right click in Chrome doesn't 'Save to Zotero'

angelagh

I have the option in the right-click menu to 'Save to Zotero'; however, nothing happens. I use this feature when the URL provided opens a PDF but I want to save the information directly to Zotero (as the right-click menu would imply I can do).

I'm using Chrome, Windows 10

This feature has never worked for me....it's cumbersome to save the file, than go to Zotero and input the information ...

I just discovered I if I click on the URL listed under the hyperlink and then the right-click menu works but it saves the google search results instead of the one PDF URL I'm trying to save.

traceylauriault

I have the same problem, but it works with Firefox. Would love to have it work in chrome.

adomasven

Why don't you use the Zotero extension button? Could you submit a Report ID from Chrome?

angelagh

I can't submit a Report ID as that feature only works from Zotero program. I will try Firefox but would prefer Chrome to work...

OK -- so here is the problem, neither browser works as expected w/ internet searches. If you right-click on the text below the URL links in the search, it only saves the search result, not the associated PDF (or website). So I have to manually create Zotero entries for those searches with a PDF as a result.

bwiernik

Please read the instructions adomasven links to carefully. It says how to provide a Report ID from the Chrome connector.

angelagh

1. the problem isn't with the connector, the problem is with the right-click zotero menu (unless the right-click menu is associated w/ the connector??)
2. the instructions need to be updated as there is NOT an options button (or link)
3. after going into the connector options, advanced, I was able to submit a bug report and finally get a debug ID D1552680045

dstillman

Yes, the options in the browser pane right-click menu are part of the Connector.

It's not currently possible to save a link via the right-click menu. This worked in the earlier Zotero for Firefox, but there are some technical limitations that make it trickier in the Zotero Connector. We're planning to restore the functionality as best as we can, though.

In the meantime, if you're just trying to save a webpage, you can obviously just click through to it and use the Save to Zotero button. The same applies if you view PDFs in the browser, which is the default in all browsers (which is why this isn't a higher priority). In that case you can just click through to the PDF and click Save to Zotero to save the PDF to Zotero, which will then attempt to retrieve metadata for for the PDF.

If what you're saying is that you have PDFs configured to open in an external program, then for now you'll need to save the file to disk and drag it into Zotero. (Dragging the PDF link to Zotero is another option, but that currently doesn't work in Chrome and Google's intermediate tracking page interferes with it in Firefox, though we should be able to fix both.)

the instructions need to be updated as there is NOT an options button (or link)

Chrome recently updated its extensions pane. I've updated the instructions.

monika.barget

I think this still hasn't been reactivated. At least, it does now work for me either, so if this feature is dead, I think the option should no longer be shown.

A small workaround that I have now is that the "Add to Zotero" weblink is a bookmark in my browser tab and that I can then quickly open this page and put in a DOI etc. if it is also part of the search result preview shown by the search engine.

In this way, I can often avoid opening the PDFs first.

dstillman

@monika.barget: I think there's some sort of misunderstanding here. What's a URL where you can't either save from the search-results page using the folder icon or click on the link and click the Save to Zotero button from there? Even if the search engine isn't a supported site, if there are DOIs on the page, Zotero will detect those, and you can save those from the save button. There's essentially no situation where opening the /save page from a bookmark — if that's what you mean — and copying and pasting a DOI would make more sense.

monika.barget

I do this in cases where I quickly want to save metadata but am not interested in keeping the PDF long-term.

Just to give you an example:

When I search Google for "island studies", one of the first results is an article in PDF format, which Google links directly rather than directing me to a publisher page first.

The Google link is the following and clearly does not save to Zotero directly:

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&opi=89978449&url=https://bibliotekanauki.pl/articles/2035482.pdf&ved=2ahUKEwjv1pChxoOJAxXK0wIHHdxOC8UQFnoECBsQAQ&usg=AOvVaw0JDnCTRN2J_SeiK-Gtggwa

When I open the link in Firefox, it looks like this:

file:///D:/Downloads/Island_Studies_Island_Geography_But.pdf

And this link clearly does not save to Zotero via the browser button. What I see is just a faint "Z" instead of an icon indicated that a legitimate entry was discovered.

However, I can copy and paste the DOI from the first page of the document, open the "save to Zotero" webpage, and easily ingest it there.

dstillman

OK, that's an example, but the easy answer there is just to use Google Scholar instead of Google Search. Google Scholar is a supported site, and the save button for a Google Scholar search for that title will save high-quality metadata and the available PDF.

The reason clicking the PDF won't work there is because the site is forcing the PDF to be downloaded instead of letting it to be viewed in the browser. (Firefox still shows it in the browser, with a file:// URL. Chrome makes you save it explicitly to disk.) That's an annoying behavior on the part of the website, and it does indeed prevent the Zotero Connector from being able to save directly, though you can just drag the PDF from your downloads folder into Zotero. (It looks like we also don't currently support dragging a file:// URL from the address bar into Zotero, but we should be able to fix that.)

Saving via right-click could work if we supported that again, and we'll see if that's still possible, though as I note above, for this case we'd have to deal with Google tracking links. But wanting to save a PDF that forces a download directly from regular Google search results just isn't something that comes up very often.

In any case, I'm still not sure why you'd want to save the DOI via zotero.org. If you're using the desktop app, you should just paste it into Add Item by Identifier in Zotero.

monika.barget

I don't really like using Google Scholar because I think it's biased and especially not a good way to find non-English content.

As far as I know, Google Scholar depends on commercial partnerships and agreements with publishers to index their content. And Google Scholar may not index all content in the same way.
Google Scholar's algorithm prioritizes documents with broader reach and higher citation counts, which is not necessarily how I as a historian approach my literature search.

I also read that Google Scholar under-indexes book chapters, older journals, or things like project reports.

This is why I am still more inclined to use Google Search in combination with WorldCat and BASE (Bielefeld Academic Search Engine).