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Adams State University
Nielsen Library

Citation Management Systems (CMS)

Need help citing your sources and compiling your research? Let us help!

Zotero is...

"Zotero is a free, open-source research tool that helps you collect, organize, and analyze research and share it in a variety of ways. Zotero includes the best parts of older reference manager software — the ability to store author, title, and publication fields and to export that information as formatted references — and the best aspects of modern software and web applications, such as the ability to organize, tag, and search in advanced ways. Zotero interacts seamlessly with online resources: when it senses you are viewing a book, article, or other object on the web, it can automatically extract and save complete bibliographic references. Zotero effortlessly transmits information to and from other web services and applications, and it runs both as a web service and offline on your personal devices" (https://www.zotero.org/about/)

Creating a Zotero Account

1.Go to www.zotero.org and create an account. (If you need help with creating an account, follow the steps provided in how to download Zotero two tabs above this tab.)

2.Go to https://www.adams.edu/library/ to find and download articles on the topic of your papers.

3.After downloading click on the green plus button back at zotero.org at the top middle of the screen and fill out the information about the article. Keep in mind the more information you fill out the more inline with the manual of writing.

4.Once you have filed it out and added the document to your library, Click on the three blue dot buttons to get a reference citation. Check the manual to make sure that you have a proper citation.

Download & How To Use Zotero

What Zotero provides

  • Zotero helps you organize your research.
  • It gives you a place to collect and store your articles and citations.
  • It also helps you cite your research in the bibliographies/works cited of papers you are writing.
  • Zotero allows you to work across multiple devices (eg. your phone, tablet, laptop and or desktop computer), and then sync your notes.
  • It allows you to collaborate freely with peers. 
  • It's free to use.
  • Apps are available for both Android and IPhones.
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