How to Zotero
Just yesterday I was talking with a fellow academic, who frustrated by Endnotes was wondering what other options exist for managing references. My no think response was Zotero. Which caused me to think about doing another plug for Zotero here on Academhack, but fortunately for me, another scholar has already done this work. Scott McLemee has written and in depth review of Zotero for Inside Higher Ed. I won’t repeat what Scott has written, but rather tell you why you should go read it: Scott is not a “tech” person. That is, Scott gives a review from the perspective of someone who is not immersed in tech, and his conclusion: “Zotero does for research what word processing did for writing.” Scott’s article not only gives his impression of the software, but also highlights the places to go to learn how to use it. And my advice for those who don’t use a citation manager: start . . .it will save you lots of time.
September 27th, 2007 at 2:06 pm
I never even tried EndNote and went straight to Zotero. I have one quibble though. If you use the Zotero-Word integration utility, have you noticed though that it can take a at least a 5-10 seconds to insert a citation into a Word document? I find it still to be worthwhile to be able to automatically produce an accurate bibliography at the end, but the delay can be disruptive when one is writing. Does anyone know of a workaround?
Here is the utility if anyone else is interested.
September 27th, 2007 at 10:46 pm
There’s also BibDesk, which is great for LaTeX users. Sente looks good, too, but I’ve never tried it and it’s not free.
September 29th, 2007 at 10:12 pm
I cannot WAIT until they make collaborative libraries a workable possibility. I’m a PhD student and write with my advisor all the time. I also spend a great deal of wasted time/effort syncing our Endnotes library. If we could just keep a single one online we would BOTH be able to save time and effort, and I would be more able to focus on my writing.
January 17th, 2008 at 7:26 am
I have been using Refworks. I am pleased with it, but am I missing out on better options?
January 27th, 2008 at 4:49 am
[...] • Inside Higher Ed: Using Zotero for doing research online (Via AcademHack). [...]
June 23rd, 2008 at 12:08 pm
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