1. Managing Your Literature Search Using Zotero
Deb Werner
Director of Library Research in Medical Education

2. Outline Overview of Zotero Set Up Online Sync Save Citations in Zotero
Create a Bibliography
In today’s workshop, we will get an overview of Zotero and cover the following things.
Please feel free to ask questions at any time, however, if you are having technical issues that are unique to you, we will have to discuss those separately at the end. If it is an issue that many people are experiencing, we’ll try to address it as a group, if possible.
Does anyone not have Zotero installed?

3. What is Zotero?
A reference manager that facilitates collecting and organizing references.
Today we are going to install and use Zotero. It is a reference manager, or citation management tool, that helps you collect and organize references from databases, websites, catalogs, etc.

4. Your literature review
Have you begun your lit review? Are you using a reference manager other than Zotero?
For those who have begun, when did you start? How far into it are you?

5. Which reference manager do you use?
EndNote EndNote Online
Mendeley Papers
RefWorks Other

6. Zotero
This is what Zotero looks like when it is populated with references.

7. Zotero Library
Your Zotero library refers to your collection of citations and any files and research notes that you attach to them – basically, all your stuff.

8. Zotero Connector Connects your browser to Zotero
Zotero uses what are called browser extensions to connect your browser to the Standalone. It’s the extension that builds the bridge between the browser and the Standalone, enabling you to send information from the browser and save it in the Standalone.

9. Set Up Online Sync Go to Zotero.org Click ‘Log In’ in upper right
Click ‘Register’ in upper right
Create your account
Verify your account
You should have the Zotero Standalone and the browser extension for your browser already installed. Are there any problems so far.
Next, there are a few settings that I’d like to walk you through. The first is setting up online sync.
The purpose of Online Sync is for Zotero to synchronize your data across as many devices as you choose. All of your notes and bibliographic data remain seamlessly and silently up to date.

10. Set Up Online Sync (continued)
Open Zotero (desktop app)
Go to Preferences:
Windows
Mac

11. Set Up Online Sync (continued)
Set Sync preferences
If you want to sync files, like PDF attachments, you need to click the check box for that. Note that you have 300 MB of free Zotero File Storage for attached files, with larger storage plans available for purchase.

12. Set Up PDF Indexing
Go to Preferences > Search Click ‘Check for Update’
There’s another setting that I want to make sure we configure now because it really enhances the functionality of Zotero.
Again in the Preferences menu, from the options at the top of the window, choose Search. In the middle of the window, you should see a large button that says “Check for Update.” Go ahead and click that button.
What this will do is enable you to search the full text of any PDFs you save to Zotero AND extract citation information from many PDFs just by dragging and dropping PDF files into your Zotero library.

13. Save Citations
Zotero icon appears in browser location bar Click icon to save citations to Zotero Firefox Chrome Safari
Now let’s talk about getting citations into Zotero. Zotero makes it easy to pull citations from websites, provided there is Zotero translator code running in the background. The translator is what enables Zotero to detect, interpret, and import citation information from a given website.
If a Zotero translator exists, a Zotero capture icon appears in the location bar of your browser. Here is an example.
In the top example, we’re looking at the location bar of a JSTOR webpage and at the end of the location bar there is a page icon. If I were to move my mouse over the icon, a text box would appear, which reads “Save to Zotero” – this tells me that there is a Zotero translator for this page, which can interpret any citation information that appears here.

14. Save Citations Right-click anywhere on page Click Zotero
If there is no capture icon, this tells us that there is no Zotero translator to interpret the information on this web page. So, we can’t save citation information from this page with one click the way, but we can right click to save it.

15. Save Citations from PubMed
Okay, next let’s begin saving citations to our Zotero library and let’s start by saving citations from PubMed.
I’m going to do a keyword search. Go ahead and do a keyword search of your choice. Okay, now that I have a list of search results displayed on the page, I have a question for you. This is a review of something I touched on earlier, when introducing you to Zotero terminology. Where on this page does the Zotero capture icon appear? Remember that the Zotero capture icon is what enables Zotero to interpret the information on this page and it’s what enables us to save citation information with one click.
It’s up in the location bar or URL bar of the browser. You can see there’s a file folder icon near the end of the location bar and when I move my mouse over it, it reads “Save to Zotero.”
When I click on the icon, I see a list of all the citations listed on this page of results. That’s a product of the way Zotero works – remember, it’s translating the information displayed on this web page.

16. Save Multiple Pages from PubMed
Select “Send to” Select “File” Under Format, select “XML” Click “Create File” button In Zotero, Import file

17. Drag & Drop PDFs
Drag PDFs into My Library; right click to retrieve Metadata.

18. Zotero with Word – Windows
Zotero ribbon in Word installed with Zotero installation Add citations and bibliographies to papers
Now, let’s move on to using Zotero with Microsoft Word.
When you installed the Zotero Standalone, bundled with that installation was the Zotero add-on for Microsoft Word. So, when you open Microsoft Word, on the Windows operating system, you’ll be able to find a new toolbar in the Add-ons ribbon.

19. Zotero with Word – Mac
You can display the Zotero toolbar on the Mac by going to the View menu, choosing Toolbars, and then finding the Zotero option to display the toolbar, which is very similar to what Windows users see.

20. Zotero with Word – Mac View > Toolbars > Zotero
You can display the Zotero toolbar on the Mac by going to the View menu, choosing Toolbars, and then finding the Zotero option to display the toolbar, which is very similar to what Windows users see.

21. Create a standalone bibliography
Right-Click > Create Bibliography from Items

22. Create a standalone bibliography
Choose a citation style: Vancouver Output Mode: Bibliography Output Method: Save as RTF (for best results)

23. Do More with Zotero
Folders – organize your library Duplicates – find & reconcile duplicate citations Add by Identifier – save citations by DOI, PMID, etc. Notes – take research notes in Zotero Groups – share citations with collaborators

24. Learn More & Get Help Zotero Guide: guides.lib.uchicago.edu/zotero
your questions or schedule a consultation
Zotero.org
Quick Start Guide
Screencast tutorials
Discussion forums

25. Questions?

26. Transfer Citations
Import RIS files: Go to Actions > Import Select the RIS file