Good research paper/citation manager application??
in [Mac Applications]
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From: Jean S. Barto on 10 Sep 2006 10:08 Hi folks-- I'll be writing more term/research papers in the near future, and I'm looking for an application that will streamline entering the citations (footnotes or endnotes) and compiling a bibliography. I'll be using both MLA (some) and Chicago/Turabian (mostly) styles. I bought Endnote 9 last year, and maybe it's just me, I wasn't really able to figure out easily how to use it. Perhaps the program can do this, I just can't figure out how to have the program do it easily. The few times I tried using Endnote, I had to tweak it too much, and reverted back to adding my citations manually within Word, as well as manually compiling my bibliography. That sufficed then (even for a 20 page paper), but will be much too time-consuming when I start writing longer papers. It seems that the other programs that purport to "automate" the compilation of citations and bibliographies are all for the "dark side." Both my Macs (800 mHz flat-panel iMac, and 12" iBook G4) are "old chip," and I wasn't planning to buy an "Intel Mac" until next year. Also, I'm planning to sell my legacy Dell laptop soon, and don't plan on replacing it, except with a mid-level MacBook. Any suggestions, folks?? Thanks in advance, Jean in VA
From: Jon on 10 Sep 2006 11:22 Jean S. Barto <jsbarto1(a)cox.net> wrote: > I bought Endnote 9 last > year, and maybe it's just me, I wasn't really able to figure out easily how > to use it. I haven't tried Endnotes, but most people seem to think Bookends (which I do use) is better and easier to use. Worth a try. -- /Jon For contact info, run the following in Terminal: Mail: echo 36199371860304980107073482417748002696458P|dc Skype: echo 139576319600233690471689738P|dc
From: Martin on 10 Sep 2006 13:30 > I'll be writing more term/research papers in the near future, and I'm > looking for an application that will streamline entering the citations > (footnotes or endnotes) and compiling a bibliography. I'll be using both > MLA (some) and Chicago/Turabian (mostly) styles. I bought Endnote 9 last > year, and maybe it's just me, I wasn't really able to figure out easily how > to use it. Perhaps the program can do this, I just can't figure out how to > have the program do it easily. The few times I tried using Endnote, I had > to tweak it too much, and reverted back to adding my citations manually > within Word, as well as manually compiling my bibliography. That sufficed > then (even for a 20 page paper), but will be much too time-consuming when I > start writing longer papers. Have you considered using LaTeX / BibTeX ? There is a bit of a learning curve, but it is incredibly useful to manage citations and to write research papers in general. On MacOS X, there is a nice frontend called TeXShop: <http://www.uoregon.edu/~koch/texshop/> Martin
From: AES on 10 Sep 2006 13:32 In article <1hlgoae.1ud99su1x3xeqkN%see_signature(a)mac.com.invalid>, see_signature(a)mac.com.invalid (Jon) wrote: > Jean S. Barto <jsbarto1(a)cox.net> wrote: > > > I bought Endnote 9 last > > year, and maybe it's just me, I wasn't really able to figure out easily how > > to use it. > > I haven't tried Endnotes, but most people seem to think Bookends (which > I do use) is better and easier to use. Worth a try. > -- This is the classic choice for Mac citation management software. I've used EndNote since it first appeared -- now have maybe 4000 citations in a database. Up through the Mac System 9 versions it was great, and got better with every version. At some point (I think it was around the time of version 7) EndNote decided to go into the Windows market also, and in addition had to upgrade the Mac version for OS X. The Mac upgrade to EN 8 (which I still use) was a disaster -- they either lost all their Mac programming talent, or their Mac programmers were not talented enough to handle the OS X conversion well. Frustrating glitches (not data losses, at least not for me, just endless weird glitches) such that I actually went out and bought Bookends. But then, when I looked at the Bookends manual, I had the classic "Better the devil you know than the devil you don't" reaction, and stuck with EndNote 8. Now a new EndNote upgrade from EN 8 and 9 to EndNote X is available, with some interesting sounding new capabilities. Does it also (finally!) fix most of the EN 8 and 9 problems? I don't know -- I'm waiting for some user reports before I send them any more money. So, this may not help you much, but: 1) Once you learn to use EndNote it is actually pretty good, and quite powerful. 2) EndNote or Bookends better? -- Can't say (and depends a lot on the user and his/her needs) 3) What I think is *really* needed is an "EndNote Lite", that retains the basic structure of EndNote but strips out a lot of the excessively complex features that only a few power users may really use.
From: Fetch, Rover, Fetch on 10 Sep 2006 15:16
only one real choice - Endnote if you are a student the pricing is like $5 from your schools software sales Jean S. Barto wrote: > Hi folks-- > > I'll be writing more term/research papers in the near future, and I'm > looking for an application that will streamline entering the citations > (footnotes or endnotes) and compiling a bibliography. I'll be using both > MLA (some) and Chicago/Turabian (mostly) styles. I bought Endnote 9 last > year, and maybe it's just me, I wasn't really able to figure out easily how > to use it. Perhaps the program can do this, I just can't figure out how to > have the program do it easily. The few times I tried using Endnote, I had > to tweak it too much, and reverted back to adding my citations manually > within Word, as well as manually compiling my bibliography. That sufficed > then (even for a 20 page paper), but will be much too time-consuming when I > start writing longer papers. > > It seems that the other programs that purport to "automate" the compilation > of citations and bibliographies are all for the "dark side." Both my Macs > (800 mHz flat-panel iMac, and 12" iBook G4) are "old chip," and I wasn't > planning to buy an "Intel Mac" until next year. Also, I'm planning to sell > my legacy Dell laptop soon, and don't plan on replacing it, except with a > mid-level MacBook. > > Any suggestions, folks?? > > Thanks in advance, > > Jean in VA > |