Can't add new, edit or refresh citations after combining chapter documents in Word 2007

julianwyatt

Hello,

I have been working with four separate documents for my four part book and thought that it was now time to combine them (I will have to eventually for contents, bibliography etc). I used "insert object / file" in Word 2007 and everything seemed OK with the 700+ Zotero citations until I tried to add a new one and got the error reported in Report ID 332456032, namely:
"Zotero experienced an error updating your document.
citations[(j-1)].sortedItems.slice(...)[0] is undefined."

I get the same message when I try to edit an existing Zotero citation or refresh the citations. When inserting a new citation, it hangs for a while with {Citation} written where it should go, then that disappears and it gives me the error message. I hope this has got nothing to do with the size of the document (300+ pages, about 150,000 words and about 5MB in size).

I tried copying and pasting the text into a new document that I had already inserted a Zotero citation into and in which I had run through the initial citation dialog. I got the same problem there too though. I am now concerned that something might be wrong with the underlying citations in the four separate documents -- which would be a catastrophe -- though in those non-combined documents I can still add and edit Zotero citations without a problem -- so that's heartening!

I looked in the forums, but couldn't find this error message commented on, so took the extreme step of this report. I would be grateful for any tips on how to fix this problem, even if they involve re-combining the separate documents as I only did this a few hours ago and haven't added much since.

Thank you in advance.

P.S. I am currently using Zotero Standalone 4.0.6 (even though I used older standalone and firefox versions when putting in many of these citations). Standalone indicates to me that I am using "Zotero Word for Windoes Integration 3.1.12.SA.4.0.6". Thanks.

adamsmith

are you running Zotero for Firefox or Standalone?

julianwyatt

Standalone -- see edit to initial post. Apologies. You're really quick!

adamsmith

fbennett would have to take a look - he just fixed something related, so this might work in the next version - in how much of a hurry are you with this?

julianwyatt

No problem. I saw he was involved with something like this when I google searched the error message.

I can go back to the separate documents and continue working in them for at least another week or so. However, I have reached the point at which it would be more convenient for me if I were able to work in one big document so would be grateful for the possibility of combining the docs sooner rather than later.

Thanks for your very prompt response.

adamsmith

I was also asking because you could try this if you were running Zotero for Firefox. If you have Firefox on your computer anyway, it would be very quick to install Zotero there, point it to share the data directory with Standalone (that's the standard set-up we recommend) - and then use fbennett's plugin that allows you to use an update version of the citation-generating part of Zotero.
Let me know if that sounds like an option - if you have Firefox installed this will take less than 10mins - and I tell you what to do.

julianwyatt

Yes, I have Zotero for Firefox version 4.0.6 installed for when I'm adding items to the library (Standalone for writing and citing). It shares the data directory because my library is the same. Which plugin do I need to install?

adamsmith

install the plugin here: http://gsl-nagoya-u.net/http/pub/zotero-processor.xpi (only thing it does is switch out the citation processor, so there's zero risk).
Then try merging the documents while you have standalone closed (i.e. only working through the Firefox version). There's a fair chance you'll get the same error - don't despair in that case, we'll fix this somehow - but there's also a good chance this will fix things for you.

julianwyatt

OK, I installed the plugin and tried the same way (inserting part two into (after) part one saved as a new document). I still get the same problem whether I try to insert or edit a citation and whether it be in the original part one or the inserted part two of the document, new report ID: 1109105677.

I also thought I should mention that, when I looked in my Firefox Add-Ons manager, I have several other Zotero Add-Ons installed including Abbreviations for Zotero, Item History for Zotero and ZotFile. Should I remove/ disable these and try again?

adamsmith

do disable item history and abbreviations, though the chance that it'll matter is small. Zotfile is definitely unrelated.
Beyond this, we need fbennett to take a look.

If you don't mind, I'd also suggest looking at step 8. here:
http://www.zotero.org/support/word_processor_plugin_troubleshooting#debugging_broken_documents
I'm mainly interested in the first split here:

Try to isolate the problematic citation. Delete half of the document at a time and see if the error still occurs. If not, use Undo to restore the deleted section and then try deleting the other half. If you can reproduce the error in only one of the halves...

It'd be good to know if this occurs in both halves or just one of them.

julianwyatt

Thanks for your ongoing help with this.

The disabling of the other extensions didn't change anything.

I am, however, having some success isolating the problematic citation, though it is taking some serious time.

I will give details shortly, but if it's late where you are, please go to bed knowing that it's probably not a problem combining documents, but with one of the original separate documents and a corrupt citation in it.

Thanks again.

adamsmith

glad you're finding something.
Do use the alt+F9 trick mentioned in the debugging steps, that can speed things up.
Note that this could not just be an existing corrupt citation, but also an invisible (except for the fieldcode) citation that wasn't properly deleted.

julianwyatt

OK, so the good news is that I was able to isolate the problematic footnote in part two. I went back to the separate part two document and saw that it was also not inserting Zotero footnotes, but I hadn't noticed this before (I haven't worked on part two for more than a month). I don't think the problematic footnote was the last one I added either, so maybe a Zotero version change in between made it unable to handle this particular note.

The interesting thing is that it was the longest note in part two (and in all my Zotero documents), 460 words and 9 or 10 different sources within it. It ran over two pages. Do you want me to send you that particular note? Should I try inserting it again or is it simply too long?

I should really have guessed that it would be this one and saved myself the narrowing down problem (which was very slow because adding a new citation sometimes took 2 minutes and ran up to 790 VBA commands -- I saw this in Word's undo menu).

I have deleted this long note in part two and re-combined the four parts. It is now a working document. The only problem is that it takes over a minute to insert a new citation (even in draft view without repagination), but this is no doubt something to do with it being a big document (maybe proofing options?) which I will look into on the forums.

Thank you very much for all your help.

adamsmith

I don't think such a long note should be a problem, but not sure - If you want to be safe you can manually add a footnote and add the citations into the footnote, writing the annotation in Word. You'll likely have to fix punctuation, though.

You're working in Chicago style? Yes, Zotero will be slow in very large documents. Out of curiosity, though - is inserting a non-Zotero footnote immediate or almost immediate?
Simon would know most about this and what to look for.