Document URLs no longer hyperlinked

lp85

In the new UI, document URLs in the right-hand info pane are no longer hyperlinked. Users must copy/paste the URL to access the document directly. It's a small change, but that extra step is an inconvenience.

Additionally, if a user is not logged in they are not able to access the full document URL unless they extract it from the bibliographic citation.

adamsmith

By document URLs you mean file URIs?
That's done on purpose -- those were never intended to be included in the URL field and the ability to open them cause some unwanted side-effects.

lp85

Hi Adam,

Thanks for your response. I don't know what exactly you mean by "file URI" but I'm referring to the only "URL" field included when adding an item to a library.

In my use case, we use the URL field to link to the resource PDF that's owned by the university library. These links work in the "old web" view and are fundamentally necessary for the Zotero library to function for students.

Does that provide any additional clarity?

adamsmith

I may be misunderstanding -- are these URLs starting with http or how do they look?

edit: see fcheslack below. I probably just misunderstood the question.

fcheslack

We're working on this. If you have write access to the library, the label "URL" is a link just like it is in the full Zotero application, but the link is not currently available in read-only mode.

lp85

Thanks for the update.

I think there are two different things happening:
1. the primary concern for our use case is the one fcheslack noted, that links are not available in read-only mode. All of our students access our Zotero library in read-only mode, so that's our biggest concern.

2. The less pressing concern is that in the previous version, the URLs were already hyperlinked, so it was a single click to open the resource in our University library. Now, while editors of the Zotero library DO have access to the URLs, they have to copy/paste them into a new tab. It's not actually hyperlinked anymore, it's just a plain-text URL. This is obviously of lesser concern, but not having to copy/paste was really convenient for our instructors.

adamsmith

If you have edit access, you should just be able to click on the URL label -- that's the same behavior as in Zotero on the desktop. Hyperlinking won't work given the way the interface works since clicking on the field lets you edit it

fcheslack

The URL and DOI labels should now always be active links if they have values, even if the library is read-only.

lp85

Thanks for the info and the updates! I'll keep checking my library for the changes... Forgive this obtuse clarification, but users with read-only access should see a clickable hyperlink instead of needing to copy/paste the link?

fcheslack

The label itself that says "URL" is the link, and yes that should now be true for all users (before it was only true if you had edit access). The value itself, to the right of the label where you would edit it, remains likely incomplete and unclickable plain text for now.

lp85

Thanks for all these fast updates! It's now working for our students. Massively appreciated!