How to move Zotero attachments split over two computers to a third computer?
I'm getting a new computer and am now wondering about the best way to transfer my Zotero files. I'm currently syncing my Zotero library between a two macs, but many attached files are available only on one of the computers (since I've hit the 300 MB storage limit). In the future, I will only use Zotero on the new computer.
What's the best way to get all my attached files from the two old computers to the new one? The information I could find in the forums did not pertain to this situation. All three computers are Macs, if that's relevant.
What's the best way to get all my attached files from the two old computers to the new one? The information I could find in the forums did not pertain to this situation. All three computers are Macs, if that's relevant.
As long as all computers are up and connected, if you only check the "zotero" option you should be able to move them all. At least, this is what I did yesterday!
@jksch, here's what you can do:
1) Make a backup of your entire Zotero data directory on the target computer.
2) Transfer the entire 'storage' folder within your Zotero data directory from the two computers to the target one (e.g., on an external hard drive), putting them in a temporary location (e.g., on your desktop).
3) Follow the 'ditto' steps on here to merge the folder contents, with 'destinationfolder' being the target 'storage' directory within your Zotero data directory.
(As far as I can tell the Merge option described further up the page no longer works in Catalina, despite still being documented on Apple's site.)
The reason you can't just drag subfolders from the source 'storage' directories to the 'target' one, by the way, is that Zotero can create folders in some cases for various purposes (e.g., full-text content syncing) even when the attachment file itself doesn't exist on that computer, so a default drag would just offer to overwrite or skip the conflicting directories. The 'ditto' command will merge them.