How To Use Zotero Chrome

Using Zotero with Google Docs

Zotero'south powerful Google Docs support helps you hands add citations and bibliographies to the documents you create in Google Docs.

Y'all can quickly search for items in your Zotero library, add folio numbers and other details, and insert citations. When you're washed, a single click inserts a formatted bibliography based on the citations in your document. Zotero supports circuitous style requirements such as Ibid. and name disambiguation, and information technology keeps your citations and bibliography updated as you brand changes to items in your library. If you demand to switch citation styles, you can easily reformat your entire document in whatsoever of the over 10,000 commendation styles that Zotero supports.

Google Docs back up is part of the Zotero Connector for Chrome, Firefox, Edge, and Safari and requires the Zotero programme to part.

Using another word processor? Zotero as well integrates with Discussion and LibreOffice.

Citation Interface

The Zotero Connector adds a Zotero bill of fare to the Google Docs interface:

Information technology likewise adds a toolbar button for i-click citing:

In the Zotero carte du jour, you'll find the following options:

Add/Edit Citation	Add a new citation or edit an existing commendation in your document at the cursor location.
Add/Edit Bibliography	Insert a bibliography at the cursor location or edit an existing bibliography.
Preferences	Open up the Document Preferences window, e.thousand. to change the citation style.
Refresh	Refresh all citations and the bibliography, updating any item metadata that has inverse in your Zotero library.
Unlink Citations	Unlink Zotero citations in the document by removing the field codes. This prevents whatever further automated updates of the citations and bibliographies. Annotation that removing field codes is irreversible and should normally merely be washed in a final copy of your certificate.

Authentication

Interacting with the Zotero functionality for the first fourth dimension in a document will prompt you lot to cosign the plugin with your Google account. Be certain to select the Google account you lot used to create the certificate or that has been given editing access by the certificate'south creator. This is unrelated to any Zotero account you may have, which isn't required to utilize Zotero or Google Docs integration.

Once authenticated, you tin begin inserting citations from your Zotero libraries.

Citing

Y'all can begin citing by clicking the ("Add/Edit Zotero Commendation") button in the Google Docs toolbar or by selecting "Add together/Edit Citation" from the Zotero menu, both of which will bring upwardly the citation dialog.

The citation dialog is used to select items from your Zotero library and create a commendation.

Kickoff typing function of a title, the last names of one or more authors, and/or a year in the dialog box. Matching items will instantly appear below the dialog box.

Matching items volition be shown for each library in your Zotero database (My Library and whatever groups you are part of). Items yous have already cited in the document volition be shown at the top of the list under "Cited".

Select an particular by clicking on it or by pressing Enter when it is highlighted. The item volition appear in the dialog box in a shaded bubble. Printing Enter again to insert the citation and close the Add together Citation box.

In the Add Citation box, yous can click on the bubble for a cited item and then click "Open in My Library" (or some other library proper name) to view the item in Zotero. Items that are orphaned (i.e., non connected to whatever items in your Zotero database) volition not accept an "Open up in My Library" push. Orphaned items tin can exist if they were inserted by a collaborator from their My Library or a group you don't have access to or if they were deleted from your Zotero library.

Bibliography

Clicking the "Add together/Edit Bibliography" menu selection inserts a bibliography at the cursor location.

You can edit which items appear in the bibliography past clicking the "Add/Edit Bibliography" button again, which will open up the bibliography editor. See Editing the Bibliography beneath for more than info. Manual edits made to the bibliography in the document will exist overwritten the adjacent time Zotero refreshes the document.

Collaboration

Google Docs is designed to let you collaborate on documents, and Zotero's integration is no unlike. You and your coauthors tin all insert and edit citations in a shared certificate, and you don't fifty-fifty need to be in a Zotero group. If you're planning a large collaborative project, though, we recommend using a group library, which not only makes information technology easy to collect and manage materials but will also allow all collaborators to change cited item metadata (authors, title, date of publication, etc.). If someone cites an item from their personal library, merely they will be able to update the metadata for that detail.

We recommend that anyone making changes to the document have the Zotero Connector installed. (The Zotero app itself is necessary only if inserting or editing citations.) If someone cuts and pastes an agile commendation without the Zotero Connector, the commendation will be unlinked from Zotero and disappear from the bibliography, and the next person refreshing the certificate with the Zotero Connector will receive a alarm about unlinked citations. While people without the Connector can theoretically edit non-citation parts of the document, we don't recommend it due to the take a chance of accidental citation unlinking.

When working collaboratively on a document, y'all and your coauthors should avoid inserting or editing citations at the same time. The Zotero Connector has mechanisms in place to preclude document and citation abuse from concurrent commendation editing, but due to technical limitations they do non provide perfect safety.

Document Preferences

Zotero Document Preferences in Google Docs

The "Document Preferences" window lets you ready the following certificate-specific preferences:

The language to use to format citations and bibliography.
For styles that abbreviate journal titles (e.one thousand., "Nature"), whether to use the MEDLINE abbreviations listing to abbreviate titles.
- If this option is selected (the default), the contents of the "Periodical Abbr" field in Zotero will be ignored.
Whether Zotero should automatically update citations for disambiguations, ibid and numbering, or whether updating should be delayed until a manual refresh. Note that if you enable this manner, Zotero will insert your citations with a gray background to indicate that the citation text is not final. The citation will be finalized and the greyness background removed one time you lot click "Refresh" in the Zotero menu.

Saving for Publication

When y'all're ready to submit your document, employ File → "Make a copy…" and, in the new certificate, apply Zotero → "Unlink Citations" to convert the citations and bibliography to plain text. You tin can then download that second certificate (e.g., as a PDF), while keeping active citations in the original document in instance you need to make further changes. Zotero will prompt you lot to create a copy if you try to download your original certificate.

Customizing Cites

Citations tin can exist customized in various means.

If a commendation is simply incorrect or missing information, kickoff by making sure that the item metadata in Zotero is correct and consummate, and then click Refresh in the plugin to update your document with whatsoever changes.

Other customizations tin can be made via the citation dialog. Click an existing commendation in your certificate and click Add together/Edit Commendation to open the citation dialog, and and so click the citation bubble to open the cite options window, where you tin can make the following changes.

Page and Other Locators

In some cases y'all desire to cite a certain role of an detail, e.g. a certain page, page range or volume. This additional cite-specific information (e.thou. "pp. 4-7" in the cite "Doe et al. 2001, p. four-seven") is called the "locator".

The cite options windows has a drop-downwards list of the different locator types ("Page" is the default), and a text box in which you can enter the locator value (e.chiliad. "four-vii"). To cite a locator other than the ones listed (e.one thousand., "Table), apply the Suffix field.

You can also add page numbers from the keyboard as you insert citations. Search for an item, press Enter once to add to the citing dialog, and so, earlier pressing Enter over again to insert information technology into the certificate, simply blazon "p.34" or similar, and the page number will be added to the commendation.

Prefix and Suffix

The "Prefix" and "Suffix" text boxes allow you lot to specify text to respectively precede and follow the automatically generated cite. For instance, instead of "Tribe 1999", you might want "cf. Tribe 1999, see also…".

Any text in the prefix and suffix fields tin be formatted with the HTML tags (for italics), (assuming), (subscript), and (superscript). For example, typing "cf. the classic example" volition be displayed as "cf. the classic instance".

Prefixes and suffixes can be applied to each item in a citation to create circuitous citations. For example: "(run across Smith 1776 for the classic example; Marx 1867 presents and alternate view)". Modifying citations by entering text into the Prefix and Suffix fields is e'er preferable to directly typing in the commendation fields in the document. Manual modifications will prevent Zotero from automatically updating the citation.

With author-engagement styles, authors are often moved into the text and omitted from the post-obit parentheses-enclosed citation, e.k.: "…according to Smith (1776) the division of labor is crucial…". To omit the authors from the cite, bank check the "Omit Author" box (this will result in a cite similar "(1776)" instead of "(Smith, 1776)") and write the writer'south name ("Smith") as role of the regular text in your document.

Citations with Multiple Cited Items

To create a commendation containing multiple cites (e.g., "[2,4-six]" for numeric styles or "(Smith 1776, Schumpeter 1962)" for writer-date styles), add them 1 afterward the other in the Add Commendation box. Later on selecting the outset item, don't press Enter/Render, simply type the author, championship, or year of the next particular.

Some citation styles require that items within one in-text citations are ordered either alphabetically (eastward.thousand., "(Doe 2000, Gray 1994, Smith 2008)") or chronologically ("(Grayness 1994, Doe 2000, Smith 2008)"). Zotero will follow these sort rules automatically.

To disable automatic sorting of the cites in the citation, drag the citations to rearrange them in the Add Citation box. You tin likewise click the "Z" icon on the left side of the Add together Commendation box and uncheck the "Go along Sources Sorted" option. This option merely appears for citation styles that specify a sort order for citations. To restore automatic sorting, re-bank check the "Continue Sources Sorted" selection.

Switching to the "Classic View"

You lot can switch to the "Archetype View" commendation dialog by clicking the "Z" icon on the left side of the Commendation box, and selecting "Classic View". To permanently switch to the classic view check the "Use classic Add Citation view" checkbox in the Cite pane of Zotero preferences.

Editing the Bibliography

Subsequently you've inserted the bibliography using the "Add together/Edit Bibliography" option, select information technology again to open up the Edit Bibliography window.

In this window, you lot can add together uncited sources to your bibliography (e.g., items included in a review but not cited in the paper) or remove items that are cited in text but which should not exist included in the bibliography (e.g., personal communications).

While it is also possible to edit the text or formatting of bibliography references in this window, doing so is discouraged. References edited here volition non be automatically updated by Zotero if you lot change the data in your library.

If you need to edit items in your bibliography, it is all-time to do this equally a final step before submitting the document. First, make a copy of the document. Then, in the copy, use the "Unlink Citations" menu pick to disconnect your document from Zotero and convert all citations and the bibliography to regular text. Finally, make your adjustments to the bibliography text.

This process tin can be used for a diverseness of minor modifications to the bibliography, including:

Calculation asterisks before references included in a review or meta-analysis
Setting the names of detail authors in assuming, italics, or all caps
Adding annotations or comments about an item
Adding headings for bibliography subsections (east.g., chief versus secondary sources)

Note: General corrections to way formatting should exist made in the CSL citation style, not in this window. Corrections to particular data should be made in your Zotero library.

Keyboard Shortcuts

You can use keyboard shortcuts for improved accessibility and faster citing.

Press Ctrl-Command-C (Mac) or Ctrl-Alt-C (Windows/Linux) to insert a citation. You can configure this from the Advanced pane of the Zotero Connector preferences.
In the commendation dialog
- Use the upwards and downwards arrow keys to move betwixt search results. Printing Enter to select an item.
- Type "p.45-48" or ":45-48" after a citation to cite a specific folio or page range.
- Type "ibid" to automatically select the terminal cited work. This works with all commendation styles, regardless of whether "ibid" is actually used in citations. If you use Zotero in a language other than English language, use the corresponding abbreviation instead of ibid., due east.g. "ebd." in High german.
- Press Ctrl/Cmd-↓ (down arrow key) to open the cite options dialog for the citation under the cursor. Use Tab and Shift-Tab to move betwixt the different elements, apply the upwardly and downward arrow keys to change the locator type in the locator drop-down listing, and the space bar to toggle the "Suppress Author" checkbox.

Limitations

While we've tried to create the same experience available in Word and LibreOffice, at that place are some limitations to be aware of when working in Google Docs:

As noted above, anyone making changes to the document should have the Zotero Connector installed. (The Zotero app itself is necessary only if inserting or updating citations.) Citations that are cut and pasted without the Connector installed will be unlinked.
Dragging citations within the document will cause the citations to become unlinked. Cut and pasting is fine as long as the Zotero Connector is installed.
If someone views the document without having the Zotero Connector installed, or if y'all download the document instead of first making a re-create and unlinking citations, active citations in the document volition testify up as links leading to URLs such every bit https://world wide web.zotero.org/google-docs/?abc123.
Commendation inserts and edits slow downwardly significantly as the number of citations increases. With 100+ citations, a unmarried citation update can accept upwards to x seconds, so for longer documents you lot'll want to disable automatic citation updates in the Zotero document preferences.
Google Docs provides limited facilities for text formatting. Styles that apply small caps fonts volition not use a true minor caps formatting style in Google Docs and volition instead fall back to the "Alegreya Sans SC" font. Citations that have been inserted with automated commendation updates disabled volition be inserted with a gray background instead of dashed underlining similar in Word and LibreOffice.

Troubleshooting

If yous take any trouble citing in Google Docs, let us know in the Zotero Forums.

You lot should ever troubleshoot with a copy of the original certificate, using File → "Make a re-create…". If something isn't working in a particular document, the document version history may allow you to revert to an earlier version. Some of the Debugging Broken Documents steps may as well be useful in Google Docs.