how to integrate Standalone and Firefox Collection

mheung
As far as I know, I have both Standalone and Zotero for Firefox installed (Windows7). I do not recall if I was asked if I wanted collections in both to be saved in the same directory. Now I find that I can add new items in the Standalone library, but when I saved webpages, the saved items do not appear in the Standalone library. The items that I added in Standalone also do not appear next to saved webpage items.

How can I manually instruct the two interfaces to use the same directory for saving items?
  • adamsmith
    in the advanced tab of the Zotero preferences, under files and folder, set the data directory of Standalone to the data directory of Zotero for Firefox (or the other way around).
    http://www.zotero.org/support/zotero_data
    note that if you will lose data that's not in both libraries, so it would likely make sense to sync first.
  • mheung
    Thank you -- success! I sync-ed the two collections by entering my user ID and password in the Sync tab under Preferences. I then clicked on the sync icon on view panel in Zotero.

    This link was also useful: http://www.zotero.org/support/sync

    Thanks so much for you advice.
  • adamsmith
    well, syncing is actually not the recommended way of doing this - there is no reason to have the same database on your computer twice. Now that they're in sync, I'd still suggest you change the custom data directory of one to point to the other.
  • mheung
    edited January 12, 2014
    Hmm . . . okay. I opened Files and Folders. The fields for both Base Directory and Data Directory are empty. I have the option to "Choose." What do I choose? Or: do I name a new directory and use the path to point to that?

    Thank you!!
  • adamsmith
    read the link to "zotero data" above - then find the data directory for standalone and write down/copy the filepath. Close down Standalone. Open Zotero for Firefox and under "Data Directory" choose custom and put in or browse to the filepath to the Standalone data directory.
  • mheung
    I did as you suggested. It seems to be working -- the sync icon (spinning arrow) activates automatically now and my collections are in sync.

    Thanks so very much -- you have been very helpful.
  • vinatan
    I have the same problem of zotero saving into My Library when I use Mozilla to search for articles. I also have my standalone open as I am working on a document. I used to be able to highlight the standalone collection and the web save will automatically appear there (Windows Vista). I work on two standalone and one works fine (Windows 7) with the saving into collection and the other doesn't (Windows Vista).

    I have looked at the link http://www.zotero.org/support/zotero_data and understand that both directories need to be from the version for standalone if I want to save my searches there. I went into my Windows zotero directory and the end folder was empty. My question, do I copy the exact location from my computer to be inserted into the directory for both my standalone and mozilla Zotero? Will I still have all the stuff from my zotero collection?

    I don't want to mess this up.
  • adamsmith
    The basic idea is that you take the data directory that now has all the items you want and find out it's location. Then you point the _other_ Zotero to that data directory. In other words, you only redirect one, not both of your data directory locations.
  • vinatan
    currently, both of my data directory in within the mozilla pathway. I don't have a problem with stuff staying there. I just want to get zotero to save into the collection path that I highlight in my standalone and not into 'My Library' after I searched in the firefox browser. Basically, I want it to do the same thing as it does when I'm on the other computer (Windows 7). How do I do that?

    Thanks.
  • adamsmith
    currently, both of my data directory in within the mozilla pathway.
    what exactly does it say under "Data Directory Location" in both Standalone and Firefox?
  • vinatan
    This is what I've got

    Mozilla
    C:\Users\user\AppData\Roaming\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\us83w7hz.default-1382720106681\zotero

    Standalone
    C:\Users\user\AppData\Roaming\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\31rbtr5f.default\zotero
  • vinatan
    Ok, maybe it's not exactly identical ;)
  • adamsmith
    right - and you want to set one of them to point to the other. I'd recommend setting Standalone to the Mozilla one, since it looks like it's currently pointing to an unused Firefox directory, which is a bit odd, but it really doesn't matter which way.
  • vinatan
    will it let me save into the specified collection when saving articles?
  • adamsmith
    yes
  • vinatan
    great!! it works. Thank you!
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