Import RDF with files in 1.0.10

RobBob · August 17, 2009

I don't want to change to the 2.0 beta since I have a few deadlines coming up. I however work on both ubuntu and winXp partitions. I saved my zotero library on the ubuntu side, and can't seem to import it into the zotero on the winXp side. I get the status bar going, but no citations or files are getting imported. The error report is 1547546887. Any help would be much appreciated to be able to continue working...

thx

Rob

dstillman · August 17, 2009

Is the import failing with an error message?

RobBob · August 17, 2009

No, the status bar keeps going on. I left it for a couple of hours, but for some 500 citations with pdfs, this seems excessive...

dstillman · August 17, 2009

This is a bug that has since been fixed on 2.0, but 1.0 isn't receiving any further updates.

If you're transferring your entire library between two computers, however, you shouldn't really be using export/import, even in 1.0.

http://www.zotero.org/support/kb/transferring_a_library

RobBob · August 17, 2009

And I thought I read through everything on your site... that'll teach me. Thanks for very quick support ! I must say I'm impressed. I still however find it curious that one shouldn't use the import/export functions to transfer libraries... Anyway, I'll take a look at the proposed methodology.

dstillman · August 17, 2009

I still however find it curious that one shouldn't use the import/export functions to transfer libraries...

Well you certainly shouldn't get errors, but, among other things, the current word processor plugins use unique identifiers in the database to link to items, and the export/import process doesn't transfer those, because they're library specific. This limitation will be addressed in future versions of the word processor plugins using embedded metadata. In the meantime you need to use the method above or syncing in 2.0 if you don't want to lose links from documents.

But we'd still be unlikely to recommend export/import for transferring entire libraries. Copying the data directory is inherently lossless, includes settings and auxiliary files that aren't included in export/import, and should also be faster, since no processing is required.