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What is a Citation Manager?
Reference management software allows you to group your sources together as you find them and then easily create citations and/or import them into your documents. These applications can simplify the citation management process for projects involving a high number of sources. Used primarily in research and writing heavy courses.
For more information about reference management software, contact your instructor or personal librarian.
The best source for APA style citations is the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association, but there are online citation generators that are reasonably accurate in creating citations, if used carefully.
1. Always double check that the citation generator is using the required edition style.
2. Make sure you enter the type of source and all the information you have available.
3. Always check the generated citations against the APA Publication Manual for the required edition style
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KnightCiteMaintained by the Hekman Library at Calvin College.
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Citation BuilderMaintained by the North Carolina State University Libraries.
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ScribbrMaintained by Scribbr B.V.
Georgia State University Research Guides on Citation Managers
Here are research guides by Georgia State University on the top three most popular citation managers. Check these out for an look into how these products work, as well as which one might work best for you.
- Georgia State University Research Guide: About ZoteroZotero is free, easy to use software that helps you save, manage, and cite research sources. Georgia State University has complied this guide to help users learn how to install and use the software.
- Georgia State University Research Guide: About EndNoteEndNote is a program that can help you manage citations for your research projects. It can automate much of the work of organizing and formatting citations and bibliographies in your writing. EndNote can connect to online sources such as GIL and article databases, output results in over 1,000 different bibliographic styles.
- Georgia State University Research Guide: About MendeleyMendeley's basic software package is free and supported on IE, Firefox, Chrome, and Safari. Web storage space limit is 2GB.
Check out the three Research Guides above on Zotero, EndNote and Mendeley.
Which citation manager has the discipline-appropriate citation style for your area of study?
Do any of them integrate with your choice of word processing software?
Between these three, which would be your choice and why?
Comparison of Reference Management Software
Interested in learning more about citation managers? The following tables compare notable reference management software, also known as citation mangers. This list can be overwhelming, but is easily sorted by multiple criteria. The comparison includes older applications that may no longer be supported, as well as actively-maintained software. Take your time and look over all the possibilities available to you. If you have questions, please reach out to your instructor or personal librarian.
Take a look at the comparison of reference management software chart on Wikipedia.
How many different ways can the information be sorted so you can find what you need?
What is the most important factor to you when considering reference management software?