Hundreds of PDFs, thousands of lines of annotations: To organize them, students create long lists of BibTeX files, pay for an expensive software subscription, or use a time-limited campus license for paid utilities. In most cases, open source software is sufficient – and a little skill.
Zotero is a reference management program. As soon as a student places a PDF in it, Zotero collects the metadata. This is structured information that a publisher or a database allocates to the article, such as its author or journal name. A database often saves the information in a citation file, for example BibTeX, CSL-JSON or RIS. Exactly these common citation file formats can be imported into Zotero. Everything a researcher needs to cite later is then stored in Zotero.
In this guide, we not only show the basic functions of Zotero. The exciting thing is how Zotero interacts with other programs: Students can tinker their own productivity system with a few settings and practical plug-ins. This system integrates LibreOffice, Obsidian, Word or Zettlr. A license does not require this – only precise signposts to quickly find and use helpful tools.
