在线研究：Zotero进入云时代

http://www.yeeyan.com/articles/view/herohao/30348/dz

 

在线研究：Zotero进入云时代

Zotero,一款流行的开源研究文献管理工具，发布其最新版本1.5b1（这个工具就是作为一个firefox的插件来使用，无独立版本），它现在可以让用户在不同计算机间同步数据，另外一些小的改进将你收集参考文献变得更为简单。

Zotero同时宣布它的插件带有一个网络组件，与同步特性紧密相关，可以自动的把你的数据备份到Zotero.org。

新特性：同步，备份，社交网络

Zotero是去年学生用户群体里最为耀眼的一款应用，主要特性是创建和管理参考书目。刚出来时它只是个简单的工具，现在它的特性已经可以和商业化的文献管理工具EndNote 或 RefWorks.想媲美了。

 

Zotero紧密依靠Firefox3可在几大主流免费或付费数据库和网络报刊，为你的文章和论文迅速保存文件，简便创建书目。

 

同步特性如同他们宣传的那么棒，当你在不同计算机间工作，可使你保持文献的同步。如果你进入Web 分布式创作和版本控制的服务器，Zotero同样可以保持你的附件的自动同步。

 

需要Firefox3

不管何时 Zotero可以识别出支持的站点，如Google Books, 亚马逊, YouTube, 纽约时报, or JSTOR（一个在线期刊数据库），它将在你的Firefox地址栏添加一个标识，可以让你简单的点击以下就把本页加入参考书目。Zotero将为你自动的提取其中的参考书目信息甚至可以你的保存的文档里创建全文。

社交网络

Zotero.org 现在已经包含了一些社交网络的特征。比如，你可以搜索以名字，邮箱，搜索别的用户。加为好友或黑名单。当然这些特性还刚刚推出，至今只有很少一部分用户在使用，但这最终将为学术研究者们带来实惠。他们可以和同事共享他们的参考文献。将来，Zotero还计划扩展它类似Twitter的性能可以跟踪你的朋友的研究动态。

与word和openoffice整合。

Zotero同样和微软的Office和openoffice整合（1.5bq版本尚未完全兼容这些插件），它支持1，100不同的模板，当然也提供自己创建模板的功能。你可以从Firefox中拖拉参考文献放到其他文档。

 

总评

Zotero已经是管理大量文献最好的工具之一。这次更新将使得它比同样的商品化软件更好。新的同步特性让你在不同计算机间工作而不用保存和更新你的数据库，这比RefWorks (实质上也是个在线工具)走了个先手。

 

小贴士:新的特性对我们很有用，但是 Zotero提醒在升级到1.5b1前，备份你的数据库。

Online Research: Zotero Moves Into the Cloud

Zotero, the popular open-source research and bibliography tool, just announced the latest version of its Firefox plugin (1.5b1), which now allows users to synchronize their databases between different machines, as well as a number of smaller updates that will make it even easier to create and curate bibliographies with Zotero.

Zotero also announced a new online component to its plugin, which, in conjunction with the new synchronization features, automatically creates an online backup of your database on Zotero.org.

New Features: Synchronization, Backups, and Social Networking

Zotero, which we highlighted as one of the top application for students last year, features an extensive set of tools for creating and managing bibliographies. While it started out as a very basic tool, its feature set is now up to par with that of other commercial bibliography tools like EndNote or RefWorks.

Zotero integrates tightly with Firefox 3 and allows you to quickly save articles and easily create bibliographies for your papers and articles from most of the major free and for-pay research databases and online newspapers.

The synchronization feature works exactly as advertised and allows you to keep your bibliographies in sync, even if you work on different machines. If you have access to a WebDAV enabled server, Zotero can also sync your attachments automatically.

Needs Firefox 3

Whenever Zotero recognizes that you are surfing a supported site like Google Books, Amazon, YouTube, the New York Times, or JSTOR, it will simply add an icon to your Firefox address bar that allows you to save the bibliographic entry for that page or article with one click. Zotero will automatically extract the bibliographical information for you and it can even create a full-text archive of your saved documents.

Social Networking

Zotero.org now also includes a number of social networking features. You can, for example, search for other users by name, email, affiliation, or discipline. While this feature is still very new, and hence only has a few users so far, this could turn out to be a real boon for academic researchers (and others) who could use this to share their bibliographic databases with colleagues. In the future, Zotero plans to extend this with a Twitter-like stream of your friends' research activity.