so many files in storage?

soaringbear
backing up my Zotero storage folder I was surprised to see 90 thousand files, when I have only 5 thousand citations. Great majority are pubmed, some from journal sites, and very few are web page copy, so there should not be so much junk of 85 thousand extra files taking up 3 G space. Mostly I just need the PMID numbers to get back to the pubmed page. What's with all the extra?
  • mronkko
    It is very difficult to provide a general answer to the question. Which operating system you are running?
  • dstillman
    soaringbear: You can look through the folders to see what's there. Most are probably files from automatic HTML snapshots saved along with items, which you can see if you expand items in the middle pane. If you don't want the snapshots you can search for them, Select All (Ctrl-A or Cmd-A), and delete them, and then empty the trash. You can also disable automatic snapshots in the prefs, though sometimes those include full-text content.

    (mronkko: What would this have to do with the OS?)
  • mronkko
    (Dan: Nothing directly, but suggesting an analyzer software like Disk Inventory X on Mac would be my next recommendation. And this would depend on the OS)
  • dstillman
    Ah, OK. Disk Inventory X or similar might be helpful for the 3GB, just to make sure there's nothing unexpected, but the 85K is unfortunately well within the expected number of files for a medium-size item library with snapshots. HTML snapshots just create a lot of files. Many of those are likely duplicates, but, as I've probably said in older threads, we can't really deduplicate while maintaining filesystem-based accessibility.
  • soaringbear
    So are you saying that for the thousands of pubmed citations, there is massive duplication of the same background captured over and over again?

    I think I need the snapshots only sometimes for creating item from web page, and maybe for some journal sites. But not for pubmed. Is there a selective way of turning off snapshot for pubmed?

    How can I ascertain when I need shapshot and when I don't?

    Win 7.
  • mronkko
    There is a keyboard shortcut to toggle snapshots on and off

    http://www.zotero.org/support/getting_stuff_into_your_library#saving_web_pages
  • soaringbear
    Do I have to change preferences on the occasions that I do want a snapshot, or is that overridden when creating item from current page?
  • adamsmith
    Actually this should be a thing of the past. Zotero's pubmed translator doesn't attach snapshots any more - just a link, which doesn't save any files locally. This change is moderately recent - I think about 6 months or so, but if you check recent import the only think you should see attached to a pubmed import is a link (looks like an attached snapshot, but has the little chain-link symbol).
  • adamsmith
    As for the pref: What you would want to do is to turn off the snapshot preference and then hold the shift key when clicking the "Create New Item"... key when you _do_ want a snapshot. As the documentation explains, that will toggle the pref for that particular import.
  • soaringbear
    chain link symbol? where?

    I'm only a casual user so remembering to hold the shift is doubtful - what are ramifications?
  • adamsmith
    It should look like this:
    http://imgur.com/baAyf5P

    As for the shift key. Zotero offers you the option to always get Snapshots, never get snapshots, and a keyboard shortcut to toggle that behavior (with the shift key) on an individual basis. I'm not sure what else you'd want?
  • soaringbear
    I don't suppose there's some friendly way to remove snapshots from old pubmed items (and not other items) in my zotero library?
  • dstillman
    I told you above—you have to search for them, and then you can delete them en masse.
  • adamsmith
    Try this advanced search:
    http://imgur.com/ZepkyJV
    This should return all pubmed items before the change in the translator. Note that the actual item title will be light grey, the attachment title will be black.
    Create a saved search.
    Go into that saved search, select all (ctrl+a/cmd+a) --> make sure only the attachments/snapshots are highlighted --> right click, move items to trash.
    Haven't tested this, but should work.
  • dstillman
    Searching for "PubMed Snapshot" in the quick search bar might also do the trick.
  • soaringbear
    thanks! quick search picks them up.

    Now I'm unclear how to pick just the attachments and not the plain item? Pick one at a time? Nervous about this since there is no undo of a delete.
  • adamsmith
    if you do select all (ctrl+a) after either of the searches we suggest, you should see that just the attachments are selected.
    (and you're moving them to the trash, so there is an undo until you empty the trash).
  • soaringbear
    checking one by one I see a couple titles containing the word snapshot that do not have attachment

    thanks for pointing out trash provides an undo
  • adamsmith
    my advanced search I posted above should be fool-proof, though if you actually search for PubMed Snapshot that shouldn't get you any false positives either.
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