Zotero had been “not good enough” for many years. Since version 7, it has become nearly perfect for me. I can’t recommend it highly enough.
Zotero 8
31–40 of 63 posts
Re: Zotero 8
#32[dead]
Im unaware of another open source tool that provides all zotero does that's lighter weight. I can guarantee it's better than using text files on disk.
Hi @ifh-hn , would you mind sharing what features you feel might make zotero better than text files on a disk? I'm genuinely interested to learn.
I've heard of zotero maybe a year or so ago, and was curious about it, but never took the plunge. I manage the bulk of my info/knowledge base across mostly locally-saved text files, with a few other tidbits leveraging PDFs and word process files (.odt, .docx)...and really i only use the latter for pasting in screenshots. And, then of course simply synching them across devices using syncthing.
While my approach works great for the majority of the time, i can imagine there might be some functions that some other tools might bring me which i might be missing...I suppose one thing that i lack is a graph of linkages for content that might live in different, separate files but might be related, etc. So, would you be willing to share your opinion, experience for what makes zotero better than text files on a disk? :-) Thanks!
Re: Zotero 8
#33Earlier quoted context omitted.
Right up until one tries to set up a self-hosted server (spoiler - you can't, at least not without 'significant effort' - they themselves say that if you ask about it).
I haven't had an issue doing this with a standard WebDAV server and this has been true since 2007 or so.
I had a very convenient setup using linked files stored in Dropbox that worked very well for 15 years. The Zotero 6 to 7 upgrade completely broke this, and modified the database so that rollback is not possible. There was no warning that this workflow would be completely broken on upgrade.
Re: Zotero 8
#34Coincidentally, I was just looking at using Zotero on Linux this morning after having used it previously on Mac for some classes.
Re: Zotero 8
#35Earlier quoted context omitted.
Right up until one tries to set up a self-hosted server (spoiler - you can't, at least not without 'significant effort' - they themselves say that if you ask about it).
I haven't had an issue doing this with a standard WebDAV server and this has been true since 2007 or so.
Is there any documentation for self-hosting that you can share or point to? Um, maybe my brain is not working today...but it sure is hell is not obvious where the instructions are for setting up a self-hosted instance. :-)
Re: Zotero 8
#36Earlier quoted context omitted.
Im unaware of another open source tool that provides all zotero does that's lighter weight. I can guarantee it's better than using text files on disk.
Hi @ifh-hn , would you mind sharing what features you feel might make zotero better than text files on a disk? I'm genuinely interested to learn. I've heard of zotero maybe a year or so ago, and was curious about it, but never took the plunge. I manage the bulk of my info/knowledge base across mostly locally-saved text files, with a few other tidbits leveraging PDFs and word process files (.odt, .docx)...and really i…
I use it in an academic sense. I use it browser plugin to one click capture a source. Zotero mostly automatically identifies the source type, author, and other metadata. It can retrieve metadata directly from files like pdfs too. Further it has ability to retrieve metadata from ISBN, doi, and other identifiers. It can export these sources to really any citation style and also integrates with other software for this purpose. It has a plugin system for extras too.
I have nothing against text files on the disk but zotero is simply much better as a knowledge/source manager.
Re: Zotero 8
#37Post Mendeley shutdown, zotero has been an awesome replacement (while not being controlled by Elsevier). Given the amount of PDF's that I see during researchy times in my life, it's been an absolute godsend. Highly reccommend!
Zotero is the best. However, if your brain is highly tuned to use Mendeley Desktop, note that they backed down on killing it, they just won't add new features (where that leaves security updates I'm not sure).
https://blog.mendeley.com/2025/07/09/mendeley-is-not-going-a...
Re: Zotero 8
#38[dead]
> amazing tool thank you
This is a sneaky edit completely different from the original post I replied to, which was about how bloated zotero was and how the op had uni stalled immediately and gone back to text files on disk.
Re: Zotero 8
#39> Zotero is open source and developed by an independent, nonprofit organization that has no financial interest in your private information. With Zotero, you always stay in control of your own data. Refreshing as a cool breeze on a hot summer's day.
Personally I use Zotero with my own WebDAV server for sync. Works as advertised, without a hitch.
Did you sync all data to multiple computers without a Zotero account? Zotero's documentation said WebDAV could sync attachment files. But everything else required a Zotero account.[1]
Re: Zotero 8
#40Earlier quoted context omitted.
Right up until one tries to set up a self-hosted server (spoiler - you can't, at least not without 'significant effort' - they themselves say that if you ask about it).
I haven't had an issue doing this with a standard WebDAV server and this has been true since 2007 or so.
Did you sync all data to multiple computers without a Zotero account? Zotero's documentation said WebDAV could sync attachment files. But everything else required a Zotero account.[1]