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"There is no technical explanation"
I'm not sure what more technical explanation you are going to want. I will gather those google results together here for you, I guess. I am one of the participants in many of the previous discussions. Since this is not Tech Support or even Customer Support, but an end user community forum, there is only so much technical info to convey here, before it is out of place. There are lots of web-based NAS guidance you can refer to. You don't need that reiterated here.
There are a couple of basic things to know. One is that Intuit via Lacerte Support will not support an installation that doesn't meet their requirements, such as Linux or Mac running a Windows VM is something users can do, but don't expect Intuit to help you with installation, rights, user access, setup, updates, conflicts, etc.
And they will host for you: https://proconnect.intuit.com/desktop-hosting/
Let's review that NAS = network attached storage, which means an external harddrive which has the motor, logic board, etc. and can be attached directly to the router or network switch, so that everyone has access.
This is different than sharing a drive that exists installed in a computer workstation (peer sharing) or in the server (or server rack) as Shared. A disk in a computer/server needs the computer to manage and operate it and the computer's OS and end user programs and sharing scheme manage user access rights, passwords, etc.
This NAS type of share is what we can refer to as a Static Share. I like to use car keys by example: If there is one car, we might each have a set of keys. A NAS implies you can each drive that one car, even though only one car exists.
1. "File Share and Sync services aren't supported for data storage, backup, or sharing purposes. (ex: Dropbox, Google Drive, or OneDrive)"
Translation: In reality, while one person has the car out, the other keys are useless for now.
To review a basic: this is not an unknown or isolated condition for Lacerte. Using a program that accesses data files where concurrency matters, matters. If you take a simple example, such as Word and Excel, you know they can have multiple data files open at the same time. However, as is especially true for many database programs and for relational databases particularly, you cannot do that same thing. Unlike Word and Excel, things are not loaded into local memory and cached that same way; and if they are, it doesn't apply to the actual file, anyway. It's not just an open file; it's also file pointers and locked records. An end user can understand that if you point out how one change to a tax schedule or form will need to update linked forms and/or schedules, which is also why two people cannot be working on the same file at the same time with Update. For people who use Carbonite, as an example, they can use this as a Backup, but they think that also means file share. But it creates conflicted copies for the types of files that need to be managed, not just shared.
I like how, at this topic: https://proconnect.intuit.com/community/lacerte-tax-discussions/discussion/no-read-only-on-nas/00/67...
"The rep thinks that it will still act as read only and when the second tax preparer tries to make changes to such a file, it will either give him a warning then or crash the software."
Ha ha ha. I would never try that in a production environment, or allow a rep to give that answer to a customer.
There is a person in that topic who "sees this as a flaw in Lacerte" and the answer is, it wasn't intended to do what you are doing. It's Working As Designed, and not designed to manage a NAS as a NAS. There are ways to make it work, but not as NAS. What matters is if you are plugging it into the router, mapping drives, Hosting it through a server, are you trying to run the program or only a datafile library, etc.
What really matters for most of this is to understand a NAS has no OS. It is not able to be Managed with a Windows service or a program that wants to manage open data files. Lacerte and Windows can't be the boss of the NAS, but they need to be.
https://proconnect.intuit.com/community/lacerte-tax-discussions/discussion/best-setup/00/109921
"It's because NAS isn't able to run an OS, so the management services that might be needed to handle data file concurrency are also not available, unless the NAS is being managed by a system. Not just Shared, but Mapped."
There are lots of places on the internet to understand this. No one is telling you that a NAS cannot be used. The issues are How it is used and what you expect from it, because there is no NAS setup or support for Lacerte.
Different perspectives.
Don't yell at us; we're volunteers
