Recommended tools/workflows for attaching PDF from browser to existing item

adamsmith
The context of this is a scoping review. I have a metadata item in Zotero. "Find Available PDF" doesn't find the PDF. I am, however, able to find the PDF elsewhere on the web, e.g. on academia.edu or an author's website. Currently what I do is:
1. Open the PDF in my browser (Firefox)
2. Download the PDF
3. Open the Downloads folder or dialog
4. Drag the PDF to the item in Zotero

There has got to be something faster, right? Previously, there was

1) Zotfile's ability to attach the last item added to the Downloads folder and
2) The ability to drag the URL bar icon to Zotero to add a file

Zotfile doesn't exist anymore and I can't get 2) to work.
Gratefully for any suggestions.
  • mjthoraval
    edited yesterday at 11:19pm
    If the PDF file can be viewed in Firefox, I use the connector to download the file directly to Zotero, to skip the temporary copy in the Download folder, and then move the PDF file to the existing item.

    Otherwise, the "Save Link to Zotero" context menu option for PDFs would be useful also, together with the option to drag directly from the link in the webpage to the existing item.
  • tim820
    edited today at 1:35am
    For linked attachment files, Zotmoov has the same feature that Zotfile did (and so does Attanger IIRC). It's under Advanced Options in its Settings ("Search Folder for Attaching New Files"). Once you've saved the file to the folder you designated there, and you have selected the item you want to add it to, use the right-click Zotmoov:Attach New File option. The latest-dated file in that folder will be attached to the item and moved to your linked-files folder (and renamed according to your Zotero renaming scheme). I use it often.

  • dstillman
    Sorry, we know this used to work better, and we're going to try to improve it.

    Dragging PDF URLs indeed doesn't work anymore, but it was never a great option, since the app didn't have access to cookies. Now that we're doing nearly all attachment saving from the browser side when using the Connector, we really want to solve this via the Connector as well, guaranteeing that attachments being viewed in the browser can be saved properly.

    It used to be possible to add both PDFs and webpage snapshots to a selected item when Zotero was a legacy Firefox extension. The Connector doesn't know when an item is selected in Zotero, so we can't provide proper UI feedback, but we could just offer blind options to do those things, and if a valid item wasn't selected, they could just show an error. That's the easiest option here. Longer-term, there are a couple options for bidirectional communication between the app and extension that could let the extension know what item is selected in the app so it can show correct, clear options.
  • dstillman
    (Another planned feature that could help somewhat would be the ability to open a PDF on disk in Zotero, with a prompt to add a PDF as a standalone attachment and run recognition or as a child attachment to the selected item. That would at least prevent the need to drag a file onto a specific item in Zotero.)
  • mjthoraval
    If the file is automatically downloaded and opened in Firefox (file:///[...]), dragging the URL file icon to Zotero is working:
    https://s3.amazonaws.com/zotero.org/images/forums/u265723/gbrluippx8cv9q1yidin.png

    Dragging from the Downloads Progress Button of Firefox also works for files that are simply downloaded but not opened:
    https://s3.amazonaws.com/zotero.org/images/forums/u265723/x0am8i563lm7tcz0dhcn.png
    So no need to navigate to the Downloads folder. I am not sure if that is what you meant.
  • adamsmith
    Thanks all -- @tim820, thanks for pointing at Zotmoov; I'd been reluctant to install since I don't need any of the other functionality, but will take a look.
    @mjthorval -- the problem with the browser icon is that most PDFs I don't load have metadata that automatically gets retrieved, and then I have to merge the two items, which also isn't super fast. I did see that I could drag from the download dialog, which is indeed a time saver

    @dstillman
    we could just offer blind options to do those things, and if a valid item wasn't selected, they could just show an error. That's the easiest option here.
    I haven't thought about the UX of this holistically much, but for my specific use case this would have been perfect. I typically use the "Locate" function from the PDF-less item to eventually get to the PDF (either via my libray or GScholar), so the item is already selected and having an option to attach from the connector would be perfect.

    The biggest risk I guess wouldn't be that folks don't have an item selected (as you said, you'd just throw an error), but that they do and aren't aware which item that is and then get the wrong PDF attached to an item in a way that's going to be tricky to trace because the file, of course, gets renamed.
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