Quote from Ann C Gilchrest on January 20, 2020, 4:52 pm

Hi Timothy,

While I can't answer questions about Google Drive I can help with question number 3.  If you added Donna's dataset for the exercises they show up in what is called "Group Libraries" Your group project would be in a group library and your personal research would be in "My Library." Each group member would have the group library in their app but they would not see your personal library. The one called "My Library."

I am not totally sure how the group library works but as I understand it the space used for the group library is part of the originator's space allocation. 

Hope this helps.

Ann

Quote from Ann C Gilchrest on January 20, 2020, 5:13 pm

Some thoughts on question number 2.

All of the information in your library shows up when you click on My Library. It doesn't matter if a record is in a subfolder or not. From that standpoint, you could just dump all your documents into one folder on your drive and then separate them using the subfolders in Zotero. 

When I started using Zotero I already had an extensive filing system for my genealogy. So it made sense to mirror that system in Zotero. However, I do have documents on my computer in folders that do not match the subfolder in Zotero. An example of this is my Dad's military records. Scans of the original documents are stored on my hard drive in a folder called "Gilchrest John Duncan Military Files." The path on the computer is "GENEALOGY>FamilyFiles_GilchrestSide>Gilchrest John Duncan Military Files.

The Zotero path is Genealogy>US Military Records>Gilchrest John D Military Files.

As to whether you want to use one bucket on your hard drive or multiple folders will depend on your personal workflow and how you work with documents in your research. Sometimes it might be easier to go to a specific folder without using Zotero to find something. Other times it might not be.  It really will boil down to what makes the most sense to you.

Ann

Quote from Timothy Bernier on January 20, 2020, 10:54 pm

Thanks for the input Ann.  I can see how it may be easy to get lazy and just throw every digital file itno a single Google Drive folder and then let Zotero be my front end file management tool, but as you pointed out, in the real world there will be times you just want to go directly to a folder and pull up a file and bypass Zotero.  So having a tidy folder structure would definitely help in that regard.  And like you, I'm starting with a somewhat organized file structure already so I might as well stay the course!

The Group Library info makes sense as well.  I was able to read more after posting this message last night and eventually came to this realization on my own.  Thanks for reinforcing that!

Quote from Ann C Gilchrest on January 21, 2020, 2:40 am

You are welcome Timothy glad I could help.

Quote from Donna Cox Baker on January 21, 2020, 4:10 am

Welcome to Zotero, Timothy! I am so glad you gave it a try, and I thank you for your compliment of my book. I hope it continues to be a help. Here are my responses to your questions (in bold after the questions):

1. With several volunteers gathering information from various sources, we've begun placing everything we've found into a single Google Drive, with a rudimentary folder structure so far.  I intend on keeping the docs on Google Drive and linking to them.  I thought I saw a post somewhere cautioning against this method, yet Donna's book and all Zotero materials explain the process fairly well.  Are there any known concerns with this method or is it working well for others?
   My experience with Google Drive is limited. I have begun to use it to scan things, but I don't store on it. I use Dropbox Plus. But I tested a link to Google Drive the other day, and there are some special considerations, depending on how it's set up. I was only able to use Google Drive completely in the cloud. It was not copied to my laptop, as most cloud apps do it. But in reading its help files, it appears there is a way to have work syncing to your laptop. If so, you can handle Drive attachments just like the ones I set up in the book. If Google Drive is exclusively in the cloud, you will need to link to the attachment slightly differently. In Google Drive, you find the file you want to link to, right-click and choose "Get shareable link." Back in Zotero, right-click on the reference item you want to attach the file to, and select the option about linking to a URI. (Sorry, my computer is not letting me open anything right now, so I can't see Zotero's options.) Paste the URL into the field. Given that three people will have to be able to open files and the chance that each computer might set up a slightly different path, it might make sense to have every attachment in the Google Drive cloud, accessed by a URL and not a hard drive path. I do not know if Zotero can search the contents of PDFs stored on Google Drive like it does for documents on your hard drive. You might want to test that before going too far. But it's also not essential that you have that feature. Many of the documents we keep, as genealogists, are manuscripts and don't have a searchable text layer anyway.
2. Because Zotero has such a rich search feature, one of the main reasons I'm going to use the app, is there a need to continue to file away documents in a well thought out folder structure?  It almost seems like it may be easier to just throw everything into a single folder and use Zotero to find everything.  Might also eliminate concerns of losing link references if I accidentally move a folder within Google.
   It does indeed have a rich search feature. As I mentioned above, its ability to search within a PDF might be affected by whether you've stored your attachments in the cloud. If searching the PDF contents is important to you, you might have to use the PC software that I've heard can be used with Google Drive. It stores one copy on your PC and syncs with the copy on Google Drive. Then in Zotero, you link to the attachments like I describe in the book. If you go with that option, your two partners need to do the same setup, in order to see the attachments. You might be onto a brilliant solution to have all of your attachments in a single folder. I'd create a naming convention for them that creates some sort of order, though. Or use the metadata fields to make sure that terms you might use to find the document are embedded in it.
3. As I will be using Zotero for both personal family genealogy research as well as group research of my historic village volunteer work, what is the best way to separate so I can keep my family research private?  Can you create multiple libraries, or is My Library the root and from there I create separate collections and only share out those collections I want?  I saw another forum post regarding Profiles.  Is that perhaps a better way to keep things separated?  Not that I'm overly concerned about privacy but more that I intend on being the only one contributing to my family research while others will contribute to the village history research
   You can create more than one library for Zotero, if needed. As Ann mentioned, your partners are only going to see what you share in the group collection. But if you want to keep some things truly separated, you can have multiple profiles. Each has a separate login to sync to Zotero. They are not connected at all. I talk about this in my new book, but I don't think I mentioned it in Zotero for Genealogy. I'll create a new post here on the forum that gives the information.

Good luck with it, and let us know how it goes!

Quote from Donna Cox Baker on January 21, 2020, 4:15 am

Hey, what do you know? I already posted about creating a second profile. Here it is:

https://genohistory.com/forum/topic/creating-a-second-zotero-profile-for-a-separate-library/