Export to db or dbs format

808design

I'm new to Zotero and wondering 1) if Zotero can export to a .db or .dbs format, and 2) how does Zotero retain the association with the document files that are attached to individual entries?

LiborA

Zotero use sqlite database, why do you need to transfer it to db format?

bwiernik

Can we take a step back? What exactly are you trying to do?

adamsmith

for 2) though, Zotero stores attached files in an internal folder (storage) and stores relative links to those files in its sqlite database.

808design

Thanks for your comments and being patient with a non-techie. I'm interested in using Zotero for a document library database at work. The department I work for would beta test Zotero over the next year, but ultimately, we may be forced to join another database system adopted by the company as a whole. I want to make sure that whatever I've entered into zotero can be exported to a format that another database would accept. I've researched and it seems that it will not export to excel or csv, so are there any other common formats that I can export to? And if so, how would the export retain the association with the document file attached to the entry?

adamsmith

Zotero does export to CSV and that export includes absolute links to attached files.
What format the database takes, of course, depends on the database. The focus of Zotero's export abilities are bibliographic formats, in line with its main purpose.

Also, .db files are typically just sqlite files (like Zotero's database) -- they're very flexible, so you couldn't just "import" a db format from one database to the other the way you can open a CSV file on different application. But you can open Zotero's sqlite with any standard sqlite reader just like you would .db files.