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Jessie Ball duPont Library

Citation Management Tools

Zotero Word Plugin

Downloading the Zotero Word Plugin

Please Note: This guide is written for Zotero 3.0.  Using Zotero 3.0 with Word documents will render them unable to be edited with a Zotero 2.X install.

You should make frequent backups of all of your information in case something goes wonky in the code.

1. Download the Zotero Word plugin either through the Zotero website or from the direct download link here.

2. This will open up the installer by the address bar of the Firefox browser. 

   After choosing allow, the plug-in will install and the browser will prompt you to restart it. *If Word is open before the installation takes place, it will also need to be restarted before the Add-In toolbar will show up.

3.. Follow the prompts in the Zotero installer and you'll have the plugin installed and ready to go in a matter of seconds.  You're now ready to proceed to the next step, inserting items from your Zotero bibliography into a Word document.

Citing Sources in Zotero

Zotero seamlessly integrates with your Word toolbar allowing you to easily enter items from your Zotero bibliography into any document that you've created.  Before you can use Zotero with Word you must first have the Zotero Plugin installed.  Information on installing the Zotero plugin can be found here.

Finding the Toolbar:

After installation the Zotero toolbar will be in the add-ins toolbar (one the right hand part of the toolbar).

 

The Zotero toolbar comes with seven default buttons.  From left to right they are: Insert Citation, Edit Citation, Insert Bibliography, Edit Bibliography, Refresh, Set Doc Prefs, and Remove Codes.  For this tutorial we'll be focusing mainly on the Insert citation and Insert Bibliography commands.

Inserting A Citation

Zotero will automatically generate in-line citations in your document in whatever format you like.  Inserting a citation is fast and simple.

1. Navigate to the text where you would like to insert your citation.  Go to the Zotero toolbar and click the "Insert Citation" button shown in the screencap above.

2. Clicking the Insert Citation button will bring up the following dialog box allowing you to choose the citation style of your choice.  For the purposes of this tutorial we will be using MLA.

Choosing a citation style.

3. After choosing a citation style, a Zotero box will pop up such as this:

                  

  This allows you to begin typing in the author or title of the work and it should pop up (much like Google does).  You can also click on the Z and it will all you to choose classic view which will talk you to this screen and allow you to choose from any of the citations you've saved previously.

4. Highlight the citation you would like to insert into your document and click the OK button in the bottom right corner and Zotero will automatically generate an in-line citation.

Please Note: You should always double check any citation that Zotero generates for you.  The above citation, for example, doesn't include a page number and may have generated the names slightly incorrectly depending on which version of the MLA manual you're working from.  Always remember that Zotero is a tool to help you generate citations, not a replacement to do all of your work for you.

 

Zotero Bibliography With Word 2010

Zotero seamlessly integrates with your Word toolbar allowing you to easily enter items from your Zotero bibliography into any document that you've created.  Before you can use Zotero with Word you must first have the Zotero Plugin installed.  Information on installing the Zotero plugin can be found here.

Creating a Bibliography

Zotero allows you to quickly create a bibliography or works cited page generated in whatever citation format you prefer.

1. Go to the page where you would like to insert your bibliography or works cited page.

2. Click on the Zotero Insert Bibliography button on the Zotero toolbar. See the Citing Sources under Word Support for help on which button that is.

3. Zotero will automatically generate a bibliography consisting of all the entries that you have previously cited within your document:

Please Note: Always double check any citation generated with Zotero.  The computer is an excellent tool, but it still can't measure up to a human double checking their work.