more than 25,000 random png & jpeg & html files downloaded from Zotero storage

Vlinda21
When I downloaded Zotero to my Mac, I noticed that there was a lot of random files popping into my file manager. There was so much that I started to click on them and most would be pictures or logos. I checked where the file was downloaded from and it listed "Zotero-->Storage-->KXAT7V7D". I had so many I started deleting some but still have around 13,000. I'm worried that this is going to affect my storage. Is there any explanation on where these files may have come from and if this is normal?
  • dstillman
    Those are just part of webpage snapshots that Zotero saves. In older versions of macOS, those will show up in All My Files, which is a fairly useless view that's been discontinued in the latest version of macOS.

    If you don't want webpage snapshots, you should delete them through Zotero, not through the filesystem, and you can disable saving of them from the General pane of the Zotero preferences. We can walk you through deleting them in batch if you want.
  • Vlinda21
    Yes, a walk through will be helpful, thank you!
  • bwiernik
    Open Advanced Search (magnifying glass) and search for:
    'Title' 'is' 'Snapshot'

    Click Save Search. In the Saved Search, press Ctrl/Cmd+A to select all of the "Snapshot" items. Right-click and choose Move Items to Trash. Then, right-click on the Trash and choose Empty Trash.

    Then, to keep Snapshots from being saved in the future, open Zotero Preferences and on the General pane, uncheck "Automatically take snapshots when creating items from web pages".
  • dstillman
    (Might not even need to use a saved search here. "Snapshot" in the search bar in All Fields & Tags mode might be sufficient. If it matches another item you can also deselect it manually with Ctrl/Cmd-click after Select All.)
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