Accidentally lost local library

dwain0wilder · January 15, 2020

I wanted to delete one of my group library's online storage and retain my local copy. After looking around the forums and not finding anything except 1) advice to discontinue syncing for the library; and 2) select "No Group File Storage" at the settings page for the library, I decided that must be the way to do that.

To my amazement, online storage deletion resulted in a sync (I later found out I should have unchecked "Automatic sync" in the local Zotero tool's preferences sync panel!) .

I deleted online storage because there was no evidence of public use of it, but I do continue to need reference to its materials.

So, question:

1) Is there a way to use the Zotero app to manage such a local library without using online storage?
2) The whole system is backed up with the Mac OS 10.12.6 Time Machine. Can I get instructions on restoring all the pieces from various parts of the system to my latest backup, and thus take advantage of the answer to question 1) above (if the answer is yes)?

Thanks!

dstillman · January 15, 2020

It's not a question of auto-sync — if you disabled file storage for the group, all the files would be removed on the next sync, automatic or otherwise. Technically you could disable syncing of that specific group from the Sync preferences, but we wouldn't recommend that as a reliable way to keep local data from being accidentally deleted when you delete it online. Groups are fundamentally online-synced entities and not intended for local-only use (except when you actually leave/delete a group and choose to keep it as a read-only local library).

You can restore the group setting, restore locally from a backup, and then use Replace Online Library from the Sync → Reset pane to overwrite the online version with the backup.

dwain0wilder · January 15, 2020

Thanks, just the info I needed. Much appreciated. I'll keep the online storage from now on. I didn't realize the depth of integration between online and local libraries —and it seems like very sound system architecture.

dwain0wilder · January 17, 2020

Restoring Zotero files from a Time Machine backup is quite challenging! I am getting an error that I do not have privileges to 'access' some files. I've turned on admin read-write privileges, recursively, in both the resident Zotero folder and the Time Machine backup of this folder.

Could be that I will have to use Terminal and sudo to get this done! Any ideas about what files are created with root ownership?? And why? My last attempt with the user interface is to give admin read-write privs recursively to the whole user folder....

dstillman · January 17, 2020

Nothing is created with root ownership. Zotero just runs as the local user, so that's not even possible.

Restoring from Time Machine should be the same as restoring anything else — it should just work. You don't need to and shouldn't give anything admin privileges. The data directory and all files and folders within it just need to be readable and writable by your regular user.

The main time this might be a problem is if you backed up from another computer or macOS user account and were trying to restore to a different account. Otherwise, it's just restoring a folder from the backup.

What's the exact error that you're getting?

dwain0wilder · January 19, 2020

The error is "The operation can't be completed because you don't have permission to access som of the items." This continued to occur after giving my Zotero folder admin read-write access, on both my computer disk and the back-up volume. Don't see a way to attach a jpeg of the error, which I captured.

I was finally able to restore the folder contents by explicitly." I intended to say I restored by explicitly restoring each file in the Zotero folder, then the sub-folders, one at a time. I was able to start the app and observe evidence of full recovery. But to my dismay, when sync started, the entire library contents disappeared. It's as if the sync went the wrong way, restoring the online null library image to my local copy!

I've now again restored my local copy and am careful not to have the Zotero app running unless I have wifi access turned off.

If you could suggest what happened to cause the sync process to download the null library rather update it from my local library, that would be helpful. One possible cause is that I am currently in arrears of payment and have received a message that online storage is locked. But I can view articles in the still existing group library, "Rochester Resilience Library." I began this mess trying to trim down the online storage to a point at which I would be liable for the lower fee, while retaining local storage (a misbegotten strategy I now understand, thanks to your explanation).

dstillman · January 20, 2020

It's as if the sync went the wrong way, restoring the online null library image to my local copy!

It didn't go the "wrong way" — Zotero only syncs explicit deletions, so if items disappear when you sync, it's because you (or someone else on a synced computer) previously deleted those items somewhere and synced those deletions. If you swap in an older version of your database, Zotero has no way to distinguish between that and a computer that hasn't synced in a while, so it will dutifully pull any deletions made since the last-sync date of that database in order to bring the database up to date.

If you want to restore a local backup and overwrite the online library, see Restoring Your Zotero Data From a Backup and Overwriting Synced Changes.

A storage subscription has no effect on this.

dwain0wilder · January 20, 2020

Thanks, that did it!

BTW, the beta Library interface is wonderful: it mimics the local library interface very nicely, and even improves on it to a degree.

The only thing I would wish for is the ability to adjust the panel divisions, to accommodate reading long sub-folder titles, long abstracts, larger views of tags list, etc.