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Online Reference Management
Zotero
For academics, some of the more interesting new online applications are “online reference
management services” that allow users to save and organize references they have found online.
Zotero is an online reference management application produced by the Center for History and
New Media at George Mason University.
Connotea and Zotero: A Comparison
We have prepared instructions for two reference management applications – Connotea and
Zotero. I have used both and have outlined their strengths and weaknesses below:
• Connotea o Strength: online database
� Can easily be used on multiple computers
o Strength: social networking
� References are shared with other members of the Connotea community
� Users can take advantage of what others with similar interests have found
o Strength: collaboration
� Groups of people can share references with each other
o Weakness: bibliography creation
� Stores only limited bibliographic information
o Weakness: organizing information
� Only uses tags
• Zotero o Strength: bibliography creation
� Stores detailed bibliographic information
� Creates bibliographies in a variety of styles
o Strength: works well with the Library catalog and research databases
� Extracts bibliographic information from JSTOR and others
o Strength: organizing information
� Uses both collections and tags
o Weakness: database on local computer
� Makes online collaboration difficult
� If you use multiple computers your references will be stored on more than
one computer
� Potential
• Can use a portable browser on a USB drive
• Next version will allow sharing among computers
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Installing Zotero on Firefox
You will need to download Zotero and install it on your Firefox browser. Instructions for this are
in Appendix A to this lesson
Viewing the Zotero Window
To see what is in your Zotero Library, click on the Zotero icon in the lower
right corner of Firefox. (If you have installed Zotero, but do not see the
Zotero icon, make sure that “Status bar” is checked on the Firefox “View”
menu.)
The Zotero window has three columns:
• Library: the left column shows folders corresponding to the collections you have set up
in your Library
• Items: the middle column shows the items in the collection you have selected
• Citation: the right column shows the information in the citation for the item you have
selected.
Note: The Zotero window does not need to be open for you to save citations.
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Saving a Citation for a Single Item
Suppose you are doing research on Emmy Hennings, the wife of Hugo Ball and one of the first
Dadaists. You have found a good article in JSTOR and want to save a citation.
To save the citation in
Zotero, click on the
article icon, , on the
right side of the text box
where the URL of the
article appears.
You should see a small rectangle in the lower right corner of the
Firefox window informing you that the item is being saved.
Saving Citations for Multiple Items
Suppose that you have gone to the Wofford Library
catalog and searched for books with “Dada” in their
title.
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Click on the folder icon in
the URL text box.
This will display a window listing the items displayed
in the Wofford Library catalog. Select the items for
which you want to save citation information and click
on OK.
Note: The Zotero list will only include those displayed
on the screen. If the Wofford Catalog displays only ten
items at a time, then Zotero will do the same.
Adding a Citation Manually
This is useful if you want to reference a book you have or a
PDF file that is saved on your hard drive. To manually add a
citation, click on the green icon with a plus sign in the center.
You will be asked to select the type of item you are going to enter
When you have chosen the type of
item, you will see a blank entry in
the Items column and blank spaces in
the Citation column.
Enter the bibliographic information
(Title, Author, etc.) in the Citation
column.
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For example, suppose you want to cite an article stored as a PDF file on
your hard drive. Click on the green icon and select Journal Article.
Fill in the bibliographic information.
When you have filled in the bibliographic information, click on
the Attachments tab. Then click on the Add button and Link to
File.
Browse to the file on your hard drive.
You should see the article you have entered in the list
of citations in your Library. The article will have a
PDF file grouped under it in the list. If you click on
the PDF file name, you will see a View File button in
the Citations column. Clicking on this button will
display the file.
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Saving a Citation to a Web Page
Suppose you have found a web page that
you would like to add to your list of
citations. When you are viewing the web
page, click on the “Take a snapshot” icon
in the Zotero window.
This will add the web page to
your list of references. If you
select the web page citation and
click on View Snapshot in the
right column, the web page will
be displayed
Adding a Collections Folder
You can create folders in your Library to hold collections of items
related to each other. To create an Emmy Hennings collection, select
My Library and click on the New Collection icon.
In the “New Collection” window that appears, enter a name for
the collection. Click on OK.
You should see the new folder added to the list of your collections.
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Adding a Subcollection
If a collection is large, it probably is a good thing to subdivide it into different categories to help
keep things organized. For example, Emmy Hennings was one of the founders of the Cabaret
Voltaire in Zurich. You might want to create as “Cabaret Voltaire” subcollection under her
name.
Right-click (Control-click on a Mac) on the collections folder
“Emmy Hennings,” which will pop up a menu window. Click on
New Subcollection in this menu.
Name the subcollection.
You should see new collection added under “Emmy Hennings.”
You also can create a collection in My Library and then drag and drop it into another collection
to make it a subcollection. For example, you might create a folder for Hugo Ball as a new
collection.
You then can drag and drop the Hugo Ball collection into the Emmy
Henning collection.
“Hugo Ball” now becomes a subcollection under “Emmy Hennings.”
You may notice a small triangle next to the top folder in the collection. You
can click on this triangle to show or hide its subcollections.
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Storing an Item in a Collection
To add an item to a collection, drag
and drop the item into the collection
you want.
You should see that the item has
been added to the collection.
An item can be stored in more than
one collection.
A Zotero collection is similar to an iTunes playlist. Adding a citation to a collection classifies it,
but does not remove it from the main Library. All items remain in your Library.
Removing an Item from a Collection
To remove an item from a collection,
select the collection and then right-click
(Control-click on a Mac) on the item you
want to remove.
In the menu that appears, click on
Remove Selected Item.
This will remove an item from a collection, but leave it in your Library.
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Deleting an Item from the Library
If you want to remove an item from the entire Library, do the same as above, except select
Delete Selected Item from Library on the menu
Putting Tags on an Item
“Tags” are keywords associated with a particular item. Associating tags with items is another
way of organizing them in a way that facilitates searching.
To add tags to an item, select the item and click on the Tags tab.
Click on Add and then enter the tag in the text box that appears.
Some items come with tags already attached. If Zotero detects
classification information as part of a catalog record, in some
cases it will extract this information as a tag.
For example, we have entered only the tag, “zurich,” but if we
look at the list of tags in the tag window in the lower part of the
Library column, we see eleven other tags on the list. These tags
were automatically attached to one or more of the items when
Zotero saved the citation.
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Sorting
You can select the information categories visible on the
screen, Click on the small icon in the
upper right corner of the Items column.
A menu will appear that will allow you to choose what
categories you can use for sorting.
Clicking on the category names will sort by this
category. As usual, the order of the sort toggles when
you click on the category name more than once.
Searching
To start a search, click within the
Search box and enter a word or
words for which you want to
search.
For example, a search for
“Surrealism” retrieves the items
shown in the list at the right.
A search looks everywhere in a
citation. In the example at the right,
the article on “Dada” is found
because it is taken from a book with
“Surrealism” in its title.
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Searching Using Tags
Tags are an excellent way to search for
information. For example, if we select the
entire Library as the collection and click on the
“Surrealism” tag, the list is narrowed to only
two items.
If we add the tag “Electronic Books,” the list
shrinks to only one item.
Note that clicking on a tag adds it to the
selected tags. You can deselect a tag by
clicking on it a second time. You can deselect
all the tags by clicking on the Deselect all
button.
Taking Notes
As we read through sources, we frequently want to take notes. Zotero allows you to do this in
two ways.
A. Stand-alone Notes
If you have a thought you would like to record while you are working, click on the
Stand-alone note icon.
You can enter the note
in the right column. It
will be saved among
your list of items.
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B. Associating a Note with an Article
If you want to connect a note with a
particular article, select the article from
the Items column, click on the Notes tab,
and then the Add button.
Enter the note in the “Add Note” window
that pops up.
The note will be displayed under the Note tab for this article.
You also can copy text out of an article and paste it into a note if you want to quote it later.
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Creating a Report
You can create a report on an item, a set of items, or an entire collection. Right-click (Control-
click on a Mac) on the item (or items or collection) you want. Click on Generate Report from
Selected Item in the menu that appears. The report will appear as a separate browser window, as
shown below. Because the report is a web page, it can be printed or emailed.
Reports could be used as a teaching tool1.
The report feature can also be used as a way for teachers to track and assess students
during the writing process. With only a few clicks, a student can create a full report of
their Zotero Library that includes information about when items were collected and how
students are associating their items with notes and tags. These reports can show the
ways that students are relating their research items, and students can turn in these
reports as documentation of their research process. Teachers have found these
comprehensive reports to be a useful way to peer into and encourage the composition
process.
1 http://www.zotero.org/documentation/reports
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Creating a Bibliography
To create a bibliography, select one or more references or an entire collection. For example,
suppose we want to create a bibliography in MLA style for all the references in the Emmy
Hennings collection. Right-click (Control-click on a Mac) on this collection and select
Create Bibliography From Collection from the menu that appears.
Choose the style of the bibliography and whether
you want to save it, copy it to the clipboard, or
print it.
Click on OK when ready.
The bibliography I generated for this example is
shown below.
Hopkins, David, and NetLibrary, Inc. Dada and Surrealism a Very Short Introduction. Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 2004.
Prevots, Naima. “Zurich Dada and Dance.” Dance Research Journal 17.1 (1985).
Rugh, Thomas F. “Emmy Hennings and the Emergence of Zurich Dada.” Woman's Art Journal
2.1 (1981): 1-6.
Sandqvist, Tom, and NetLibrary, Inc. Dada East the Romanians of Cabaret Voltaire. Cambridge,
Mass: MIT Press, 2006.
There also is a Microsoft Word plug-in that will add Zotero bibliographies to a Word
document. I have not tried this, but it might be worthwhile.
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Appendix A: Downloading and Installing Zotero
You must use the Zotero with the Firefox web browser. If you do not have Firefox installed on
your computer, download it first (http://www.mozilla.com/Firefox). If you frequently will use
Zotero on multiple computers, you might install a portable version of Firefox on a USB drive.
Using your Firefox browser go to http://Zotero.org. Click on Download.
Depending on the security settings of your browser, you may see a message saying that Firefox
prevented the installation. If so, click on Allow.
In the next window that appears, click on Install Now.
When the installation nearly is
completed, you will be asked to
Restart Firefox. Do so.
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After restarting Firefox, you will see a
message that Zotero has been installed.
Firefox will show a quick start guide screen.
Part of this handout is derived from the quick start
guide.
You now have the Zotero add-on installed.