Zotero

This will no doubt be only the first of several posts on Zotero, as it is both simple to use and has room to grow, if you explore all of its possiblities.

A free plug-in for Firefox that helps you to manage your online research, I first used it last Fall when trying to create documentation to help Medical School faculty and students comply with the General Counsel's advice on copyright law. In the past many of us may have created pdfs of articles that we use in our teaching and research, as it has always been difficult to find reliable and static links to the online articles, which Stanford pays a subscription for affiliates to use. This situation has improved, not only because online journals now regularly provide static links to the page, and tools for exporting references in a variety of formats, but also because Zotero can automatically capture these links and references into a virtual searchable rolodex. Huh?

I will tell you how to download the plug-in at the bottom of this post, but take a look at it first, so you know what you are being offered:

This is a Screen Shot of an article in Nature on Neanderthal DNA

The Green arrow points to the button you click to save articles--and this includes the long-awaited STATIC LINK, the REFERENCE, and an ATTACHMENT, which is basically a stripped down html version of the page. What more could you need? Tools for searching your saved items, libraries for cataloguing them for different projects, and so on and so forth. This tool was made for you, not made for someone in business, and partly adaptable to your research. There are also tabs for taking notes, and more. I leave you to play with this yourself, on an article of your choice.

The Red arrow points to the logo of Zotero in the corner, which is what you click on to open and shut this plugin for Firefox. It will be there after you download it.

In case you don't yet have Firefox (most cross-platform compatible at the moment, so mac and pc alike are good), you will need to download it at:

http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/

There is a link to help you find plugins too, but just google Zotera to find the plug in. You may have to "allow" it to be installed--a yellow bar at the top of the screen will say that firefox is blocking the install and you can just click on it and allow. You may also have to restart the browser to get it working but that is pretty much it. click on the zotero logo in the bottom right corner, and navigate through lane library, or wherever else you do online research. Play with it and send me your questions!

moth@stanford.edu