Help with zotfile watch folder

quarkz
Hi, I'm a new user of zotero and zotfile. Coming from mendeley, I hope to get the watched folder function which was available in mendeley.

I thought zotfile has this function but when I set it up, nothing happens. I read somewhere that this feature is removed in the newest ver, is that so? Can someone clarify?

What I need to move or copy pdfs which I just downloaded into a specified location based on the journal they came from, and add their info into zotero. How can it be done automatically

Thanks!

  • dstillman
    edited August 13, 2019
    Zotero is designed to be used a bit differently, so you'll want to read through Adding Items to Zotero. Generally, you save to Zotero from the article page, which tends to result in the best-quality metadata and usually includes the PDF as well. If you only have a PDF, you either save that from the browser the same way or, if you've received it some other way or you don't preview PDFs in the browser, you just drag it into Zotero, in which case Zotero will try to recognize it and retrieve metadata.

    ZotFile offers an option to manually add the most recently downloaded file from a specified directory to the currently selected item, but that's mainly for use when you've added an item to Zotero and a PDF wasn't automatically attached.

    ZotFile can also move files to a custom folder structure after you save them if you prefer that.
  • quarkz
    ic ... I'm trying what you mention and I got it to work. Ya, a different mtd but it seem quite easy. I'll continue to try. Thanks!
  • adamsmith
    (ZotFile used to have functionality more akin to a real watchfolder, but that was never quite stable and the developer decided to discontinue it)
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