Saving items to Zotero
There are 3 methods to save items to your Zotero library:
- Use the Zotero Connector browser extension
- Drag and drop a pdf into your Zotero library
- Add an item by identifier or manually within the Zotero platform
Let's walk through each one and address some troubleshooting techniques.
The Three Methods
The Zotero Connector browser extension (be sure to pin it to your taskbar!) will detect when you're looking at a journal article, book, newspaper article, or website and the icon in your taskbar will change accordingly to look like the item type (document, closed book, rolled newspaper, etc.). Click the icon to save both the citation information and the pdf (article) or screen capture (website) to your Zotero library. Choose from the drop down menu for the Collection or Group Library you would like to save the item to. Make sure to check your Zotero library that the information was recorded accurately! Change any details manually as needed in order to have accurate citations in your bibliography.
Troubleshooting: If the connector is unable to save the pdf, you can download the pdf and drag and drop it on top of the item record to attach it to that record.
You can drag and drop a pdf into Zotero and, if the pdf contains the metadata about the item, Zotero should populate a record with the citation information and automatically attach the pdf to the record. Make sure to check your Zotero library that the information was recorded accurately! Change any details manually as needed in order to have accurate citations in your bibliography.
Troubleshooting: If the pdf does not contain the metadata information, it will just show as a pdf in your library. To add an item record, you have two options. You can either use method 1 to find the publisher page for the item and add it via the Zotero Connector. Or, you can right click on the pdf item in Zotero and click on the option “Create parent item”. From here, you can add the DOI, ISBN or other persistent identifier to see if it can pull this info to populate the parent record. If this isn’t possible, or it doesn’t populate, you will have to fill out the information manually with the “Manual Entry” button on that window.
If you'd like to add an item record to your Zotero library by DOI, ISBN, or other persistent identifier, click on the magic wand icon (circled in red) and enter the corresponding identifier to the item you're looking to add. Make sure to check your Zotero library that the information was recorded accurately! Change any details manually as needed in order to have accurate citations in your bibliography.
If the item you're trying to add does not have an identifier, or you don't know it, you can add its information manually by clicking on the document icon with a plus sign in the corner (circled in blue), choosing the item type (article, book, etc.), and then manually typing in the appropriate information.
Note that these methods will only add the item record and not the pdf or screen capture itself to your library. However, if you have the pdf or a screenshot, you can drag and drop the file on top of the new item record you've created, just like in Method 2, to save it to your library.