Hide 'all notes' in pdf reader notes sidebar

krzys.r

Is it possible to hide the "All notes" section of the notes sidebar in the built-in Zotero pdf reader? If not, could this be a feature in a future version? I find ''All notes" takes up space that could be used by "Item notes" and I don't usually need to look at notes on other items while annotating.

tim820

I agree. I have always thought 'All Notes' appearing under that heading is incongruous. Also the fact that the '+' icon for All Notes only creates Standalone *unfiled* notes is a further incongruity. Maybe there is a use case for needing to see all notes from your whole library there, but I can't think of it. It also exacerbates the differences in the notes interfaces between the main window and the PDF viewer, which I think is a problem. I would like to see the two notes interfaces made more consistent.

There could be a Preferences option for 'Show All Notes in PDF viewer right Notes pane', so people could turn them off.

dstillman

We can consider an option to hide or collapse the All Notes section, but to be clear, the point of the Notes pane is to enable two different ways of working: using child notes for individual items or using standalone notes to take notes from across different items. The All Notes section also allows you to open a child note for one item and add an annotation to it from another item.

This is also why it's a separate pane and works differently from the item-specific Notes tab in the library view. We spent a lot of time designing a system that was flexible enough for different working styles.

I find ''All notes" takes up space that could be used by "Item notes"

It doesn't, though. The Item Notes section is never truncated, so if you have many child notes the All Notes section will just be pushed down.

krzys.r

Thanks for the explanation. It's helpful to see the use of having 'All notes' there. I would still probably use the 'hide' or 'collapse' option if there ever is one, though.

ArtemisFowler29

I agree with krzys.r: an option to fold it would be nice.

gothamgreen

I'll add my voice to this request. I have 727 notes in my library, and, while the All Notes section is not muscling in on the UX Item Notes real estate, it is distracting. I need to be able to see at a glance whether the particular paper I'm working with has notes, but when I have to tell myself to pay careful attention and make sure the white bits I'm seeing are under Item Notes and not one inch lower, it's a tiny stumbling block.

Also, if I open an annotation for a paper in that pane, then when I open another paper, the annotation for the previous one will remain. It fools me into thinking that the new paper already has notes, and I have to expend extra effort to double-check.

For a person with limited attention spoons who regularly has to work with dozens of academic papers per night (currently reviewing about 600, for the one that I'm writing), every bit of UX matters. These UX requests are small, and won't stop me loving and using Zotero. But they do have an impact on accessibility. Enough small things, and executive dysfunction pokes its head around the corner, like a BFG in Doom 1.