bibtex export quit working

floBa
bibtex export quit work.
for the last year i used the drag and drop function to export single citations to an opened bibtex file. this morning the function quit working. it's also no possible to export the whole library to bibtex. however it's possible to export to other formats.

there is no error message for the drag and drop task. i submitted the error with the code: 904913445

the error message for the library export task in german is as follows:"Ein Fehler ist aufgetreten bei dem Versuch, die ausgewählte Datei zu exportieren."
  • adamsmith
    [i'm travelling for the next 2 days - if someone else could have a look that'd be great].
  • zharmad
    Which zotero are you using (Firefox browser or standalone)?

    I just installed Zotero stand-alone today on Mac OSX 10.7.5, and was testing the Bibtex export ability. I can use "File->Export Library..." with no problems.

    The drag and drop functionality also seems to be working as well.
  • dstillman
    [JavaScript Error: "secMan is undefined" {file: "chrome://zotero/content/xpcom/translation/translate_firefox.js" line: 54}]
    Simon will have to comment on this, but I'd guess that this is due to an incompatibility with Firefox 10 (you're running 10.0.11). If possible, upgrade to Firefox 17.0.1, either the primary one or the Extended Support Release version (which replaces 10.0.x ESR). If that's not possible, you can wait to see what Simon says.
  • floBa
    GREAT! upgrading to 17.0.1. worked fine. didn't thought of that because i didn't change anything (that i'm aware of)in my firefox installation before it quit working.

    @zharmad: didn't work for the standalone either.

    thx flo
  • dstillman
    This should absolutely work in the latest version of Standalone. Do you perhaps have an older version of that installed?
  • charpent
    I think that I am also bitten by this one. But I have another problem : I'm stuck with Iceweasel 10.0 ESR because I'm on Debian Wheezy, which is in freeze ==> no direct update possible for a while, and I am somewhat reluctant to install a "parallel" version of Firefox.

    My symptoms : When trying to export from Zotero (either directly or through Zotelo), Iget a truncated file, containing the first headers of the first entry, stopping short of the beginning of actual content, such as (all text surrounded by three stars) :
    ***

    @article{spiegelhalter_bayesian_2002,
    title = {***

    and, when exporting directly, a message box tells me (IIRC) "Une erreur s'est produite lors de la tentative d'exportation du fichier sélectionné." ("An error happened during the attempt to export the selected file."). I get no error number nor proposition to transmit to Zotero web site.

    Could you keep me posted on this ? It's quite annoying, since Zotero is my main bibliographic tool...
  • Leitungswasser
    Hi, I was having exactly the same problem: Zotero BibTeX export not working and bound to Debian Wheezy. However, I downloaded Mozilla 17 as a .tar.bz2 and everything just worked. No need to install a parallel browser, just unpack & run. It found my Zotero config automatically.
  • pulsus
    Hi I am also experiencing this problem. The export of bibtex does not work anymore.
    I get exactly the same output as the user above, in the form of

    @article{authorkey_year
    title = {

    Due to I am using zotero at work, I am stuck with Firefox 11.0. What can I do to resolve this issue.
    BibTex export used to work fine in the last months.
  • adamsmith
    I don't know if we'll fix this - FF 11 isn't even supported anymore and the support for the 10.x ESR is running out in a month - but you can download an old version of the bibtex translator from here:
    https://github.com/zotero/translators/raw/b7dc1496997391e3bd1411fc7a9e1cd093692730/BibTeX.js

    open it with a text editor (notepad, TextEdit) and change the last Updated date to 2013-01-03 03:18:04
    and then save the file to the translator directory in the Zotero data folder:
    http://www.zotero.org/support/zotero_data#locating_your_zotero_library
    , overwriting the existing Bibtex.js file
  • pulsus
    This worked.
    Thanks for the help!
  • charpent
    Dear adamsmith,

    Replacing the BibTex.js translator with this "older" version was successful. Thank you for the hint !

    May I suggest fixing this problem notwithstanding the close expiration of 10.x ESR : I have a feeling that Debian users will be stuck with this version for a long time, and the alternatives available in "experimental" won't install...

    Thanks for the help !
  • adamsmith
    Note that you may have to repeat that step in the future, as we update the bibtex translator.
    I'm pretty sure you can just install a recent FF version from mozilla on debian - it's not like aptitude is the only way to install on debian - and especially as Firefox won't provide any more security updates for the 10. branch when the ESR branch switches to 17 it would seem wise to update your browser anyway.
    You could also run Zotero standalone, of course.

    If this were a Zotero bug, we'd obviously fix it, but an incompatibility with an outdated browser version is not very attractive to spend (very limited) time on.
  • rousseau
    Hello everyone,

    I do have the same problem: cannot export bibtex file of the whole library.

    Same thing happens using Zotero standalone or FF18 on MacOsX mountain lion.

    my report ID is : 709359221

    thanks
    françois
  • Simon
    [JavaScript Error: "outerHTML is undefined" {file: "/Users/rousseau/Library/Application Support/Firefox/Profiles/iypqoxti.default/zotero/translators/BibTeX.js" line: 2094}]"
  • adamsmith
    can you export smaller chunks of the library?
  • rousseau
    Yes. If I select few articles, it works fine.

    The whole library, no. :(
  • adamsmith
    how about if you select all items in your library (i.e. click on your library and then do "select all" (cmd + a) in the middle panel, then right-click--> export selected items

    I'm wondering whether the problem is something specific to the "Export Library" function, or whether there is a problem with one (or a couple of) specific items.
  • aurimas
    edited January 16, 2013
    I can't get it to trigger an error, but I do see that there is a problem with exporting fields that contain unbalanced < characters. If you can track down which entry in your library is causing this error, we can probably fix this quickly.

    On a more technical note, I think we might have to drop DOMParser for escaping formatting. I don't see how we can avoid mis-parsing fields with stray < characters (and probably some other characters too). I suggest that in the mean time we revert back to the BibTeX version we had before this was introduced.

    I'm working through the BibTeX translator right now, but it will take me hopefully until the end of the week to finish.

    Edit: I also noticed that we end up using invalid characters in BibTeX key generation
  • rousseau
    -> adamsmith : same error happens when I select all the articles and click-right to export to a bibtex file.

    -> aurimas : I do have 810 articles in my Zotero ... it's a bit difficult to find which one can cause this issue... unless there is a tool to find such entries.
  • Simon
    You can find down the problematic article quickly by "binary search." First, export half of your library. If you get an error, try half of that set. Otherwise, try half of the remaining set. Repeat this procedure log2(810) = 10 times and you should find the problematic article.
  • aurimas
    @Simon, we should probably log item title and/or ID on Zotero.nextItem(). Even better, we can include it in the thrown exception.
  • aurimas
    I reverted the HTML escaping changes we recently introduced. Let us know if the export is still not working.
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