Zotero 9 not allowing for manual renaming of attachments

jdien · 2026-07-12T02:07:25+00:00

I have a lot of old attachments in my Zotero database that were added prior to automatic renaming. I've been renaming them as I went along, using the "rename attachment" option in the right-click menu. However, in Zotero 9.0.6, this option seems to be gone? It's still renaming new additions to the database, it's just not letting me rename them short of manually removing the attachment and then reattaching them, which is a hassle. Is there some reason for having removed this option? I can understand automatic renaming being potentially an issue, but why remove manual renaming? Could it be restored? Or is there still some way to do this?

dstillman · 2026-07-12T02:38:49+00:00

Zotero has always had automatic renaming, and it still has manual renaming, now via a button that appears next to the filename in the item pane if the filename differs from the current filename format. Zotero now has continuous renaming, so the filename will remain updated even if you update item metadata after adding the item, meaning that the button normally won’t appear unless you change the filename format.

See also https://www.zotero.org/support/kb/attachment_title_vs_filename

jdien · 2026-07-12T03:15:14+00:00

Thanks! I don't see the button being mentioned in the online documentation. I've tried it and it does seem to work as advertised! For the case where it is a link to a pdf, the pdf is being renamed when I click on the icon you noted, but the title of the attachment is unchanged. This is not ideal, but I don't really care as long as the pdf is renamed. Thanks!

Joe

dstillman · 2026-07-12T04:06:55+00:00

Linked files aren't renamed by default. You can enable that from the settings, and then you won't need to use the button.

the title of the attachment is unchanged

This is explained on the page I linked to.

jdien · 2026-07-12T04:48:48+00:00

Ummm...the link you gave kind of does not say anything about the icon. Look for yourself!

Also, I already had it set to rename attached files. It's simply not doing so in the case that I described. See the attached screencap.
https://s3.amazonaws.com/zotero.org/images/forums/u5696674/cv370txlzkb7wuvs6uec.png

tim820 · 2026-07-12T04:57:52+00:00

@jdien regarding linked file renaming, if you use the Zotmoov plugin, its right-click "Move Selected to Directory" actually does *two* things:
1. if linked file renaming is turned ON in Zotero settings, it renames *both* the title and the filename to the same name, according to your Zotero renaming format (similar to what its predecessor Zotfile did);
2. it moves the PDF as a linked file to your 'move to' linked-files folder set in Zotmoov settings.

If the PDF is *already* in that folder, it will still do the title/file renaming as in #1. So if you like the title and filename being the same, it is a simple way to quickly rename both, for one or more selected items.

dstillman · 2026-07-12T05:06:21+00:00

Ummm...the link you gave kind of does not say anything about the icon. Look for yourself!

@jdien: I was responding to the thing I quoted — your comment about the title. That's exactly what the page explains.

@tim820: You don't need to keep telling people about ZotMoov changing the title too — there's been a setting in Zotero to just display filenames in the items list since earlier this year. That's what people should use. There's no reason ZotMoov should even be doing that anymore — it's just throwing away data that in some cases provides information about the provenance of the file.

tim820 · 2026-07-12T05:19:08+00:00

I realize Zotero can now display filenames in place of titles in the main library view. I personally prefer the way Zotfile did it for years (explicitly making the two the same), which Zotmoov continues to do by default. But linked files users can easily turn that default matching OFF in Zotmoov via extensions.zotmoov.rename_title, and turn ON the the Zotero method in Settings, if they prefer that way.
https://github.com/wileyyugioh/zotmoov/blob/master/docs/SETTINGS_INFO.md#selected-hidden-preferences

dstillman · 2026-07-12T05:21:54+00:00

“the way Zotfile did it for years” doesn’t make sense when there’s now a setting to show the filename in the items list instead. Again, it’s just throwing out potentially useful data that, with the setting, you never would see unless you went looking for it.