File Synching Disabled in Client

vincedmet

I have helped a conservator in our museum install the client on her workstation. She already has a Zotero PaperShip account on her iPad and has paid for additional storage, so we decided to synch her data and her files from the client via
Edit>Preferences>Synch>Set-Up Synching.

When she added a citation (using Chrome connector) to her client, everything starting synching - which is good - such that her library looked exactly like the one on the Zotero cloud. However, when we tried to open a PDF file from the client, it gave us a "SSL certificate error connecting to [domain]". I realize there are instruction for how to deal with that, but in addition to this, we now see that when the conservator goes to her synch setting in the client Edit>Preferences>Synch window, that the File Synching portion of the window is just cut-off. Anyone know why this is happening?

dstillman

It's not cut off — it's just not shown. You can't configure file syncing until you've set up data syncing, since the former relies on the latter.

vincedmet

Thanks. My thread actually connects to another that I posted under the conservator's name, Sarah Scaturro, (to which you just responded) "Question about Synching".

I thought we had set up data syncing, especially as all her citations are present (as are the PDFs - we just can't open them because of the SSL error.)

But if we would like to make sure and set-up data synching again, we can't because the window doesn't give us the "Set-up synching" button, just an "OK" button.

dstillman

Can you take a screenshot of what you're seeing and email to support@zotero.org with a link to this thread?

vincedmet

Yes, will do.

dstillman

OK, you're right — the file syncing section is indeed cut off in your screenshot. Not sure why that's happening, but if you switch to another preference tab and close and reopen the preferences, does that fix it?

vincedmet

I am not at the conversator's PC at the moment - I will ask her to try and let you know.

On a related note/thread - https://forums.zotero.org/discussion/comment/317703#Comment_317703

-would this file syncing problem, as well as the SSL Certificate error I mention at the top of this thread, be occurring because of the following: after having changed the Zotero Data directory, instead of clicking "sync" in the message that came up confirming this change, I clicked cancel instead.

I wonder if I should just remove the client from this station and reinstall it? Every time we've tried to follow the SSL Certificate steps we cannot resolve the problem ...

dstillman

The SSL problem is due to security software or your network setup — something intercepting your secure requests. It's not related to the data directory, and reinstalling Zotero won't help it.

You don't say exactly what you've tried from the instructions, but those are definitely the way to fix it.

vincedmet

Okay thanks so much for your response. We will have to get our IT dept. involved to resolve the SSL problem since as librarians we don't have admin rights on staff PCS. I'll let you know how we do.

With regards to the File Syncing being cut off in the Preferences window -
"if you switch to another preference tab and close and reopen the preferences, does that fix it?" The conservator confirmed that this does fix this issue - thanks!