Problem with migrated document

adlerhn
I had a document with about 50 citations, with some comments and changes enabled.

I then had to switch to another computer, where as suggested I have brought by full Zotero database. Using Ubuntu, installing Firefox (tested 25 to 29), LibreOffice 4.2.1, and Zotero for Firefox with the LibreOffice plugin.

I have several errors which may or may not be related:

- When trying to sync my Zotero database to the Zotero server, I get the error:

"The file '[xxx].pdf' cannot be updated.

Check that the file is not currently in use and that its permissions allow write access."

Permissions are fine. My user can correctly write these files, stored in an NTFS filesystem. Exactly the same as in my previous computer, but here synchronisation is failing, whereas it was working correctly in the other one. The Debug ID when starting Firefox, including the synchronisation is D1845108694.

- Furthermore, and most importantly, Zotero is practically unusable from within LibreOffice. When I select an operation (like opening the preferences Window), it works the first time after I've started Firefox and LibreOffice, but not always. This is the error I get sometimes when opening the preferences window:

Zotero experienced an error updating your document.\n\nassignment to undeclared variable needUpdate

The Debug ID is D708278223.

I think this is even worse with Firefox 29 than it was with Firefox 25, with which at least I could open the preferences dialog once. After clicking ok, nothing worked anymore until I closed LibreOffice and Firefox and restarted both.

- Very likely related to the previous issues, the formatting of the citations and the references list is messed up. Some appear duplicated, like: "(Drewes, 2010)[1](Drewes, 2010)(Drewes, 2010)[1](Drewes, 2010)(Drewes, 2010)"). I've tried changing the citing format, but the reference table is never changing style.

I hope all this is related to one or two small root issues.

I will try to troubleshoot this by removing factors. Nevertheless, any help or guidance would be welcome.
  • dstillman
    If you're looking for support, you need to provide Debug IDs from the latest released version of Firefox, not an unreleased alpha version.
  • dstillman
    (Or, alternatively, Zotero Standalone.)
  • adlerhn
    Hi Dan, thanks for the suggestion. I didn't think it would make a difference, but Zotero Standalone works a bit (but definitely) better than it did with Firefox 29. But I still have the same issues I had with Firefox 25.

    I've removed the tracking of changes in the document so as to decrease the number of factors, and executed new tests, now with Zotero Standalone.

    - Clicking on the Refresh button: The Debug ID is D817427145.

    - Clicking on Set Document Properties: The Debug ID is D1735835896 (after showing the dialog and pressing OK).

    - Adding a citation: The Debug ID is D1923976028 (the citation is added to the document, but the popup window with the progress bar stays open at around 70%).

    Each of these tests are performed on clean instances:

    - Run Zotero Standalone
    - Run LibreOffice
    - Enable Debug
    - Execute action
    - Stop Debug and send to server
    - Close LibreOffice
    - Close Zotero Standalone
    - kill some zombie zotero process that stays in the background (otherwise I cannot execute Zotero again)
  • adlerhn
    Just noticed that closing and reopening LibreOffice is not really needed. Only Zotero needs to be killed and restarted in order to be able to execute additional tests.

    Following this approach about 30 times, choosing the Set Document Properties each time and just pressing OK (so the Zotero references are refreshed) I've solved the citations that were printing incorrectly. But the citations list at the end of the document still doesn't refresh: The Debug ID is D250164377.
  • dstillman
    Simon will need to take a look at this, but does any of this happen in a new document? If not, see Debugging Broken Documents.
  • adlerhn
    Thanks for the link. This has helped me fix the issue.

    It looks like the Zotero field codes in the document were corrupted for some reason. In my action yesterday I fixed the citations, but when the citations list was refreshing it was still crashing. After accepting all the changes, the list now refreshes correctly.

    So, I guess there were some corrupted citation entries marked as unconfirmed changes, and the Zotero plugin wasn't completely able to ignore them.
  • adlerhn
    Zotero is still not working in Firefox 29 (I can help debugging if needed), and the synchronisation is still failing for some reason, but it is working fine in both Standalone and Firefox 28, so I can get back to work. Thanks again!
  • adlerhn
    And after a couple of additional tests I think it was the use of Zotero under Firefox 29 what corrupted my document on the first place.

    So, watch out when updating.
  • dstillman
    If the 4.0 Beta doesn't work in Firefox 29, we'd want to know. Otherwise, no need to report.
  • dstillman
    To be clear, this isn't "updating" — this is using an unreleased alpha version of Firefox. You shouldn't have any expectation that that would work with the current, non-beta release of any add-on.
  • adlerhn
    That's perfectly understandable. I just thought it would be handy to report an incompatibility before it affects many users.

    Anyway, I guess that incompatibility has been fixed now, as Firefox 29 with the Zotero 4.0 beta is apparently working fine.
  • dstillman
    I just thought it would be handy to report an incompatibility before it affects many users.
    Yes, definitely — just be sure you've tried the beta first. We try to fix issues with Firefox Nightly in the beta before they hit Aurora/Beta.
  • dstillman
    (And, I would say, if you're going to be running Aurora, you should definitely be running the Zotero beta anyway.)
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