Importation error file RDF... Help please

bjarni3000
Good afternoon,

Before beginning: sorry for being the 2351342th person with this problem... I haven't seen the recommandation not to use the RDF export way before now and... I have a problem now. I have cleaned all my computer and used a RDF full export of Zotero before doing it. (So I had the .rdf+file with all documents)

But now I am trying to import it, it puts an error. With the notepad, the file .rdf seems.... empty! But at the same time, the other file next to it is full of documents (1 to 961 files). I could take it manually but there were 961 files so... does it exist a way to recover this rdf?

I did the manipulation you have asked other users. Debug ID D2030855106.
Does someone could help me please?

I already thank you very much for your help!!!
  • bjarni3000
    Anyone? :)
  • bwiernik
    Let’s take a step back. What exactly are you trying to do? Why are you exporting?
  • bjarni3000
    Hello Bwiernik!

    Before rebooting my laptop, I copied my zotero file with the export button in RDF.

    Now that my computer is clean, I try to put my zotero library back with the import button but the RDF... can't be read by Zotero! I would like to have my zotero library back...

  • bwiernik
    Okay, exporting is not the appropriate way to back up your library. Do you have a full backup of your computer from before you wiped it?
  • bjarni3000
    My computer can't do automatic backup for a mysterious reason since the beginning (bug when I try).

    So I did manual copies of everything. I have a copy of the Zotero File. Inside there are 2 documents. 1 File "files" full of things and a RDF file (the one Zotero can't read)

    My backup of summer 2019 works well. The last one say there is an error with the rdf file... Same way to copy
  • dstillman
    Zotero aside, you should never wipe your computer without a full backup of your entire disk. That would include a proper backup of the Zotero data directory and all sorts of other things you might forget to back up manually.

    While an RDF file isn't a proper backup, it would still contain a version of your data, but if the file is empty, there's obviously no data there. I couldn't tell you how that would happen — it looks like the file is in a cloud storage folder, so something might have gone wrong there — but unless you have a backup of the data directory or non-zero-bytes RDF file, I'm afraid there'd be no way to restore your data, assuming you weren't syncing with the online library.

    You can drag PDFs from the exported folder back into Zotero, and Zotero may be able to retrieve metadata for some of them, but that's about it. If you've written documents using the word processor plugin, see Importing Formatted Bibliographies for a way to extract metadata from those and add it back to Zotero.
  • bjarni3000
    Damn!

    Yeap I know for the full backup but as I said, the automatic way doesn't work, when I lunch, there is a bug... The only way is manually, I already contacted the ASUS helpdesk some time ago but there have no solution except this one.

    Alright...
    I will do the PDF dragging way and will synchronizing now the library in the future as well, just in case...

    Thanks for your help anyway!

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