Windows UserName\AppData folders.

nbrefzot
edited December 18, 2018
Hello,
I've come back to using Zotero and have a variation on a question which I have asked before (https://forums.zotero.org/discussion/71452/divided-data-files-in-windows-after-moving-data#latest) in another form. I'm still wondering if there is a way to move both the Profile folders, in C:\Users\UserName\AppData\Local and the corresponding Roaming folder to a USB stick where I have my Library folder. I could move the remainder of the Roaming\Profiles folder there with the command line using the profilemanager command, but would also like to move the Local\Profiles folder with the cache in it. Is there a way to do this?

Thank you for any help you are able to provide, sorry if you think I'm just repeating myself concerning a change that isn't of interest to anyone else. As I don't want to continue to sync my library to the web when I eventually run out of storage space, having the entire application and data on a single USB stick will help to make working more efficient, I think.

Regards. nbrefzot

  • adomasven
    The data that is synced with Zotero is in your data directory. This is the directory that grows in proportion to your library and the only one you need to move to a USB stick if you want to keep it off your main computer. You can set the location of your Zotero directory within Zotero Preferences. The profile folders only contain cache and certain prefs data and will not grow as your Zotero library grows.

    Is there any reason why you would want to move the profile folders off your hard drive too?
  • nbrefzot
    Hello adomasven,

    Yes, I've already moved the data directory onto a USB stick to make it portable, but my understanding is that the Roaming Profile is also unique. So if you move to another computer with just the data directory and not the Roaming Profile as well, the new computer will not be able to create a new profile to compliment the files in the data directory. I don't intend to rely on there being any files online.

    I think you may be right about the Profile in Local with has the cache, this could be created each time you started Zotero, using the files in the Roaming Profile and the data directory as reference material, but this may not be the case.

    At present my cache profile is about 177Mb and growing, I'm not sure whether the size of the cache is slowing-down or speeding up the application.

    Maybe someone can answer this. A large cache in a browser like Chrome slows it down and needs deleting periodically.

    Thank you for your reply. nbrefzot.
  • dstillman
    edited December 20, 2018
    my understanding is that the Roaming Profile is also unique. So if you move to another computer with just the data directory and not the Roaming Profile as well, the new computer will not be able to create a new profile to compliment the files in the data directory. I don't intend to rely on there being any files online.
    That's incorrect. The profile directory only contains some prefs and automatically recreated files. It's trivial to get started again on a new computer with just the data directory — having the profile might save you a few minutes, but you don't necessarily even want the same preferences on different computers.

    None of this has anything to do with having files online.
    At present my cache profile is about 177Mb and growing, I'm not sure whether the size of the cache is slowing-down or speeding up the application.
    You don't ever need to manually touch any files in Zotero's data, profile, or cache directories. There's no harm in deleting the cache folder if you want to clear up space immediately, but the space is managed automatically.

    Zotero uses the system cache folder by default. It's possible you can change it with browser.cache.disk.parent_directory, as in Firefox, but I have no idea if that works, and there's certainly no reason to do it for data longevity, since the whole point of the cache is that it can be wiped at any time.
  • nbrefzot
    Hello dstillman,

    Thank you for all that, it's sorted out all my understanding and misunderstanding of the purpose of those folders. One further question, there is a 'firefox' folder in the AppData\Local\Zotero\Zotero folder, is that used by Zotero v5 and newer, I don't and never have used Zotero just through a browser, or at all with the Firefox browser.

    Thank you very much for your help, nbrefzot.
  • dstillman
    I think that was created by an older Zotero version. It really doesn't matter, but you can delete it.
  • nbrefzot
    Thank your for that answer, it was probably v4, I started off with that.

    Regards nbrefzot.
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