Reference corrections in desktop app do not update in Word bibliography

tgbissett

This is infuriating.

I've used Zotero Desktop for about the last year, working on a 750 page document. About 320 citations in the ref library.

Started QA/QC today to do some final editing and came across several typos in the bibliography that the Word Zotero plugin built for me. So I corrected them in the Zotero Desktop app (*not* in Word).

Then I updated. No changes.

So I deleted the bibliography and rebuilt it.

No changes.

So I backed up the library (with corrections), deleted it, wiped the trash, and then reimported. Then rebuilt the bibliography.

No changes, the old typos are still there.

So I uninstalled Zotero and user preferences, wiped the online library, uninstalled the Word plugin, and did a fresh install. Then rebuilt the bibliography.

Errors are still there.

WHAT IS GOING ON HERE?? Where is Zotero pulling the information from to build the bibliography, and what good is this program if I can't do a simple edit to the bib and have it stick?

dstillman

https://www.zotero.org/support/forum_guidelines#etiquette

(We're happy to help you, but you'll need to just describe your problem calmly if you're going to post here.)

So I backed up the library (with corrections), deleted it, wiped the trash, and then reimported. Then rebuilt the bibliography.

This was extremely the wrong thing to do, and wiping the online library made it permanent. By doing this, you made a completely new library with no connection to your old library or the citations in your document.

At this point, the only way to restore any links to citations in any of your documents would be to restore your library from a backup and overwrite your online library.

If you don't have a backup of your data directory but there are still zotero.sqlite.bak or zotero.sqlite.1.bak files in your data directory, you might be able to restore your data (though not your files) from one of those. You should make an immediate backup of your entire Zotero data before doing anything else.

dstillman

As for losing the connection with the citations initially, we could've debugged that with you — might've just been a few orphaned items from, say, deleting duplicate items in Zotero instead of merging them — but I'm afraid you're well past that now by deleting your library.

tgbissett

I've reimported the library from the backup file. The first thing I did was back it up before wiping it. It's not like I threw up my hands and gave up. The references are back in the desktop app. And the citations are still active and linked to the references, I've tested that.

There are also (and weren't before) no duplicate items, I've long since merged any duplicates. It was one of the first things I did.

The trash is empty, and there are no orphan items.

Any other suggestions you can think of?

dstillman

If you "reimported", then no, you have an export, not a backup. A backup is a copy of your Zotero data directory. You made a new library.

Again, we would've been happy to help you debug the original problem, but you no longer have a library that's connected in any way to your document.

adamsmith

What do you mean by "the back-up file"? If you mean a Zotero RDF export then, as dstillman says, exporting and importing your library disconnects your library from the references in the Word document.

tgbissett

So then there's no solution to this? That seems odd.

The Zotero add-in in Word still seems to be drawing information from somewhere, because the bibliography can still be built. It's just got the old information in it.

Surely that information is stored somewhere.

dstillman

I explained above. If you deleted your library, you would need to restore from an actual backup. If you don't have a backup, and you also wiped your online library, then no, you deleted everything and can't restore it.

You can continue using the new library you imported, but it won't have any connection to any existing documents.

The citations in your document include embedded metadata and will continue to generate bibliography entries, but they're not connected to your Zotero library, since you made a new one by reimporting.

adamsmith

At this point, I'm afraid likely not, no. What I'd do is to make a copy of your Word document (really make a copy, though), unlink citations in the Zotero add-on, and then do QA manually in Word.

For future reference, I'd very much ask that you ask for help before doing anything that involves wiping or deleting things in Zotero as that makes troubleshooting much harder and, when it's done as thoroughly as in your case, can preclude any fixes.

Also, read the section on back-ups linked to by dstillman above so that you know how to (and how not to) back up your library for future reference.

tgbissett

>The citations in your document include embedded metadata and will continue to generate bibliography entries, but they're not connected to your Zotero library, since you made a new one by reimporting.

Fair enough, can those be edited?

dstillman

No, sorry. A future version of Zotero will probably provide a way to do that, but it's not supported currently.

As adamsmith says, at this point your best bet is probably to unlink citations in a copy and finish by hand, using Quick Copy to paste in any additional citations and bibliography entries.

(For the future, I would very strongly encourage you to set up an automatic backup system for your whole computer (e.g., with Time Machine on a Mac, which is as simple as plugging in an external disk). This isn't about Zotero — if you delete anything by mistake, you should always have a way to restore it.)