Exciting citing #cpd23

I've been using Zotero to manage references that might be useful for my professional development. More about this is in a previous post and here is my updated zotero library (growing very slowly but surely!)

In the interests of exploring other reference management tools for the purposes of being able to help and advise library users about them, let's take a quick look at Mendeley.

One thing I like about Mendeley is the feature to drag and drop pdfs into your Mendeley library, to generate a citation. I tested this with a couple and found that the journal title was wrong both times, but I may have just been unlucky with my choices! At least any incorrect details can be manually amended, and Google Scholar searched for the correct details. The ability to retrospectively organise an existing pdf library sounds like a real bonus to those who aren't at the beginning of the research process. The collaboration side of Mendeley looks useful too, with the ability to share documents and folders with colleagues, and join relevant Groups.

I haven't really got to know all the things Mendeley does, as I haven't used it extensively, but at least now I am not completely clueless if a library user asks me about it! In general I think it's useful for librarians to know a bit about reference management tools, particularly for those in user education type roles in academic libraries, where many library users are likely to use them and may want advice about them.

Organising references #cam23

Since finishing university, I haven't really felt the need to use any reference management tools. I have an account for Endnote Web, which I set up and explored so I would be able to help students who were using it. I also tried zotero a couple of years ago, but having no real need to save or export large numbers references, my account languished forgotten. Now I thought I would resurrect it for my chartership references. I like a web-based programme as most of my references are from the web.

I had to remind myself of how to get references in my zotero library. After a brief distraction caused by removing a spider (eek!) from my working space, I got down to work. A look at the very helpful quick start guide was all I needed to get started, and it was very easy to add items to zotero from LibrarySearch. Here is the start of my zotero library:

I aim to keep using this for any possible chartership-related references, and then use this as the basis for my bibliography.