Removing PDFs from the online library

Noiredd

First of all, thank you for this great tool - believe it or not, but prior to finding out about Zotero, I was storing the list of research items in an Excel sheet, with a folder for full texts!

However, I'm running into issues with file sync. I just ran out of my free storage space and since I figured that I don't need the full texts backed up online, the decision was to disable syncing them with the server. My thinking was that if I go Preferences->Sync->Settings->Data Syncing and untick "Sync full-text content", Zotero will no longer upload PDFs to the online library (I want to have the whole list of items online, together with my notes and tags, but keep PDFs only locally). Since when I clicked the sync button again nothing happened (the "not enough online space" warning popped up), I thought I have to somehow force the change to happen and went Preferences->Sync->Reset and selected "Reset File Sync History", making sure I preserve the local versions every time. But my online library is still full of attachments.

The question is then: how to get rid of the PDFs from the server side only, while keeping everything else synced? Is it this rare situation when I should purge my library?

dstillman

Is it this rare situation when I should purge my library?

It is indeed.

The other two options are for different things. (Full-text content doesn't count against your quota and allows you to search for items online and on other computers without syncing the files. Reset File Sync History is for complex situations, usually involving WebDAV.)

dstillman

To be clear, you want to use Purge Storage in the storage settings online. You don't want to purge your library in any way.

Noiredd

Thank you. I purged the online storage, then reset file sync history again. The only other thing I had to do was untick both "Sync attachment files (...)" options under Preferences->Sync->Settings->File Syncing (since unticking "Sync full-text content" did not seem to have any effect and I ran out of space when syncing again after the purge). Now it works flawlessly.

Also, a great thing that the attachments show up in the online library, together with the URL links - except they're not using up any space as the actual files now! :)