Linking refs to pdfs in /home folder

Ezr
Hi,

I'm moving from Windows to Linux on my “school work” machine, and also plan to use Zotero-Firefox to help organize papers.

Here's what I plan to do: I'll create a /home/papers folder without any further folder hierarchy where I'll just put all the paper pdfs in my collection (about 400) and then access them through Zotero (where they will be tagged and sorted in folders) by attaching the files to the refs.

But I have two doubts now: since I plan to keep only a local copy in home/papers, not in the Zotero folder nor in the server, it'll take quite some work to manually attach/link the refs to the pdfs.

a) what if I change my Linux distro in the future and then re-sync the ref info? Will the /home/papers/“xpaper” links still work or will I have to attach them all again? And

b) is there by any chance a more practical way to do what I intend to do? :P

Thanks
  • adamsmith
    a) yes, that should work, as long as you stay on linux (i.e. you'll be able to have a folder with the path /home/papers
    b) yes. Just keep the pdfs in Zotero's own storage system and server and use a saved search (if you want to combined with a cron-job) to create the home/papers folders with all the pdfs.

    If you really don't want to do b) you should probably work with Zotfile
  • Ezr
    Great. I'll check Zotfile for now and see how it works, but I might try the server storage later (also as extra back-up). Thanks! :)
  • adamsmith
    can I ask what the problem with using Zotero's built-in file system is? You'll save a lot of time using it (because that's where translators auto-download attachments) and if all you want is a single folder with all pdfs there is really no downside.
  • Ezr
    Well, on the one hand, I don't want to be stuck in one distro/installation, hence my question on the permanence of attachment links;

    and, on the other hand, frankly, I don't want to feel dependent on one program. It's supposed to be just a front-end to visualize stuff that is already there in my own file structure and backed-up by other means.

    It'd be ok do add files to the Zotero folders and server as extra back-up and sync, but I'd be uncomfortable with having that as my main means of accessing my files, specially considering the risk that any bug/corruption in the server end could cause trouble.

    So I'd say the reasons are the same I don't save stuff in Dropbox and prefer one-way cloud sync, for example.
  • adamsmith
    edited July 11, 2012
    Well, on the one hand, I don't want to be stuck in one distro/installation, hence my question on the permanence of attachment links;

    and, on the other hand, frankly, I don't want to feel dependent on one program. It's supposed to be just a front-end to visualize stuff that is already there in my own file structure and backed-up by other means.
    but these are two separate issues. For the first one, using links is a bad idea: You're tying yourself to using linux - and linux only - for the future, and if on one of your future linux installs you won't be able to create the exact same folder in the same place, all of your links are dead. On the other hand, with your pdfs stored in Zotero you can just move around your entire data folder (or sync with attachments) and you can move around between distros and OSs without any trouble.

    For the other issue: 1. If you ever want to get your pdfs out of Zotero, you hopefully don't just want the pdfs, but also the data attached to them - with Zotero exports in various formats and 2. as I say above, you can use a saved search to have all of the pdfs in your Zotero folder accessible in a single folder, without any subfolders (and use one-way cloud-storage to back that up if you want.

    It just sounds to me like you're planning on making your life a lot harder than necessary by not taking advantage of the things your computer can do.

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