What is bibliographic software?

Bibliographic software (sometimes called Reference Management software) enables you to keep a database of the sources you use (books, journal articles, websites etc.) when researching your assignments. You can then automatically select them when citing your sources in your written work and produce bibliographies automatically from the citations you have included. The sources can be arranged into folders for different assignments (although the same source can be used in multiple assignments and so be in multiple folders). Various output styles can be chosen for your citations and bibliography to conform to your departmental guidelines.

Generally, the software allows you to:

Collect your references
Store your references
Organise your references into folders
Add notes to your references
Link to the full text, web pages and documents
Store linked pdf files
Cite your references and create bibliographies
Share your references

The university officially supports two bibliographic software packages EndNote (including EndNote Online) and RefWorks.

EndNote information and support

RefWorks information and support

EndNote v RefWorks - which is best for you?

EndNote and RefWorks basically do the same thing and in most circumstances the decision which to use will be arbitrary. However, undergraduate students working with standard sources (books/articles/conference papers/government papers etc) often find RefWorks slightly easier. However, if you are using non-standard sources (maps, images, audiovisual sources etc) or are a postgraduate student who may want to import literature into the NVivo qualitative analysis package then EndNote will definitely be better. There is a brief description of each option below. You can also download this document: EndNote v RefWorks - a detailed comparison of features for a more comparative viewpoint.

Other bibliographic software

Mendeley and Zotero are free bibliographic software packages that have desktop and online options, but neither are available on the University Network and are not supported by the University. Mendeley and Zotero do not support the University of Hull Harvard or Footnote referencing schemes but if your department uses APA or OSCOLA they may meet your needs.