Says "Saving to" But Nothing Gets Saved

gregggonsalves

So, have newest version of Zotero and have followed other troubleshooting steps, but I am trying to save references from Google Scholar to a Zotero folder, but they don't appear. The selection window pops open, I check off the references, a small "saving to..." window appears but nothing shows up in my Zotero folders.

adamsmith

is the title of the item listed when you're trying to save?
If not, check 10.I here:
https://www.zotero.org/support/troubleshooting_translator_issues

If that doesn't work, see if you can select bibtex as export format to appear in the Google Scholar settings and if that sticks.

gregggonsalves

Sadly, neither of these options worked either.
G

adamsmith

meaning what for the 2nd one? You can't set google scholar to display bibtex or doing so doesn't help?

gregggonsalves

So I did set bibtex as export format as well as reseting translator...both didn't work.

adamsmith

and on a new search with google scholar, the bibtex links are still showing? And could you confirm you've checked your cookies settings?

JonathanCorin

I'm having the exact same problem. I can go the long way and export each individual citation using google scholar and import it back into Zotero but I cannot do it the easy way like I previously could (just clicking the extension button). This is rather frustrating as I have an important assignment due soon and this is slowing me down considerably. I would love it if someone had a fix.

dstillman

Jonathan: See adamsmith's questions above.

dstillman

As far as we know, the only cause of this is corrupted cookies from Google Scholar, which manifest themselves as a problem changing citation export settings in the Google Scholar interface itself. I'd guess that clearing Google and/or Google Scholar cookies manually in the Firefox preferences would fix it. We're not aware of any problem in Zotero itself.

dstillman

adamsmith/aurimas: I can actually reproduce this myself, though. When I go to set citation links to BibTeX and click Save, it returns to the results page with no change, and when I return to the prefs it's still set to "Don't show any citation import links.". I'll look at the cookies being sent, but Firefox is set to "Remember history". So it seems like there's at least somewhat widespread breakage on Google's end.

In another profile, it's working fine.

JonathanCorin

I have tried clearing all cookies in chrome to no avail. As with Dan it seems I am unable to change the 'Bibliography manager' preference from 'Don't show any citation import links.'

dstillman

OK, I cleared the GSP (Google Scholar Preferences?) cookie for scholar.google.com in the profile that was working, and now it won't save the settings there either. So it seems like Google Scholar settings might just be totally broken at the moment, and the only reason this is working for some people is that they still have the pref saved from earlier and it hasn't yet expired.

adamsmith

but how did people get it back to work (and we've had a couple of cases of that, too)?

JonathanCorin

Now some really strange things are happening. It randomly started working but clicking the icon would only show the title for the first search result. However, saving the first result did work fine. Now the Zotero icon has gone completely.

dstillman

but how did people get it back to work (and we've had a couple of cases of that, too)?

I'm not sure. The only way I can get it back is by swapping in a backup cookies.sqlite.

aurimas

FWIW, I'm seeing the same problem in Chrome. I don't think I've messed with the GSP cookie before on this profile and the BibTeX preference is not sticking (GSP is missing from cookies too). All other prefs do stick.

adamsmith

(JonathanCorin is also on Chrome -- see above).

dstillman

I haven't really thought about it, but I wonder if there's a way we can simulate a click on the Cite button to get to the export links but hide the overlay — say, by temporarily adding custom CSS rules. It'd be a hack, but changing the pref and then resetting it has never exactly been an elegant solution.

aurimas

It's not about getting the links to show up. GS actually cares that the GSP cookie has the correct "CF" value set. That's the only way to get BibTeX export.

In any case, this is clearly an issue with Google Scholar, but it seems that when the GSP cookie is missing, manually setting the GSP cookie to what we want fixes the problem. It also makes it possible to change the preference via Google Scholar interface.

Previously, when the GSP cookie was missing, we attempted to set it via the preference page. The reasoning for that was that the cookie was hidden by a proxy (IIRC) and setting it directly in the browser would not help. For the time being, I think fixing this problem is more important than supporting such proxies.

I implemented the fix above and it's now available. For anyone affected, please update your translators via Preferences -> General -> Update Now, restart browser and try again.

aurimas

@Dan, I misunderstood what you were suggesting. When using the Cite function, request for BibTeX data includes a required "scisig" parameter, which seems to be some server-side generated value (e.g. "AAGBfm0AAAAAVT8Pf0ueX3Ey_mxke1G4L7Ry5a4QGm-N"). So at minimum this would require one additional HTTP request to retrieve it (i.e. simulate the Cite click). It may become a little more problematic (well, inconvenient) when trying to import multiple items, since I'm not sure if the "scisig" value is persistent. It may get invalidated by subsequent requests.

dstillman

Fix works great, thanks. (And no need to restart browser.)

JonathanCorin

Just to confirm, I am still having problems with google scholar. Automatically importing citation data is working correctly for all other sites.

dstillman

Did you update your translators?

gregggonsalves

As with Jonathan, everything used to work fine. I've tried all the options in the troubleshooting document and the one that adamsmith has suggested. Nothing seems to fix it.

adamsmith

could you confirm (both) that you've pressed "Update Now" in the General tab of the Zotero preferences and tried again since last night (which is when the fix was uploaded)?

gregggonsalves

OK. Seems to be OK now.

gregggonsalves

Damn. False. One reference got through. But that's it. Strange.

gregggonsalves

It's with Google Scholar. Reference I am adding are coming through the journal sites, which Zotero does pick up.

aurimas

Try updating one more time. There was a mistake in the last update.

JonathanCorin

All is working perfectly for me know now. Thanks very much folks for getting this sorted. I very much appreciate it.

rosalie.dench

aurimas "For anyone affected, please update your translators via Preferences -> General -> Update Now, restart browser and try again."

This worked for me, thanks!!