Reference Software

misskool

endnote for referencing, you can get a substantial discount from your uni IT shop.

Stubert

If you use Word 2007 if does referencing for you. It doesn't quite do it in Harvard style, but it does it in APA (which I also think it sometimes called Chicago?) which is fairly similar. My department were fine as long as you were consistent really.

bitsandpieces

Endnote isn't a way to avoid having to learn how to format references right - you still need to learn this, to make sure the software is formatting them correctly! It does give you a nice way of storing references (along with notes on them), searching them, adding them to Word and them using them to generate a bibliography. By the time you're dealing with hundreds or thousands of references, it becomes very helpful.

Zotero looks interesting. Never used it - but it's free and seems well-liked. If you don't already have a copy of Endnote it may be worth trying Zotero and only buying Endnote if you don't like it?

Stubert wrote: »

If you use Word 2007 if does referencing for you. It doesn't quite do it in Harvard style, but it does it in APA (which I also think it sometimes called Chicago?) which is fairly similar. My department were fine as long as you were consistent really.

You'll need to check with your department before doing this. Some won't mind, but many will view using a style other than what you're told to use as wrong (even if you're consistently wrong in the same way!)

melancholly

you can change any output in Endnote anyway, so if you need anything specific that isn't there as a template, it isn't too tricky to get it sorted.

MrsManda

Thanks everyone. I have no intention of not learning how to reference myself - I've done a lot of work which have required me to reference material. I'm thinking of buying reference software because from now onwards (at least for the next two years and if I'm good enough, hopefully for the next decade or so) I'm going to be doing a lot of referencing and with many references being used in multiple pieces of work as I get more specialised
So would be useful to have something to keep track. My university library has said it ought to be possible for me to access their Reference Manager software at home so I'm going to try and get that to work (not yet succeeded) to see if I find that useful. If I do it may be worth getting a personal copy, if not I'll see if I can trial some of the others mentioned on here. Thanks for you suggestions and comments

southoftheriver

I've used Endnote web and Refworks (both through uni's albeit different ones). Prefer refworks although I don't use the work add in, I just copy and paste the references from my bibliography into my text.

I agree you could do it the long way, but at 130 references and counting, a software package is so much easier!

littlepinkstars44

I use Ref Works, free from my university with Athens log in. Also download the Ref Grabbit, which makes it so much easier to reference a website!

echelon101

EndNote is good.

If you are writting a thesis etc then Latex with BibTex has been highly recommended, it's free, but will require learning as it is a code based writting scheme