webDAV syncing with IDriveSync is working

slow500

Hi

just a short note to say that the webDAV feature of https://www.idrivesync.com/ appears to work well with Zotero.

Initially, it did not work but the support team was able to sort out the problem at their end within a few days.

The upside is that you get 10GB storage space with a free account; when I signed up there even was a promotion for more free space if you signed up with an .edu or .ac.uk type email.

I thought this could be useful to some looking for a webDAV storage solution.

Best........Stefan...............

ekcheng2

I tried to set up webdav sync for zotero with idrivesync, but got the following message "Your WebDAV server must be configured to serve files without extensions and files with .prop extensions in order to work with Zotero."

Any suggestions on what the problem could be?

Thank you

slow500

Hi,

initially I got exactly the same error message. After sending a message to the support, they sorted it out and it worked ever since. Maybe they need to change a setting per account?

Bye.....Stefan............

rusodepaso

Stefan,

Did you speak with somebody specific at IDriveSync? Or can provide any more detail on what was tweaked on the IDriveSync side, to make it work?

I've been trying to set up Zotero with their WebDAV service, but it is not working. I emailed, called, and had an online chat session, with their tech. support. Neither of those could answer the question, and all three said that they need to check with their development team. Since then, I haven't heard back so far.

dstillman

Despite what it says in the error message, this can occur if there's a delay between when an item is uploaded (PUT) and when it's available for download (GET). If they're using Amazon S3 or a similar service as a backend, a delay of a few seconds before the file shows up is pretty common. We have a ticket to add a short delay to the verification process.

If you go to about:config—either by typing about:config in the Firefox address bar (Zotero for Firefox) or via the Advanced pane of the Zotero prefs—and search for extensions.zotero.sync.storage.verified and set it to true to manually bypass the verification, syncing might just work, though there's no guarantee.

dstillman

Since this is becoming increasingly common, in Zotero 3.0.13, now available, the server will pass verification—with a warning message—if the uploaded test file doesn't exist immediately after uploading, allowing you to attempt to sync.

ekcheng2

Thanks for the suggestion, Stefan. I emailed idrivesync support, told them the message I was getting, and they fixed the problem for me, so for anyone looking for a cloud service with a lot of free storage, 25 GB for anyone with a edu email address, idrivesync does work with zotero

rusodepaso

Dan, thank you very much for the suggestion. I followed your instructions, and was able to get the connection (though only in Zotero SA, not in Firefox). However, all I am getting is error 500, most of the time. After trying again and again, I got 43 meg uploaded, but this is a tiny portion of my files.

Ekcheng, what's your secret word for IDriveSync support? It's been 48+ hours since I emailed them, then called, then had an online chat, and I am yet to hear from somebody with any suggestion / solution.

rusodepaso

Here is an update. IDriveSync updated its pages referencing its WebDAV capabilities with this statement:

Note: IDriveSync's WEBDAV compatibility is limited to single file operations, such us for use within iWork to open and edit or view a document directly. It is not meant for extensive operations involving large number of files with a single command. For extensive use, use the provided desktop and mobile clients.

So finally, after 2 weeks of begging their tech support for some kind of an answer, I have it here. But still haven't heard from them directly. Needless to say, this is NOT my idea of how a business should run its customer service / tech support. I will strongly recommend AGAINST using them in the future.

aurimas

AFAIK Zotero does not do mass uploads/downloads. It uploads and downloads one file at a time, so this should not affect Zotero performance. Dan might have more to say though, but a 500 error would indicate a fault on IDriveSync side. Perhaps they would be more willing to troubleshoot this if you tried uploading some files using a dedicated WebDAV client (maybe something that they recommend).

adamsmith

I feel like people should go to the services that work with Zotero out of the box and reliably.
E.g. cloudMe seems to work for everyone and specifically encourages people to use it for Zotero:
http://forum.cloudme.com/viewtopic.php?id=416
there might be others.

aurimas

I use box.net, which also works well, although it doesn't pass server verification.

dstillman

I use box.net, which also works well, although it doesn't pass server verification.

It probably passes verification (with a warning) in 3.0.13+.

aurimas

Right, I just meant to say that it's not as smooth (in terms of user experience) as it can be. We might want to make a wiki page listing webdav services known to be compatible (or incompatible) with Zotero.

thomea

So...I set this up and I think it's working... . What is strange that isync appears to be adding a series of .zip folders in the top root profile directory whose naming convention corresponds to the folders located in the /storage folder. Seems redundant and potentially hazardous. Has anybody else encountered this?

Thanks,

A

aurimas

What is strange that isync appears to be adding a series of .zip folders in the top root profile directory whose naming convention corresponds to the folders located in the /storage folder.

What do you mean by "top root profile directory". Is this on IDriveSync server or your computer? The zip files on the ISyncServer are zipped up directories from your zotero storage directory, so they should have the same name. I'm not sure what you mean by redundant though.

thomea

I just discovered my error. I had previously followed instructions for using dropbox/skydrive with zotero by copying over the entire directory that zotero uses to those services. I assumed it was the same with webDAV.

I think, and please correct me here, what I should have done and am now doing is to (1) leave the zotero directory in the FF profile directory and simply setup and empty webdav server directory to handle the syncing. So what I should see in idrivesync is /zotero/*.zip and a .prop file.

Correct?

Also, zotero seems to throw a 500 error for every couple of uploads, but seems to clear it and then resume after a couple of minutes.

Correct?

adamsmith

I think, and please correct me here, what I should have done and am now doing is to (1) leave the zotero directory in the FF profile directory and simply setup and empty webdav server directory to handle the syncing. So what I should see in idrivesync is /zotero/*.zip and a .prop file.

Correct?

correct. Never move your Zoter profile into dropbox, even if there are blogposts on the web suggesting that's a good idea. It's a terrible idea.

aurimas

Also, zotero seems to throw a 500 error for every couple of uploads, but seems to clear it and then resume after a couple of minutes.

I have seen these intermittent errors, but I have not been able to track down the root cause. It's most likely an issue with the WebDAV server, but Zotero may be able to deal with these errors better (i.e. retry uploading after a short delay or something similar). In my experience this has only happened when I was uploading my entire library and not while syncing only a few files incrementally.

Edit: I should note that, for me, this was happening on box.net

dstillman

In the future we'll be better about automatically retrying requests that fail. (Among other things, requests to Amazon S3, which we use for Zotero File Storage, can fail pretty regularly.)

mronkko

This is a bit off-topic, but is it really dangerous to have the Zotero data dir in Dropbox folder? I know that, in theory, this can cause corruption of data. But are there any known instances of where this has actually happened? (Dropbox is inferior to WebDAV for many other reasons, though.)

adamsmith

there have been multiple reports of malfunctions based on database lock etc. and also a fair number of corrupted translator directories etc. I think the number of actually corrupted databases that we've seen here isn't very large, but I'm pretty sure there have been a couple of those, too.
Some data-loss we'd likely never hear of.

mronkko

Can you link to some forum threads? I get asked about Dropbox all the time, so showing some of the problems would put more weight behind the argument that it is a bad idea.

adamsmith

http://forums.zotero.org/discussion/27900/synching-to-dropbox/ was a recent one - for other ones I'd have to search same as you.

mronkko

I linked some threads here

http://www.zotero.org/support/sync?&#alternative_syncing_solutions

b0c5

Any updates in the last years using iDrive webdav? Has it gotten any better? Thanks.

rusodepaso

Yes, it has become better. Works for me most of the time.