Upgrade StorageZotfile seems to be copying and not moving files and thus creating duplicates
Hello,
Thank you for all your work on zotfile. I wish I had found it earlier. I'm in the process of migrating a large library into zotero with the help of zotfile. This is not the first time that I've migrated between systems, and it is going better than ever before.
However, I notice that when I look for .pdfs in my "download - to import" file, zotfile, correctly attaches them to items in my database, renames them, and then moves them onto my sync file (Onedrive for now). However, it leaves the original, poorly named, poorly organized documents in the "download - to import" file.
I keep running a duplicate detector on the files, removing all duplicates, fixing up my database a little more and then running the "find pdfs" again, hoping to iteratively connect most things so I just have a small batch of pdfs (i.e. image scanned articles form 60s). However, what seems to be happening is that Zotero/Zotfile finds a whole bunch more files, renames them, and moves them over, but most have already been found and now I just have lots of duplicates everywhere to clean out.
Is there are way that I can tell Zotero to move/delete them in the orignal location?
I thought this problem was coming from the fact that my files were not on my computer but on a server and perhaps that was preventing them from being deleted. But now I'm trying again with them all on my computer and the same thing is happening.
This seems to be the opposite problem that many people are having so I wonder if there is some secret setting that I've changed.
Thank you!
Thank you for all your work on zotfile. I wish I had found it earlier. I'm in the process of migrating a large library into zotero with the help of zotfile. This is not the first time that I've migrated between systems, and it is going better than ever before.
However, I notice that when I look for .pdfs in my "download - to import" file, zotfile, correctly attaches them to items in my database, renames them, and then moves them onto my sync file (Onedrive for now). However, it leaves the original, poorly named, poorly organized documents in the "download - to import" file.
I keep running a duplicate detector on the files, removing all duplicates, fixing up my database a little more and then running the "find pdfs" again, hoping to iteratively connect most things so I just have a small batch of pdfs (i.e. image scanned articles form 60s). However, what seems to be happening is that Zotero/Zotfile finds a whole bunch more files, renames them, and moves them over, but most have already been found and now I just have lots of duplicates everywhere to clean out.
Is there are way that I can tell Zotero to move/delete them in the orignal location?
I thought this problem was coming from the fact that my files were not on my computer but on a server and perhaps that was preventing them from being deleted. But now I'm trying again with them all on my computer and the same thing is happening.
This seems to be the opposite problem that many people are having so I wonder if there is some secret setting that I've changed.
Thank you!
If you just drag files on disk to Zotero, Zotero (not ZotFile) will add them as a stored file, which always leaves the original in place. ZotFile can convert those to linked files in your configured location, but by that point the original file is no longer involved.
You can hold down a modifier key (Cmd on macOS, I think Shift elsewhere) when dragging files to Zotero to move the files instead of leaving the original in place.
You can also use a different modifier key to add files as links rather than stored files. That will obviously leave the files in the original location, but ZotFile might be able to move those to the configured location. (I'm not sure about that, but I don't see why it wouldn't.)
When I did drag them, I was aware of this so I deleted them in the original location.
I was not aware of the modifier key option, that is great.
I think the problem is that they are stored as links both in my chosen (sync) file and in the Zotero storage database folder. So even if I delete them physically, they come again. I guess the solution is to highlight everything and "rename (move)", and then remove duplicates again?
Thank you