Problem exporting collection - help urgently needed!

Leah Bohle SCIH

Dear community,

I am currently trying to export a collection from my library (and another one from my group library). I have right-clicked on my collection in Firefox and tried the Zotero RDF format and BibTex format. The exporting process starts but it simply does not stop for hours...- maybe due to the high number of pdfs?
I tried yesterday and it was ongoing for 4 hours and that is when I closed Firefox...

I have also tried to export a sub-collection as Zotero RDF and it very quickly tells me: An error occurred while trying to export the selected file. (Java Script)
I am not sure what to do and need to admit that I am not a computer expert...

I need to urgently export the collections with the pdfs attached as I promised them to a client.

Any help would be highly appreciated!!!!

Thx

Lily

adamsmith

First, make sure that your Zotero version is up to date, i.e. 4.0.29.10
If that's the case, could we get an error report for the subcollection export?
https://www.zotero.org/support/reporting_problems

Leah Bohle SCIH

Dear Adam,

Thank you very much for your reply.
I checked my Zotero which is up-to-date. However, I noticed that my Firefox is not (version 45...).

I have now also tried to export single files. It worked for one file but when I tried others (independent of whether it contained a pdf or not) it did not work.

I am hesitant in posting the error message in the forum as it also contains some personal information as I noticed. However, I forwarded it accordingly.

Your help would be highly appreciated!

Thx
Lily

adamsmith

We want the error ID here on the forums, not the error message itself; that'd be the number you get after submitting the error report. We will need that here so that devs can associate the problem description with the actual error message.

Leah Bohle SCIH

...I am awfully sorry to ask that question but after carefully reading the link you sent related to the error reporting and ID, I am not sure how to generate an error ID. Where do I get this from?

adamsmith

When you click on "Report Errors" and then on "Next" you get an error report ID (in red) in that window. It's a 10 digit number. If that's not clear, could you describe what you're doing and seeing? It's possible something isn't working correctly, as this should really be pretty self-explanatory.

Leah Bohle SCIH

Thank you very much for your patience. I was simply too hesitant in clicking on "Next" as it said in another post that the error messages sent are not read...

Here is the error ID: 1470898948

However, when trying to export either a collection or a sub-collection it does not give me an error notification as such but it showing me the green bar that items are exporting but it does not stop for hours. This is independent of trying to export the full collection, a sub-collection or only a single item.

Here are the steps:
1. Open Zotero in Firefox
2. Right click on sub-/or collection in "My Library"
3. Click on "Export Collection"
4. Choose either Zotero RDF or Bibtex (does not work with both versions) -- here export notes and export files are activated
5. Save in folder

--> the exporting process starts
When trying to export a collection it does not tell me anything but the "exporting process" does not stop for hours

--> the exporting process starts and it tells me "Java Script" - "An error occurred while trying to export the selected file."
This is when I tried to export a sub-collection

--> I also tried to export single files (with and without pdfs attached) and except for one file without a pdf it also did not work and the exporting process did not stop...

I hope the above description is any helpful.

Many thanks,
Lily

adamsmith

Yeah, that's what I understood.
@Dan -- anything in there?

@Leah -- while we wait to hear back, could you check your database integrity in the advanced tab of the Zotero preferences?

Leah Bohle SCIH

This is what I did:

1. Action menues
2. Preferences
3. Advanced
4. Check Database Integrity
--> no errors were found in the database

dstillman

@adamsmith: Nothing in there.

adamsmith

@Leah -- can you try again, submitting the error report ID immediately after triggering this:

--> the exporting process starts and it tells me "Java Script" - "An error occurred while trying to export the selected file."
This is when I tried to export a sub-collection

Leah Bohle SCIH

Good morning!

I tried to export sub-collections again including only three articles and that worked surprisingly!
Following I tried to export the library and here I got the error message again.

ID: 706553345

Steps:
1. Right click on library
2. Export Item (Zotero RDF)
3. Saving in folder
4. Export started --> error message (Java Script)

Thank you!

Leah

dstillman

@adamsmith:

[JavaScript Error: "Component returned failure code: 0x80520012 (NS_ERROR_FILE_NOT_FOUND) [nsIFile.copyTo]" {file: "chrome://zotero/content/xpcom/translation/translate_item.js" line: 942}]

adamsmith

@Leah -- the only times I have seen this error is
1) with an incorrect filepath specified under relative links in the advanced tab of the Zotero preferences
2) When creating a fielpath that's too long.

To check on 2 -- could you try exporting to a location with a short filepath, i.e. pretty close to your C: directory?

Leah Bohle SCIH

Hi Adam!

That could be it!
I tried to export in into a folder of our company's server...
I will try now to export it onto my desktop instead and will let you know it that works.

How long should the export of a large library with ca. 300 pdfs take in average?

Many thanks!

Lily

adamsmith

Varies a lot, but I'd expect less than an hour, likely significantly less.

Leah Bohle SCIH

Yeahhh that worked! And it took only 2 minutes max.

Many thanks!!!!

SOLVED

Lily

adamsmith

@Dan -- can we trigger a more informative user-facing error for this?

dstillman

Issue created. I'm not sure if the invalid-relative-path issue still occurs or under what circumstances, but we can create an issue for that too if necessary.