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A Medical Students Guide to the Library

Desktop Application

Once you have created an account, you can return to the desktop application and sign in. To do this, select Preferences under the toolbar tab Edit (on a Mac, select Preferences under the Zotero tab on the menu bar). 

Select Preferences under the Edit tab

 

Next click on the Sync tab of the Preferences window. Enter in your username and password to your account and select both the Sync Automatically option and Sync Full-Text Content option. 

Select the Sync tab in Zotero preferences

Zotero gives all users 300MB of storage for free and additional storage can be purchased on their website

Desktop Interface

To access the stand-alone client (the desktop app) on your computer, open it from the programs menu. If you have not yet added the Zotero connector for your browser, you can do so from the Download Webpage. 

A breakdown of all the Zotero desktop application icons, in order from left to right

Borrowed from UNC University LibGuide https://guides.lib.unc.edu/zotero/getting-started#s-lg-box-126659

 

The above image displays the layout of the Zotero pane. From left to the right the buttons are for:

  • Create a new collection: The first button to the left creates a new collection. This is useful if you are working on multiple assignments or projects and want to keep the citations for each project separate.

 

  • Create a new library/group: This button allows you to create different groups to let you collaborate with colleagues. If you are using a group to collaborate, the group will use the storage space of the creator. So, it may be a good idea to create a different account to create the group so that it has the full 300 MB of storage space for the group project. 300 MB is between 300 and 1,200 PDFs, depending on the size of the PDF.

 

  • Create a new item: This button allows you to add a citation to your library manually. It will ask you to choose a format (book, article, video, etc.) and will automatically format the data you enter.

 

  • Add an item by identifier: This button will allow you to add items to your library if you have an identifier for the item, like a DOI, PubMed ID, or ISBN. For more information on this process, see the Using Zotero page.

 

  • New note: This button will allow you to add notes to the citations in your library.

 

  • Add attachment: This button allows you to add an attachment to a citation. Use this button if you want to add a PDF or file copy of a citation in your library. Remember that Zotero only offers 300 MB of free storage, which roughly translates to 300-1,200 PDFs, depending on the size of your PDF.

 

  • Advanced Search: This button will allow you to search through your library using advanced features. The basic search bar is beside the advanced search button.

 

  • Simple Search: This is useful for doing a quick search of your library for tags, titles, years, and other info.

 

  • View PDF or full text online: This button will allow you to try to locate a copy of the citation using a number of options. The options include local PDF stored with the citation, link in the citation that leads to the full text, CrossRef Lookup (which is used for DOIs), Google Scholar, and UNC's databases (this feature requires you to edit the preferences, see the Advanced section for a walk-through on this).

 

  • Sync: This button will sync your library with Zotero's servers. Much like when working on a document in Word, be sure to save your work often!