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Citation Management and Writing Tools: Zotero

A guide describing software to help with citation management, writing, and other parts of the research process.

Get started with Zotero

1. Download the software application AND the browser connector. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

2. Open Zotero. In your browser, search for an article in a database.

3. Click the Zotero icon at the top of your browser to save a citation from that page. It will look different depending on the number and types of citations listed.

 

4. While writing your paper, use the Zotero tab in Word to insert citations and a bibliography.

5. See the Zotero Quick Start Guide for more information.

Use Google Docs with Zotero

To insert a Zotero reference in Google Docs, use keyboard shortcuts:

  1. Open your Google Doc and your Zotero library.
  2. In your Zotero window, click on the record you want to cite. 
    1. To copy an end-of-document reference, use keyboard shortcut: CTRL+ALT+C. 
    2. To copy an in-text citation, use keyboard shortcut: CTRL+ALT+A.
  3. Paste it into your Google Doc.
  4. To add a bibliography at the end of your document, in Zotero, select the citations you used, right-click, select “Create Bibliography from Selected Items,” and choose “Export to Clipboard.” Then paste into Google Docs.

Learn more on the Zotero help page.

Barton and Zotero

Zotero works with the MIT Libraries' web catalog, Barton, but there's a trick to it. When you're on the list of results screen (not the detailed record screen), click on the Zotero icon in the web address bar to select one or more records to save to your Zotero collection.

Zotero will not show individual titles when selecting which records to import, so titles in a list will be shown as "Display full record." After you import them, the titles will display correctly in your Zotero collection.  Subject tags in library records will be saved into the tags field in Zotero.

Improve access to articles through Zotero

Zotero makes it easy to view the article for a citation that you have saved in your Zotero collection, but there is a setting that you can adjust to make it more reliable from off campus.  

To set MIT as your favorite library, click on "actions," "preferences," then in "Advanced," enter "https://sfx.mit.edu/sfx_local" as resolver, version 0.1.