Thanks Robert, it's very helpful to have this level of detail. I have been looking into Zotero, as I would like to rekindle my old academic studies and have many PDFs sitting in my OneDrive folder. I have a few questions please:
Do you do all your annotations just using Zotero's built-in PDF reader?
Have you tried out the Zotero mobile app (android/iOS)? As well as reading and annotating the PDFs on my laptop, I would love to be able do this on an iPad, and then have those highlights/notes sync with the PDF on my laptop (and into my Obsidian).
Do you use Zotero's own storage (for files)? The mobile app syncs across devices but only supports Zotero 'stored files' (not 'linked files'), and Zotero's free tier is only 300MB. I would be in its >6gb tier which is $120/year which is too expensive for me. However it also supports WebDAV so I am looking into that, for instance with Koofr which gives 10gb free.
>Do you do all your annotations just using Zotero's built-in PDF reader?
Yes. I could do these with other tools (esp. Readwise Reader which I use religiously for non-work reading) but I find it's better to have a single source of truth for research work.
>Have you tried out the Zotero mobile app (android/iOS)?
I actually had no idea there even was a Zotero mobile app for Android until you just mentioned it! (I'm not an iOS user so I have no idea about iPads.) In the past I was using a third-party app that is called "Zoo" (IIRC) on my Samsung Tablet and it wasn't that good. I'm checking the app out now on my Android phone and it looks promising.
>Do you use Zotero's own storage (for files)?
I do, and I have the $120/year tier, and I have my university pay for it since I'm using it for job related scholarship. If I weren't in such a position, I'd be looking at workarounds -- because when I started the research review, I blew through the 300mb of free storage in a week whereas that had been perfectly adequate for years prior.
Thanks. I’m pleased you’re using the inbuilt reader for your Zotero library, keeps it simple.
I am experimenting with the Readwise free trial at the moment. I know it integrates well with Obsidian.
Although the WebDAV providers themselves are 3rd party and one has to make sure their servers are correctly specified, WebDAV per se as a syncing route is an official feature, selectable within Zotero's sync settings (vs. plugin workarounds like Zotmoov) - so an attractive option for using the mobile app without running into storage limits.
Thanks Robert, it's very helpful to have this level of detail. I have been looking into Zotero, as I would like to rekindle my old academic studies and have many PDFs sitting in my OneDrive folder. I have a few questions please:
Do you do all your annotations just using Zotero's built-in PDF reader?
Have you tried out the Zotero mobile app (android/iOS)? As well as reading and annotating the PDFs on my laptop, I would love to be able do this on an iPad, and then have those highlights/notes sync with the PDF on my laptop (and into my Obsidian).
Do you use Zotero's own storage (for files)? The mobile app syncs across devices but only supports Zotero 'stored files' (not 'linked files'), and Zotero's free tier is only 300MB. I would be in its >6gb tier which is $120/year which is too expensive for me. However it also supports WebDAV so I am looking into that, for instance with Koofr which gives 10gb free.
https://www.zotero.org/support/kb/webdav_services
https://koofr.eu/blog/posts/koofr-with-zotero-via-webdav
https://mubtasimfuad.com/tools/zotero/
>Do you do all your annotations just using Zotero's built-in PDF reader?
Yes. I could do these with other tools (esp. Readwise Reader which I use religiously for non-work reading) but I find it's better to have a single source of truth for research work.
>Have you tried out the Zotero mobile app (android/iOS)?
I actually had no idea there even was a Zotero mobile app for Android until you just mentioned it! (I'm not an iOS user so I have no idea about iPads.) In the past I was using a third-party app that is called "Zoo" (IIRC) on my Samsung Tablet and it wasn't that good. I'm checking the app out now on my Android phone and it looks promising.
>Do you use Zotero's own storage (for files)?
I do, and I have the $120/year tier, and I have my university pay for it since I'm using it for job related scholarship. If I weren't in such a position, I'd be looking at workarounds -- because when I started the research review, I blew through the 300mb of free storage in a week whereas that had been perfectly adequate for years prior.
Thanks. I’m pleased you’re using the inbuilt reader for your Zotero library, keeps it simple.
I am experimenting with the Readwise free trial at the moment. I know it integrates well with Obsidian.
Although the WebDAV providers themselves are 3rd party and one has to make sure their servers are correctly specified, WebDAV per se as a syncing route is an official feature, selectable within Zotero's sync settings (vs. plugin workarounds like Zotmoov) - so an attractive option for using the mobile app without running into storage limits.