Unable to Sync

LorenaWallace · February 4, 2015

Hi, I had to re-install zotero and lost my library. I have had my zotero window open with the syncing arrow spinning for more than two hours on multiple occasions without any success. Our library is very large and before (when I had it synced) I had been finding the desktop zotero version very very slow and almost unusable (I've been accessing my library through the website instead). However, my colleagues (with the same group library) have have also found the zotero desktop app slow, but somewhat usable. Is there anything you can do to help with syncing and speed of zotero for desktop? I am using the standalone version.

Thank you,

Lorena

dstillman · February 4, 2015

The group library you're an admin (but not an owner) of has over 121,000 items in it. I'm afraid that's just beyond the size of libraries that Zotero is currently designed to work with. It's extremely unlikely that you'll be able to sync that down all at once — which is the only way syncing works at the moment — since the download will time out before it's done processing. The next major version of Zotero, due out later this year, will sync things incrementally and so should help with that. For now, if the library stays that size, you'd probably have to use the website or restore your library from a backup or another computer.

For the library speed itself, there are some things you can do, like closing the tag selector, using Title, Creator, Year mode for the search bar, and putting " before searches to disable search-as-you-type. But ultimately you'll probably need to wait for future optimizations to allow Zotero to work well with such a large library.

OT Lynn · February 7, 2015

Thanks for this helpful reply. When we set up the group library, we didn't realize that all of the additional items in each citation were also being uploaded as separate items (i.e. the references). So, now we are planning to delete that library and start again so that it is not such a large collection.

However, I think we have to move all items to the trash, and empty the trash before we can delete the library?
Is there any way to delete them faster than page by page, 25 at at time?
thanks
Lynn

adamsmith · February 7, 2015

you can do so in the client, where you can delete as much as you want at once, though I'd recommend going about 1-2k items at a time so the operation -- both they sync and emptying the trash -- won't be too big.

OT Lynn · February 7, 2015

Thanks! I think I got ahead of it, and maybe did it too fast. I realized that I could delete the subfolders, so they have disappeared, but the trash is still there. not sure if is going to empty, but I'll wait for a little while and see what happens.
thanks again.

OT Lynn · February 8, 2015

hi, I think we have it sorted out now. Thanks very much for your help. We were able to delete the large library and start over again, making sure that we are careful about how many (hidden) items to include before entering them into the new library.
thanks again,
Lynn