap the button on your phone), or a bunker address.
Your name and picture come from your Nostr profile if you have one. Otherwise click your name at the top right to set the name others see.
Your folders
Everything in Kota is in two places: users, a folder for each person, and groups, a folder for each group. My folder is yours: nobody else sees it until you share something in it. Shared with me lists what others have shared with you.
On the website you can make folders, upload files (or drag them onto the page), download, rename and delete. Each folder shows who can see it:
- 🔒 private: only you.
- ⭕ circle: you and the people you shared it with.
- 🏷 group: the members of a group.
- 🌐 public: everyone who has signed in to Kota.
Inviting someone new
For people who don't use Kota yet, open Share and choose Invite someone new (for a group: Invite someone new on the group under People). You can:
- Make a link and send it any way you like. Anyone with the link can join until it expires.
- Send it by email: Kota emails the link. It works once.
Whoever opens the link signs in (or makes an account, the same step) and lands right in the folder or group. The invite list shows who joined; Withdraw stops a link from working.
Groups
Under People, anyone can make a group. You become its admin: add people, make others admins, and choose whether members can edit the group's folder or only read it.
On your computer
Install the small kota program (Get started has the one line to paste for macOS, Linux and Windows), then:
kota login
Your browser opens and asks to add this computer: check the code and approve.
kota install
Kota now syncs in the background, also after a restart. Your files are in the Kota folder in your home folder. Work there as with any folder.
Useful commands: kota status (is it in sync?), kota pause and kota resume. Everything else is on the Devices page: rename a computer, move its Kota folder, pause it, or remove it.
When something's wrong
- The sign-in email doesn't come.
- Wait a minute and look in your spam folder. You can ask for a new email after a minute; the old code then stops working.
- My files don't appear on my other computer.
- Run kota status on both. If it says offline, check the internet connection; if paused, run kota resume (or untick Paused on the Devices page). The Devices page shows a green dot for each computer that is connected now.
- My changes in a shared folder don't reach the others.
- You may only be able to read it (the folder says read only). Ask its owner to let you edit.
- “Not enough space”.
- Each person and each group has a storage limit. Delete files you don't need, or ask the Kota admin for more.
- macOS or Windows warns about the program.
- That happens with a downloaded file because the program isn't signed yet. The one-line install on Get started avoids the warning. On macOS you can also right-click the file and choose Open.
- The code from kota login expired.
- Run kota login again; a code works for 15 minutes.
- Two files with “kide-conflict” in their name.
- Two people changed the same file at the same time and Kota couldn't combine them (pictures and other non-text files). Both versions are kept: open them, keep the one you want, delete the other.