Installing and Configuring Zotero

1. Go to https://www.zotero.org and install Zotero and the Zotero Connector for the browser you use

2. When prompted, set up a free Zotero account

3. In Zotero, go to the  edit menu then preferences. Select the citation tab, and choose Chicago Manual of Style, 17th edition, full not

Before Working

• When starting work a different set, delete whatever is leftover from your last set from Zotero and make sure it has no content in it.

Google Alerts

• Copy and paste the email contents into a Word document

• Find each title given in all of the UMBC emails, and remove all duplicate entries.

If there is a limitation on what you’re supposed to process

• If you're working on an update, delete everything you don't have to process.

• If you're working on new work and have to park some of it:

  • Cut and paste everything that you’re not supposed to process into another Word file,

  • Give both files appropriate names

  • Post a task for Michelle in Workast to “Park” the portion of the work that you’re not supposed to process. Attach the file with the work you’re not supposed to process to the task. Give it the tag "Works to be parked."

  • Attach the file that you’ll be processing to the existing processing task.

Determine if the Work is Out of Scope

CV's, Obituaries, Patents, Abstracts with no Full Text, Theses and Dissertations

Strike these out and do no processing:

• CV

• Patent Application

• Abstract with no full text document—if it’s more than a paragraph, and doesn’t say it’s an abstract, it’s not one

• Obituary unless the subject is a UMBC person

• Description only of a grant funded project.

• Theses or Dissertations:

  • Generally, if the item is a master thesis or PhD dissertation, or says Proquest Dissertation Publishing, we don't add manually–cross it off on the print-out.  UMBC thesis and dissertations are automatically sent to UMBC by Proquest and batch loaded, so don't add to a spreadsheet.

  • EXCEPTION: We don't receive any senior theses from Proquest, so these should be added to the spreadsheet and manually loaded.  Other institutions' master theses or PhD dissertations are out of scope. 

About UMBC or an Author Affiliated with UMBC

• There must be a UMBC author or alternately, the item must be about UMBC, a UMBC department, or person affiliated with UMBC. Often, the authors’ affiliation is included on the item. If not, use the UMBC directory, here, http://www.umbc.edu/search/directory// to determine. If there is no UMBC author, and the subject is not UMBC, a UMBC department, or person, it's out of scope–strike out and do no processing

Determine if the work is already in MD-SOAR

1. Search MD-SOAR to determine if the work is already in the system. If you find a work with the same title, authors, and formats, it’s the same work. If the authors or format don’t match, ask Arushi or Michelle if it’s the same work.

Identifying Federal Government Documents and Works on CC licenses

1. Find the publisher’s record for the item that you’re processing

2. Determine if the work is a federal government document

   1. Check if the publisher is a U.S. government department or agency. Check if any authors’ affiliations are a U.S. government department or agency

      1. Federal government agencies often have U.S. or national in their name, e.g. U.S. Department of Energy, National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). They can also be identified by a .gov URL (see exceptions below). Sometimes, you simply have to know that it's a federal government agency, e.g. Smithsonian Institution, Los Alamos National Laboratory. 

      2. Some common government agencies that we encounter are:

         1. NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, U.S. Department of Commerce)

         2. The National Weather Service

         3. NASA Goddard Flight Center and any other NASA (National Aeronatics and Space Adminstration) agencies

         4. Army Research Labs

         5. Navy Research Labs

         6. NIST (National Institute of Standards and Technology, U.S. Department of Commerce)

         7. CDC (Center for Disease Control and Prevention) and any CDC department or divisions

         8. Los Alamos and other National Laboratories

         9. Smithsonian Institute

      3. If you're not sure if a publisher is a U.S. federal government agency, google and look for the .gov in the URL. If the .gov is in the URL, it's a U.S. federal government agency.

      4. The U.S. government is notthe publisher of works on ERIC, eric.edu.gov, (works on education), Medline/PubMed, NCBI - WWW Error Blocked Diagnostic  (medical works), and the NASA Technical Report Server, NASA STI Compliance and Distribution Services  (NASA Publications and NASA employee publications), except for works on the NASA Technical Report Server where another publisher isn't given in the record for the item

      5. City, state, and county publications are not U.S. Federal Government publications.

   2. Find the authors affiliated with federal government agencies. At least one must be only affiliated with a government agency.

3. If either publisher is a federal government agency, or an author is only affiliated with a U.S. government department or agency, it’s a federal government document.

4. If the work isn’t a federal government document, look for a creative commons license on the work.

Arxiv

• If items in arxiv have been published, handle them as published works.

• If the work isn’t published, process it using Zotero but do not add a citation if

  • working a set the faculty member has asked us to add

  • an author is in https://umbc.box.com/s/9cbm6oxiaxqhj9w4vyicoawhxgljvo2u

• Otherwise, note “arxiv” under it in the Word document

Other Unpublished Works

1. If you can’t find any indication that a work has been published, note “unpublished zot” on the Word document, and add it to Zotero but do not add a citation.

Published Works

• Find the publisher in policies on file. Note the version or versions we can add on the Word document.

• Try to find the version we can add on the publisher’s site or by Google searching. If you find it, add using zotero. In the notes, indicate what version we’re adding, where the file can be found if the URL doesn’t go to the version we can add, and all publisher requirements.

Processing

1. Use the publisher’s record to add to Zotero. If unpublished, use the record where the work appears. When on the correct record, go to extension, and Zotero, and a pop up will appear that you can use to download the work and it’s metadata to Zotero. 

2. On the Word document, record fed gov doc, cc lic, arxiv, unpublished, or which version(s) we can add as appropriate, and zot to indicate that you’ve added it to zotero.

3. If the info loaded into Zotero seems minimal, check that the title, authors and URL have been added to Zotero. If not, add them manually, or add the work using a regular spreadsheet that will be input manually.

4. Copy the citation going to “edit” and then “copy bibliography”

5. On the info tab, change the format to journal articles.

6. On the info tab, paste the citation into Journal Abbr

7. On the info tab, If the work is a fed gov doc, copy and paste this rights note into the ISSN: “This work was written as part of one of the author's official duties as an Employee of the United States Government and is therefore a work of the United States Government. In accordance with 17 U.S.C. 105, no copyright protection is available for such works under U.S. Law.”

8. On the info tab, If the work is on a CC License, copy and paste the name of the CC license into the ISSN

9. On the info tab, If the URL is the DOI, change it to the URL

10. On the notes tab, and any necessary notes and Delete any extra notes that Zotero created when adding the record

Free Works

• When a work is published and you couldn’t locate a policy, determine if it’s free:

  • The determination of whether an item is free is based on whether the publisher is making the item available for free or if the U.S. government is making an item available for free. There may be free versions posted elsewhere, but if an item is not free on the publisher's site, or in a U.S. government database, it's not free.

  • When working at home, any item you can access on the publisher's site or in a database without using the proxy server is free.

  • Some works are available for free in these U.S. government database:

    • ERIC, edu.gov, (works on education)

    • Medline/PubMed, NCBI - WWW Error Blocked Diagnostic (medical works),

    • The NASA Technical Report Server, NASA STI Compliance and Distribution Services (NASA Publications and NASA employee publications).

    • Sometimes articles in these databases are free, and sometimes they're not free, so you have to figure this out. A pubmed record may have a link icon that says free or  an attached pdf.  When unsure if an item is free or not, simply try the links to find out.

  • When working in the library, materials in databases that UMBC subscribes to appear to be free when they are not.  These are paywall protected pages where anyone accessing via UMBC IP ranges automatically is given access. Generally if there is a UMBC logo or mention of UMBC on the page, it's a subscription resource that is paywall protected. A list of UMBC paywall protected subscription resources that appear free is here: Vendors/Platforms that are Paywall Protected(this list is likely not complete–if come across something that needs to be added to it, let Michelle know). Individual items on paywall protected sites are free if the record explicitly states that the item is open access, available for free, or is on a Creative Commons license. 

  • Science Direct is a subscription database and not free, even though UMBC isn't mentioned on it, unless the record says it's Under an Elsevier user license, or Open Access, in which case that particular item is free. If Open Access, check for a Creative Commons license or terms.

• If an item is free on the publisher's site or in a U.S. government database, write "free" next to it, and add it using zotero. In the notes, indicate link only.

When A Set is Completed

1. Go to file, and export Library.

2. Select EndNoteXML.

3. Check all the boxes.

4. Click ok.

5. Give the download directory a name that matches the set that you’re working on.

6. Go to file, and export Library.

7. Select EndNoteXML.

8. Check all the boxes.

9. Click ok.

10. Give the download directory a name that matches the set that you’re working on.

11. Attach the Word document and the directory you downloaded from zotero to a check work task.