Upgrade StorageURL attachments
My goal is (1) to cite a web page and (2) to get quick access to the web page when I want to look at it again. Putting the URL directly in the item satisfies (1) but not (2), because I have to copy and paste the URL into my browser. So I usually right-click on the item, select ADD ATTACHMENT, select ATTACH LINK TO URI and fill in the URL of the web page. Then, if I double-click on the attachment, it takes me directly to the web page in my browser. So that satisfies (2).
After I began that practice, I discovered that I could drag the URL from my browser and drop it on the item. That resulted in an attachment that looks identical to the one resulting from the method explained above. However, it's *much* different. In this case, Zotero caches a copy of the web page (including all HTML, graphics, etc) in my Zotero library, using, sometimes, a lot of storage. So, lesson learned: don't drag and drop URLs.
However, now I have to go back and clean up the mess. The problem is that the attachments made in the two different way look *identical*. They both display the URL of the web page with no indication that one is simply a link and that the other is a cached copy.
Can you fix this so that they appear differently inside Zotero?
After I began that practice, I discovered that I could drag the URL from my browser and drop it on the item. That resulted in an attachment that looks identical to the one resulting from the method explained above. However, it's *much* different. In this case, Zotero caches a copy of the web page (including all HTML, graphics, etc) in my Zotero library, using, sometimes, a lot of storage. So, lesson learned: don't drag and drop URLs.
However, now I have to go back and clean up the mess. The problem is that the attachments made in the two different way look *identical*. They both display the URL of the web page with no indication that one is simply a link and that the other is a cached copy.
Can you fix this so that they appear differently inside Zotero?
Then, the icon for a link does look different: it has a link symbol (chain link) whereas snapshots (i.e. including the whole page image) do not.
Yes, I see now that if I click on the label "URL" (not the link), it will take me to the website. That's a good thing to know. Thank you.
Yes, I also see that the icons are different. The difference is almost infinitesimal, but, now that you have pointed it out, I can see that they are different.
So, now,
(1) To clean up my library, how can I search for all of these cached copies among the hundreds of entries in my database?
(2) When I delete the attachment in Zotero, it does not seem to delete the folder in "storage" where the cached copy is saved. How can I get it do that?
Thanks for the help.
2) You likely just haven't emptied your Zotero trash (bottom left). Attachments deleted in Zotero are removed from the harddisk.