Citation Managers

The library provides access to a number of resources called citation managers. These are online tools that can import and organize information sources, often directly from library databases or the web, and automatically generate citations and bibliographies to use in your writing. Each has strengths and weaknesses, so explore further to find one that works best with your workflow.

RefWorks is a popular citation manager, and it integrates well with library databases. Most of our databases will directly export to RefWorks with one push of a button. RefWorks has a good variety of basic organization and citation functions, and is a good general choice.

EndNote is similar to RefWorks, and many databases also export to it directly. While RefWorks is all online, however, EndNote has an online version and a desktop application you can download that lets you work offline. Some people find EndNote more complicated to use than RefWorks, but it can be more powerful.

Mendeley, which can be found in the Database Finder, is a newer citation manager that works a little differently. While it’s harder to import references from databases into Mendeley, it also has a desktop application like EndNote, which you can use to automatically scan PDF files and organize them. Mendeley can be a good choice if you tend to download a lot of PDF articles to your hard drive. It also has some interesting functions for discovering new literature and connecting with other scholars.

APA Academic Writer is a tool by the American Psychological Association, the source of APA citation style. It can also be hard to import references into, but it provides some important official information on APA style, and also some very useful templates for constructing research papers and articles.

For more information on using any of these tools, please contact your librarian.