As a student you will probably collect all kinds of interesting information to help you with your studies. Many of these will be for research projects in various classes. Some will be useful throughout your time as a student, while others may only be useful for a specific paper. Quick and effortless retrieval of key citations from your collection will allow you to concentrate on writing a better paper.
Bookmarking web sites is simple. You can save and categorize your favorite web sites with a simple button click. Saving the results of your hard work on research projects is often much more complicated. It doesn’t have to be.
Do you hate searching for articles and citation information that you had saved on your computer?
Sometimes it is hard to find good articles for your research assignments. Having to find it a second time because you can’t remember where you saved it is just frustrating.
Don’t get frustrated, get organized! Use citation management software to tame those large research projects.
There are several ways to populate your Refworks account and keep track of the great research articles that you have found. You can drop pdf documents into the Refworks, use the browser import tool or manually type in information. One of the most efficient ways to get the information into your Refworks library is via direct export from the various library databases.
While there are over 100 databases to choose from at the D’Youville Library many of the databases are related and export the same way. Below we detail how to export information from the Ebsco databases.
How to Identify an Ebsco Database
The first step in using this tutorial is to make sure you are in an Ebsco database. Several of our most used databases come from the Ebsco company including Spartan Search, CINAHL and Medline. You can identify an Ebsco resource by looking at your browser tab while you are searching. It will have a blue “E”.
The blue “E” for Ebsco
You can also look for the Ebsco host icon.
The Ebsco Host Icon
How to Export to Refworks from Database
Click on the Folder Icon in the top right hand corner of the screen. This will show you the items that you have selected during your current search. You can deselect any unwanted items at this time. The “Export” icon can be found in the right hand column menu at the bottom. Clicking on this will bring you to the “Export Manager”. There are several different ways to export your citation information, so make sure to select the “Direct Export to RefWorks” option before clicking on the “Save” button. You may want to also click on the “Remove these items from folder after saving” box if you want to continue searching to prevent importing duplicate records.
Folder Icon
Select the newest version of Refworks from the next screen and the information will be ported over to your library. You may be asked to login to Refworks at this point if you haven’t already.
Select the Blue button
Working with Your Newly Imported Records
The Ebsco databases will not export the full text pdf. The information that is needed to complete a works cited page is sent along with a url to view and retrieve the full text. Do not use the the “Find full-text using link resolver” link at the top of the page. The correctly functioning URL link can be found near the bottom of the record (full records can be viewed by clicking on the title in the center pane).
Document Retrieval URL (Highlighted in Red)
Direct exports from the Ebsco databases provide a easy way to quickly populate your research library. Similar functionality can be found in most of our databases and will be covered in future posts.
Take a look at our Youtube page to watch an video version of these instructions.
RefWorks is a citation management software designed to gather information, organize articles and journals, and cite research. It is also is compatible with library database journals, academic journals, and search engine websites. RefWorks allows teams to share research and information while making citation pages and annotations for research simple and easy.
