Request for Cobiss

aarroyo · November 17, 2022

Hello,
I would be interested in being able to use directly the zotero connector to add directly references from the Cobiss catalogue - library catalogue for many southeastern european countries such as Serbia, Bulgaria, Montenegro, etc. Right now it is necessary to download the RIS file and then add it to Zotero, which is a small inconvenience.
Thank you !

adamsmith · November 17, 2022

We'd want a couple of URLs for important catalogs to test/develop with, please

aarroyo · November 17, 2022

Here are some examples :

Serbia Cobiss :
https://plus.cobiss.net/cobiss/sr/sr/bib/search/advanced?db=cobib

Bulgaria Cobiss :
https://plus.cobiss.net/cobiss/bg/en/bib/search

Slovenian Cobiss :
https://plus.cobiss.net/cobiss/si/sl/bib/search

You will find the list for the catalogues at this page :
https://www.cobiss.net/sr/

adamsmith · November 17, 2022

Yes, that's looks very doable. Issue here: https://github.com/zotero/translators/issues/2927
No guarantee how quickly someone will get to it, but I wouldn't expect it to take *that* long (would also be a good candidate for someone interested in contributing).

brendanoconnell · August 28, 2023

Hi @aaroyo,

A translator is now available for COBISS. Your Zotero Connector should have already auto-updated to include it, but just in case it hasn't, you can also update manually by clicking "Update Translators" in the "Advanced" pane of the Zotero Connector preferences.

Hope that helps, and let us know if you encounter any issues with it!

aperdih · December 21, 2023

Hi, the translator for COBISS is very useful. Would it be possible to improve it by importing also the DOI?
Here is an example that contains DOI: https://plus.cobiss.net/cobiss/si/sl/bib/136673795
(I see one DOI on webpage, but it is actually encoded in two places in the HTML, if that is of any help).

brendanoconnell · December 21, 2023

Hi @aperdih, I'm unfortunately no longer with Zotero, but I'm sure someone else either from the team or a community contributor could make this improvement to the translator!

ViktorJov · February 2, 2026

I don't think it works anymore, ever since the last (COBISS) update (it stopped working even before Zotero 8)... Is there a quick fix?

tomaz pipan · 2026-06-03T08:19:55+00:00

COBISS translator appears broken again for Slovenian COBISS records.

COBISS is the central bibliography portal for all Slovenian bibliography. All the scientific bibliography needs to be in COBISS so it is really important for the Slovenian community to be bale to parse COBISS records. I would greatly apprichiate if this issue can be looked into.

I was trying to parse this:
https://plus-legacy.cobiss.net/cobiss/si/sl/bib/286496768

I also tried importing a RIS file created based on this site but did not work:
https://plus-legacy.cobiss.net/cobiss/si/sl/bib//risCit/286496768

Zotero Connector: Chrome 5.0.209
Zotero desktop version: 6.0.36
I tried Update Translators in Connector Preferences > Advanced.

aborel · 2026-06-03T08:29:11+00:00

The translator apparently needs an update, but the RIS import should work if you run the current Zotero version. 6.0.36 was released 2 years ago, the current version is 9.0.4

tomaz pipan · 2026-06-03T09:49:40+00:00

The RIS file upload works in the last version of Zotero thanks!

I FOUND A WORKAROUN
COBISS runs a legacy page with the old front end.

1. Open the COBISS.js file for COBISS translator in Notepad editor (C:\Users\username\Zotero\translators)
2. Replace word "plus" with "plus-legacy" (this points the connector to the legacy page)
3. Open Zotero Connector options page in Chrome >> Update connectors in Chrome
4. Do not update connectors in the desktop app! Update to the desktop app will reload the .js for all the connectors on your computer.
5. Do your search for biblio from the legacy page: https://plus-legacy.cobiss.net/cobiss/si/sl/bib/search

aborel · 2026-06-03T10:04:30+00:00

To protect your modified import translator against the normal updates that are actually useful and recommended, just give it a different name and identifier using Zotero's translator editor https://www.zotero.org/support/dev/translators/scaffold