Zotero Standalone, libreoffice plugin

I am running libre office 3.3.2 on ubuntu 10.10 with the zotero standalone. The zotero firefox plugin is deactivated. I have two issues with the standalone.

1. LO integration does not work. The icons are shown in LO, but when I click to enter a citation an error message appears that "Open Office.org could not communicate with Zotero. Please ensure that Firefox or the Zotero Standalone is open and set to an online state and try again."

What do I have to do?:

Remarks:
The Standalone is open.
I don't have openoffice installed, only libre office.
I imported all settings for standalone from the plugin at the first start.
I should have the right JRE (see below)
The Standalone is open, how do I set it to an online state?

2. I furthermore cannot create new entries to my library (except for doing it by hand), the icons in the URL-field in firefox don't appear. Should they?

Please help. I think the standalone is a great improvement but I can't use it in this state.
Thanks!
versa


Also:
Sun-java is activated:

update-alternatives --config java
There are 2 choices for the alternative java (providing /usr/bin/java).

Selection Path Priority Status
------------------------------------------------------------
0 /usr/lib/jvm/java-6-openjdk/jre/bin/java 1061 auto mode
1 /usr/lib/jvm/java-6-openjdk/jre/bin/java 1061 manual mode
* 2 /usr/lib/jvm/java-6-sun/jre/bin/java 63 manual mode

Press enter to keep the current choice[*], or type selection number: 2
  • for the second questions - there is no separate connector plugin for Firefox with the Standalone (SA) client - mostly SA is designed for people using other browsers (which have separate plugins). What you can do is use regular Zotero in FF and have it share a database with SA.
    But can I ask why you would want to do that? As long as you're using FF anyway, pretty much everything works better with the plugin than with the standalone - proxy redirection, doi and similar translators etc. and with tab mode, I find it hard to think of a use case.
  • Thanks for the quick reply.

    I want and need to find a workaround for this:

    http://forums.zotero.org/discussion/17547/zotero-and-firefox-40-slow-and-unreliable/#Item_1
  • I very much doubt the standalone - which is essentially just a copy of Zotero running through XUL runner instead of Firefox - is going to be the solution, though. The problems should be exactly the same.

    For your speed issues I'd do some tests with different set-ups, including FF 3.6.x, the old OOo plugin (3.1.b1), the trunk version of the Ooo plugin etc. to see if that helps.
  • Sure, but it wouldn't block firefox for minutes and furthermore I wouldn't have to restart the whole browser.

    And I also would like to less depend on FF.

    So, back to the questions: If there is no separate connector, how do I make the integrated one work?
  • standalone upon installation should give you the option to share the FF-Zotero library (I don't know exactly how this is currently set up, if it can be done after installation - look at the preferences) - my understanding is, though, that that means you can't have both open at the same time. But you could surf, close FF, open SA and try to work with that - not sure if that's viable
    Alternatively you might dabble some with SA and Chromium/Chrome to see if that works - overall you should be aware that SA really is alpha software, so a somewhat bumpy ride is expected.
  • Thanks Adam, sure, I don't expect it to work out of the box. I already tried your suggestions before posting here.
  • Hello versa:

    I'm now working fine with LibreOffice and Zotero. I just did the following steps:

    1) Downloaded the Zotero Standalone Alpha version for GNU/Linux and uncompress it.

    2) Under the uncompressed folder I navigate with Nautilus, or (Explorer under Windows) with the following path: .../Zotero_linux-i686/extensions/zoteroOpenOfficeIntegration@zotero.org/install/ and then click to the archive Zotero_OpenOffice_Integration.oxt (the OpenOffice.org/LibreOffice plug in to Zotero) to install it automatically to LibreOffice.

    3) Then, open the binary file of the Standalone, under /Zotero_linux-i686/ a binary file that is called simply zotero (under GNU/Linux).

    4) Using Zotero I went to Preferences -> Cite, and then I just wrote the following paths:

    UNO Directory: file:///usr/share/libreoffice/basis-link/ure-link/share/java/
    soffice Directory: file:///usr/lib/libreoffice/program/

    5) Then, I just re-start LibreOffice and Zotero, and everything worked for me!

    The following Spanish language link helped me:

    http://tramullas.com/2010/11/25/zotero-integracion-con-openoffice-y-problemas-con-java-en-ubuntu/

    On other hand, I do agree that the Standalone version that woks with Firefox is not a very stable version. Is strange that the Zotero Standalone Alpha version looks more stable than the version that supposed to be "the stable version". I had a lot of problems with the current Standalone version with Firefox (the "stable" one):

    http://forums.zotero.org/discussion/17285/zotero-standalone-crashing-with-openofficeorg-ubuntu-1010/#Item_4

    By the way, on that moment I used Ubuntu 10.10 with OpenOffice.org and Zotero Standalone Alpha solving the Firefox-Zotero problem reported on the moment. Now I'm using Ubuntu 11.04 having the same happy results.

    Sorry for my bad English. I hope that this explanation help you to solve your particular case.
  • Now I'm trying to do under Windows 7, the same that I posted here. As I noted, those steps worked GNU/Linux Ubuntu. But now under Windows 7 I'm not having succesfull results.

    I did almost the same steps, with the difference of this path:

    UNO Directory: file:///C:/Program Files/LibreOffice 3/URE/java
    soffice Directory: file:///C:/Program Files/LibreOffice 3/program

    Can someone help me trying to work with Zotero under Windows 7, as I did under GNU/Linux Ubuntu?
  • Hello:

    ¡Zotero Standalone Alpha version is working under Windows 7, also! I just repeat the same steps but closing Firefox. So maybe the problem around Windows 7 and LibreOffice is something related with Firefox when is open simultaneously with Zotero and LibreOffice. I have the conjecture that the problem is around the java version of Windows 7, because it interfaces the 3 softwares in conflict: LibreOffice and Zotero in one hand, and Firefox on the other.

    I'll post this as bug on other post.
  • Thanks RadicalLibre - your instructions for making standalone work with libreoffice worked for me on ubuntu 10.04.
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