Zotero integration with e-porfolio system

anitsirk

Hello,

Has anyone already started on a plugin of Zotero for an e-portfolio system?

The Bachelor en Sciences de l'Education at the University of Luxembourg uses the open source e-portfolio system Mahara. We are funding development work in Mahara to include a bibliography tool. As our students are introduced to Zotero in their 1st semester and are encouraged to continue using it, we want to have a plugin developed in Mahara which will enable users to import (but even better: sync) the bibliographic references they have in Zotero.

Using the RSS feed would not be enough because students should be able to display their references in APA style and choose which collection(s) of their Zotero library they want to display.

Kristina

bdarcus

So do I understand right that you'd like to be able to have a reference list generated within Mahara from Zotero data? So it's important the list content is "live" rather than static?

dstillman

Using the RSS feed would not be enough because students should be able to display their references in APA style and choose which collection(s) of their Zotero library they want to display.

This will be possible using feeds in the near future. (You can already get a feed from any collection, but retrieving formatted references instead of data will be possible.)

anitsirk

@bdarcus: Having "live" data is preferable because the amount of references in a collection might change over time. Learners wouldn't need to to into Mahara and click on a button "update bibliography" (many will most likely forget to do that).

@Dan: That sounds fantastic. What timeframe is "near future"? ;-)

anitsirk

Hi Dan,

I guess, my mail from September 6, 2009, to you about this issue got lost on its way or got caught in your spam folder. Thus, a bit more on this here. We would be willing to contribute to the funding of this development or fund it entirely depending on the proposed costs. I am looking forward to further discussions.

Having the feed displayed outside of Zotero is a great way of bringing in the latest additions to the library. However, we were thinking more along the lines that students should be able to display their libraries or parts of their library, e.g. the library for one
semester, i.e. a Zotero collection, in alphabetical order besides a chronological one, and display it in parts (e.g. only letter L).

Furthermore, our students are asked to create annotated bibliographies, but should use the APA style for the references. We would need to make sure that such an annotation can be displayed immediately, e.g. via a dedicated note. Currently, students need to export their bibliography and then type in / paste their annotation below each reference.

Kristina

mark

In my experience, when the developers here use the words 'in the near future', they mean something like 'in a matter of months not of years'. Even expressions like 'very soon', 'next week' or 'this months' have proven extremely flexible. No doubt this has to do with the multiple constraint satisfaction problem that is software development.

Gary Day

Hi, just come across this today.
How is this going anyone?

anitsirk

Hi Gary,

I don't have any updates or further responses. :-(

ajlyon

The new CSL processor is able to work independently of the Zotero codebase, with any modern JavaScript interpreter. I think that this means that an enterprising person could write a webpage that uses server-side JavaScript to work like a Zotero RSS proxy; like this:

http://www.example.com/rssproxy?<url of input feed>&<name of style>

The page returned would be a modified RSS feed.

Alternatively, a Mahara module could be written that embedded the CSL processor, running it either server-side or client-side; it could still use RSS feeds (which can be collection-specific), or it could use the Zotero API.

I'm not volunteering to do this, but all the pieces are there-- the citation processor exists and works outside of Zotero, and the Zotero servers provide sufficient data to import the desired entries.

dstillman

"Near future" may have been a touch optimistic, but particularly now that the new CSL processor has just been completed this is high up on our to-do list.

anitsirk

Great. Looking forward to more on that.

JonasLagneryd

Hi, What happened to this fantastic initiative? / Jonas

adamsmith

Zotero's API can format bibliographies by any available CSL style:
https://www.zotero.org/support/dev/web_api/v3/basics#parameters_for_format_bib_and_content_bib

There are also plugins for various systems like Drupal or Wordpress.

anitsirk

@Jonas: The Mahara cloud plugin https://wiki.mahara.org/wiki/Plugins/Artefact/Cloud allows for pulling Zotero data.