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zkokalj

Hi!

I've been using Zotero for years and would like to do so in future. However, an error started appearing suddenly - i.e. I have no clue why as it worked previously on this computer (Win11, Word 2019, latest Zotero and extension). ID D643337368.

Zotero works fine on a new document, but when I close and reopen it, I get the "Zotero experienced an error updating your document. Would you like to view troubleshooting instructions?" pop-up. If I copy content to a new document, I can edit citations and add new ones, but the problem reappears if I close and reopen the document. This is of course unsastainable for larger, styled documents. Please help.

adomasven

Are you storing the document on OneDrive, or on your disk? Does it matter which drive you store the document on?

zkokalj

I store everything locally and have this problem on two computers. I've tried installing Zotero 7 beta, but the problem persists.

adomasven

Does it work if you store the document on disk C instead of a different disk? Do you run any proprietary security software? Does it work if you disable it temporarily?

zkokalj

Thank you for trying to help me.

I disabled the security software, but this doesn’t solve the issue.

I have administrative privileges on the computer as a user, but still cannot save to root on C drive. I can save to folders on C, but this doesn’t solve the problem.

Running Word with administrative privileges specifically, I can save to root. This doesn’t help as Zotero seems to dislike Word being run with administrative privileges – it now throws the “Zotero integration error” even if I want to create a citation in a new document.

I also noticed the following. I open a document with citations and a new document. I place the cursor inside a citation in the old document and press the Add/Edit Citation in the Zotero toolbar. Zotero does not throw the error but starts the process of placing new citations in the new document – select the citations style and after this it places a citation in the new document. It seem the connection between the old document and Zotero somehow gets broken – the Zotero debugging output states “Could not find a running Word instance. [getDocument:y:\adomas\zotero\word-for-windows-integration\build\zoterowinwordintegration\document.cpp:145]”.

adomasven

Sorry, I meant just any folder on C: disk, not the root directory.

Does it work correctly if you create a new Windows user account on this computer? What is the full version number of Word that you are running? (Open a Word document, choose File from the top left corner, and then click either Account or Help on the left nav bar. You’ll see your Office version and information under Product information, on the right side of the window). How was Word installed on this computer?

zkokalj

I'm using word 2019, v.1808, 10411.20011. Installed "normally".

I created a new user and Zotero works as it should. Hm. Now what?

Could a group library be a problem?

adomasven

This is not related to your Zotero library contents. Zotero is failing to find a running instance of Word on your main user account. It would be caused by some user-wide Windows configuration or proprietary software, but its hard to say what specifically. We occasionally see issues like this, although usually on institutional machines with group policies. You should check and make sure you are not running Zotero or Word in any compatibility mode on your main user account.

zkokalj

Could it be that I login to the computer with a microsoft account and the new user account is local? I noticed Zotero does not work on my other computer where I also login with a Microsoft account.

adomasven

Microsoft is most likely synchronizing your user preferences across computers for the Microsoft account, so it is likely that the issue is caused by some user configuration setting.

zkokalj

The computers are institutional and we have group policy, although I've only started noticing problems with Zotero a month ago and I've been using it since 2010. Do you have any tips on where to begin searching for the culprit settings in the group policy?

adomasven

Zotero tries to get the document by accessing the Running Object Table. This is failing for you. If it fails for some reason, then Zotero tries to get a running instance of Word via the OLE registration database using GetActiveObject and accesses the currently active document. Based on your debug log, it seems like Zotero is able to find the running Word instance, but then fails to get the active document. This suggests that your OS somehow obfuscates/hides running documents from other applications, possibly to prevent tampering. Since its an institutional machine and account, it would be best to troubleshoot this with your IT and pass this information along. Let us know if they identify what policy change caused this.

zkokalj

Thank you! I'll let you know if we get to the bottom of this.

zkokalj

I know this is note really a proper solution, but upgrading Office to v. 2021 solved this problem.