Zotero: Citation management software

Creating a quick citation list from an item or folder

1. Right click on a single citation or folder in your Zotero library
2. Select 'Create Bibliography from Item' or 'Create Bibliography from Collection'

3. Select citation style and other options.  Note: Choosing 'Copy to Clipboard' allows for easy pasting in your destination.

4. Paste citation(s) into destination document.

Using Word for In-text Citations and Creation of a Reference List

1. Open Zotero programme and Microsoft Word.
2. Place your cursor where you would like the first in-text citation.
3. Click the Zotero or Add-Ins tab in Word to view the Zotero menu.  On a Macintosh, the toolbar could be under the Applescript icon or displays as a floating menu.  (Note: The location of the citation menu for both Macs and PCs depends on your version of Word.)

4. Click Add/Edit Citation or the corresponding icon.
5. The first time you add a citation to a Word document, choose a Citation Style.  Install new styles by visiting: http://zotero.org/styles  Change the citation style at any time by selecting Document Preferences. 

6. A red oval box will pop up.  Start typing in a word from the title of a resource, author name, year, etc.  Select the reference you want to cite, and click enter.

7. To insert a bibliography, place your cursor in your Word document where you would like the bibliography.  Click Add/Edit Bibliography.
8. To create a bibliography (without in-text citations), select a folder/collection or citations from your Library (use the Control Key to select more than one citation), right click.  Select Create Bibliography from Items.

Zotero works with Google Docs! 

The first time you use Zotero in Google Docs, you will be asked to verify the plug-in using your Google account.  Note, this is unrelated to your Zotero account. Explore all the features of Zotero in Google Docs at the following link: https://www.zotero.org/support/google_docs

Zotero uses data from your personal Zotero Library when creating bibliographies.  If the data about sources are wrong in your library, the references will have errors too.  Here is an example of a poorly generated reference and the errors spotted:

Follow these steps to correct citations:

1. Go to the correct citation in your Zotero Library.  If you can't find it easily, select 'My Library' from the top of the left-hand column.  Use the search box to find the article of interest.
2. Select the correct citation so the 'Info' about that item shows to the right.  In this example, we can see that several of the key fields are blank.

3. Click on the individual fields to enter the correct citation data.

4. Regenerate bibliography by clicking Refresh in Word.

5. Check the corrected citations for accuracy.