Missing Library

treknick
This morning I opened Zotero for the first time in about a month and I get this message: https://imgur.com/a/YvfVHV4

I cancelled but when Zotero opened up, it was empty, nothing in the library. https://imgur.com/a/DoZIHf9
Same for the synced zotero.org library. Where did my library go? I had about 170 entries in there.
  • dstillman
    Start here: https://www.zotero.org/support/zotero_data#locating_missing_zotero_data
    Same for the synced zotero.org library. Where did my library go?
    You've never synced with this account. Syncing isn't required, so unless you had another account you simply never synced.
  • treknick
    Thanks for the tip, none of those options work for me.
  • dstillman
    Can you say more? Unless you deleted your data, or something on your computer deleted your data, or you're misremembering and you last used Zotero on another computer, it would still exist somewhere.

    In your current Zotero data directory, what are the names, sizes, and timestamps of all zotero.sqlite* files? Is there a 'storage' directory, and does it contain folders with timestamps corresponding to your previous usage of Zotero?
  • treknick
    Hi dstillman

    Thank you for your continued assistance. Listing in the order shown on the linked page:

    I started using Zotero in 2019, so it is unlikely to be the upgrade issue.

    I only use this computer.

    zotero.sqlite (dated today) 4,800KB
    zotero.sqlite.bak (dated yesterday) 4,800KB
    zotero.sqlite-journal (dated today) 417KB

    The storage folder does not exist.

    A File explorer search has revealed no other zotero.sqlite* files on This PC.

    I used the default data directory.

    ---

    It's all a bit of a mystery, really. Would Disk Clean-up delete Zotero's database?



  • dstillman
    OK, so that's a completely new, empty data directory.
    Would Disk Clean-up delete Zotero's database?
    That's certainly not something we've heard of happening before.

    Do you have any full backups of this computer?
  • nickgoddard
    Thanks for all your help and advice. It turns out that, for some reason, I was logged into (and synced with) a Zotero account that I created in error and don't use.

    https://imgur.com/a/SrjLrPt





This is an old discussion that has not been active in a long time. Before commenting here, you should strongly consider starting a new discussion instead. If you think the content of this discussion is still relevant, you can link to it from your new discussion.

Sign In or Register to comment.