Zotero won't start: "There was an error starting Zotero."

guybrariang

I have Zotero installed in both Standalone and Firefox. I was away for a week, and when I returned I could not launch either version. My only guess is that the IT department may have pushed an update to my computer that broke Zotero.

Steps to reproduce:
1a. Double click shortcut for Zotero Standalone.
2a. Receive error message "There was an error starting Zotero."

1b. Open Firefox.
2b. Click Z icon to open Zotero.
2c. Receive error message "There was an error starting Zotero."

This is what the Firefox browser console says:

[Exception... "Component returned failure code: 0x80630002 (NS_ERROR_STORAGE_IOERR) [mozIStorageService.openDatabase]" nsresult: "0x80630002 (NS_ERROR_STORAGE_IOERR)" location: "JS frame :: chrome://zotero/content/xpcom/db.js :: Zotero.DBConnection.prototype._getDBConnection :: line 1119" data: no]

zotero.js:824:0

Any help would be much appreciated. Thanks!

dstillman

NS_ERROR_STORAGE_IOERR usually happens when the Zotero data directory is on a network share or in a server-mirrored location on your hard drive. Security software could probably also cause it, but that's somewhat less likely. If possible, try moving your data directory to a normal location on the local hard drive.

guybrariang

Thanks for the quick follow up, Dan.

You're right - my data is on a network drive. Unfortunately, the system is locked down so I can't access the local drive (I think the IT department makes us save everything on the network drives so we can log in and access all our stuff from any computer).

As an update, I'm now experiencing slightly different behaviour. Now when I open Standalone, I see "Zotero is already running, but is not responding. The old Zotero process must be closed to open a new window." Then I click Close Zotero, and it gives me "Your Zotero profile cannot be loaded. It may be missing or inaccessible," and when I click OK it exits the program.

Is there a way I can open Zotero to an empty library, and then re-populate it from the latest synced version? Thanks again!

guybrariang

Does anyone have any suggestions on how I can get Zotero to start again?

DWL-SDCA

Zotero "expects" that your data directory will be located on your local hard drive. There are good but technical (meaning that I only have very limited understanding) reasons why this is the best location for your data. It is possible that you can resolve your problem by working with your IT department.

dstillman

It's not exactly that Zotero expects a local hard drive — just that network drives don't necessarily mirror standard hard drive behavior (mostly around file locking) that the SQLite storage backend expects. To the extent that they don't, you might get errors like this.

I certainly wouldn't try to use Standalone and Zotero for Firefox together from a network drive. You might have better luck using Standalone only. (We'll be releasing a version of the Zotero Connector for Firefox in a few days. In the meantime, you'd want to use the Chrome connector)

As for recovering, if this happens with only Standalone open, you can look in your Zotero data directory and see what files are there. I'd make a backup of that directory and then try copying one of the recent automatic backups into place. Failing that, you can always delete zotero.sqlite altogether and Zotero will pull down your data from the server. Don't touch 'storage', which has your attachment files.

But this may very well recur.

guybrariang

Okay, thanks for the advice. I'll give this a try.