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Mat-Su College: Zotero, a free citation manager

An introduction to Zotero, a free, open source citation manager.

Using the Zotero Connector browser plugin

After installing the Zotero Connector browser plugin (https://www.zotero.org/downloads) you will notice a new icon in your browser's toolbar. It will look like the letter Z, a piece of paper, a book, or so on, depending on the type of site you are on. If you click this, whatever you're looking at in your browser -- whether it's an article, book, webpage, etc -- will be saved as a reference in Zotero.

Note: Zotero Connector requires that the Zotero desktop application be open, or that you have Connector set up to sync to your Zotero web library. See the "Installing Zotero Connector" tab for more details.

Using Zotero Connector to save a webpage

Any time you are on a web page which you'd like to save to Zotero, just click the Zotero Connector icon in your browser's tool bar:

The Wikipedia page on Zotero with an arrow pointing to the Zotero Connector icon in the browser toolbar

Back in the Zotero client you will see that this web page has been added to your list of items.

One more thing: when you click the Zotero Connector button, it doesn't just save the reference details of the webpage. It also attaches to the reference a copy, or "snapshot," of the web page as it appears at that moment. That means that even if the website you referenced is updated or taken offline, you will always have the copy you were looking at when you did your research!

To view a snapshot...

Using the Zotero desktop application: right click a saved web page reference and choose "View Snapshot"

Using the Zotero web application: click on a saved web page reference. In the right column, where the details of the reference are displayed, click "attachments." Then click the "Open" icon to the right of the word "Snapshot" (see screenshot):

Zotero web version with the attachments tab open and the open snapshot icon highlighted

Using the Zotero Connector plugin to save from a database

In many article databases, Zotero Connector will not only save the details of the article you're looking at, it will even save a PDF of the article! All you need to do is view the details of the article, then click the Zotero Connector button:

Saving an article from Academic Search Premier by clicking the Zotero Connector icon

To view a PDF attached to a reference in Zotero...

In the Zotero web app: click on a reference, then in the right-most column click "attachments" to see attached PDFs.

In the Zotero desktop app: you can right click the item and choose "View PDF"

Zotero Client displaying the menu for a saved item in the middle pane; the view PDF option is indicated by an arrow