Delete some files from web library but not from desktop

dstillman

This discussion was created from comments split from: If I delete the articles on my computer, will zotero still work ?.

shorif78

I want to delete some of my files and folder from web library but I do not want to delete from desktop.

dstillman

No, that's not possible — if you delete something online, it will be deleted locally.

The point of Zotero syncing is to make your library available everywhere. You can configure it not to download files onto every device, but everything will always be available in the online library.

The main exception is that if you leave or delete a group, Zotero will ask you whether to keep an archived copy of the group locally (which will never be syncable again). But that's more of a special case, not something to rely on for normal usage.

idaelvira

Can I create two different instances of Zotero to have one private and the other public? Thank you ida

dstillman

You can create multiple Zotero profiles, but it's an advanced configuration that we don't generally recommend.