A group of scholars at George Mason University released a free Web-browser enhancement this month designed especially for other scholars. The project, which was originally called Firefox Scholar, is now called Zotero.
The goal is to bring search and organizational tools to humanities scholars who might not have the skill or interest to otherwise use them, by embedding them in the Web-browser software the scholars are already using, says Daniel J. Cohen, an assistant professor of history and director of research projects at the Center for History and New Media at George Mason University.
With Zotero, which requires the latest version of the Firefox browser, users can import Web pages, and citation information from them, into a personal filing system, among other features. A written statement on the project's Web site says the software "includes the best parts of older reference-manager software (like EndNote)—the ability to store full reference information in author, title, and publication fields and to export that as formatted references—and the best parts of modern software such as del.icio.us or iTunes, like the ability to sort, tag, and search in advanced ways." –Jeffrey R. Young
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