Mendely move - dropbox

tomandersen

I am going to move to Zotero from Mendely as I don't think the new Mendely will allow me to store my pdfs on my computer. (I have other tools that run against those pdfs).

Does Zotero 5 work in a Dropbox folder?

Should I just use the instructions provided to move over?

It will be a paid account it seems.

--Tom

dstillman

See Stored Files and Linked Files.

To import, see Mendeley Import.

tomandersen

Thanks - looking at that now.

thistlillo

I would like to re-open this question because I cannot understand what flag I need to switch for using Linked Files instead of Stored files.

So far, I have been using "stored files", but my library has become a mess. I would like to switch to "linked files". I filled in the "Linked Attachment Base Directory", but my "Data directory" still points to the location where the papers were being placed.

Is specifying the "Linked Attachment Base Directory" enough for NOT storing pdfs as I have been doing so far?

dstillman

@facardillo: This is explained in the section I linked to, and the Linked Attachment Base Directory section linked from there.

Zotero only creates stored files, unless you manually create a linked file. The Linked Attachment Base Directory has no effect on where it stores things. If you want to convert new attachments to linked files, you'd want to use ZotFile, but that's not something we can help with.

thistlillo

I have read that section, but unfortunately I am missing something.

If I specify a "Linked Attachment Base Directory", what happens to the other setting related "Data directory location": will it be used for the library metadata only? will it be disabled? I do not see a way to say I do not want to save pdf files there.

dstillman

They have nothing to do with one another. One is the data directory, and the other is the linked attachment base directory.

I do not see a way to say I do not want to save pdf files there.

Because Zotero doesn't support that itself, as I said in my previous message.