Group not appearing in standalone, cannot import items?

mrissa
Hi there,

So I started a private group on my zotero account. I read in previous forums that it is possible with the newest version to simply drag whole collections (including subfolders) into the group. So first, I created the group, put in the settings, etc. However, now the group does not appear in my zotero standalone- under my library, group libraries appear but it is blank underneath. When I click group libraries, it takes me to the website URL for the group.

I thought I could just drag my items into "group libraries", but that did not appear to work. I suspect it is because my group is not showing up in zotero standalone. The only way I can add items to my group appears to be in the WEBSITE version of the group, which is really bizarre. I can't seem to do it in the standalone version.

Anyone have any ideas?

Thanks!
  • mrissa
    Also, when I added a folder and a fake file in the website version of the group, just to see if it would show up in standalone, it did not. I closed and reopened zotero as well and it still did not show up.
  • dstillman
    If you don't see the groups in the client, then it's probably not syncing (anything) correctly.

    http://www.zotero.org/support/kb/changes_not_syncing
  • mrissa
    Thanks for replying so quickly!
    I checked my preferences and it's all setup to sync. I don't see the green sync icone in either the website groups page or in the standalone.. where is this?
  • dstillman
    There's no sync icon on the website. (The website doesn't sync. It's the client, running on your machine, that needs to sync with the servers.) The green sync icon is on the right-hand side of the toolbar in Standalone.
  • mrissa
    I am sorry but I cannot find this icon. I see that it is suppose to look like this http://www.zotero.org/support/sync, but it is not appearing on my standalone- that arrow is not visible at all.

    I figured out that arrow is for manual syncing, however since I am set up to automatically sync, I can't figure out why this is a problem.
  • mrissa
    Oh wait. I found the arrow. It is not syncing though, and has not merged my libraries together from zotero.org, so I still cannot see my group in the standalone that I created.
  • dstillman
    It is not syncing though
    You need to be more specific than that.

    http://www.zotero.org/support/reporting_bugs
  • throndse
    edited June 21, 2012
    Hi there,

    I'm having the same problem.

    edit: hindsight
  • throndse
    edited June 21, 2012
    edit: hindsight
  • throndse
    Arrrhh...

    The 'fix' for this is to click the tiny arrow next to the Group Libraries header to make it expand.
  • Jacksy
    Thanks throndse, I could have been messing about for hours without that little piece of info about the tiny arrow!!
  • throndse
    you are welcome. only happy that you didn't have to!
  • essinedvega
    I spent days trying to figure this out -_-
  • r4chong
    This helped me as well! hahah. The tiny arrow....
  • KatrinaPlato
    The tiny arrow reference also helped me. Thank you!!!
  • inecollins
    This just saved me after 6hrs.
  • liloukc
    I hope Zotero devs are listening to this thread. There's no reason why the "My groups" list shouldn't just display all subscribed groups without user intervention.
  • adamsmith
    I'm pretty sure groups show by default. People may have accidentally collapsed them.
  • dstillman
    Yeah, as far as I know this only happens when people collapse "Group Libraries" manually.
  • Vandana110791
    Thank you so much for telling us about the tiny arrow! Whew
  • a_lim_
    that tiny arrow...
  • anf14b
    Sorry guys, but where's the arrow?
  • dstillman
    To the left of "Group Libraries" in the left pane of the Zotero client.
  • selway
    Damn. I've been at this for hours. Now one-thirty in the morning. Tiny arrow indeed. Love this reference manager but really people, you have to fix this.
  • dstillman
    Sorry you had trouble with this. As we say above, as far as we know the only way this happens is if you accidentally collapse Group Libraries yourself, though perhaps there's some way it can happen automatically. And, to be fair, this is a standard UI mechanism that's used in pretty much all hierarchical lists (e.g., file managers), so there's not really anything out of the ordinary here.

    But this does seem to confuse people an awful lot, so we should probably figure something out. One option, suggested by liloukc above, would be to make Group Libraries just a header rather than a collapsible row, so that all libraries — personal and group — were always displayed, even if they were individually collapsed. A little annoying for people who do want to collapse their library list, but maybe worth it.
  • selway
    Yes I started thinking about it after venting about it. But it's not quite standard. In my windows file manager at documents, for example, if I click the "little arrow" it does expand the folder. However, expansion also occurs if I double click on the "documents" button itself. And within the expanded documents, each folder expands when I double click and so on. Double-clicking on "Groups" in my Zotero Firefox extension however was opening a new window in my browser and taking me to Zotero.

    I certainly agree that it would be awkward to have huge long lists open all the time.
  • rowanscribbles
    Hi- thanks for this thread- had zotero less than one day and set up a group on the server and was trying to copy paste items on the actual group page rather than in the client window.
    This page of comments and the look for the little arrow was important to me. My client pane- if thats what it is called was open so that it showed up to 'trash'. So the group library didnt show in the pane as it was hidden as my pane was too small.
    Anyway am a Mac user and the safari extension doesnt work as welll as the original firefox one- I'm using firefox now whilst I evaluate for my programme-ta
  • KAYGREENE
    One more quick question (and I agree with dstillman that the 'little arrow' is a standard convention...but I digress) ...

    When I click on 'Group Libraries' on the left-hand panel, the center panel is empty. I can look at the articles in each collection and it's sub-collections only when I click on the name of the group collection. BUT, when I click on 'My Library' at the top of the page, ALL my articles are in the center pane, regardless of where they are in my collections. Is there a way to see (and therefore SEARCH) all the articles in ALL my group libraries with one click?
  • adamsmith
    Each group is treated as a separate library (so each group is equivalent to "My Library"), so no, there's no way to see all items in all groups in one view
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