Collect references once, export and share infinitely. That’s what tools like Endnote and Zotero come down to. In grad school I used Endnote to manage my references and then cite them as needed in Word documents (papers, my dissertation…). The software would automatically create bibliographies from cited material, in virtually any format imaginable (MLA and Chicago are just the beginning). But I never took it a step further to create an online, shareable library. It wasn’t until I began work on a Ford Foundation bibliography here at the Archive Center that I saw the benefits of an online reference-storing tool. Thanks to Hillel’s suggestion, I began to build one using Zotero, a free program .
Although I’m only about a month into using the software, I thought I’d outline the process for creating online bibliographies in Zotero, while adding some comments about RAC-specific uses and parts I still need to work out. I’m interested in discussing the “why” as much as the “how,” so please comment or feel free to chat about this with me, if you think it may be something you could use, too!
