Customized Item

hmartinho

Hi all;

I'm quite new at this, but let me start by saying what a great tool Zotero is.
What I wanted to know is if there is a way to make customized items in Zotero?
Let's say I have some sort of database already done with a certain number of fields and names allready defined (and I do :) ), how can I import this into Zotero without having to adjust my fields to the ones in any item available? I mean, if I allready have some kind of classification system/method wich makes sense to me, it would be easier to use some sort of template with the same field.
Please feel free to move this around since I'm not sure I've posted it in the correct place.

Thanks in advance.

Cheers.

ajlyon

There is no customizable item type, largely for data portability reasons. People have generally found the item types in Zotero flexibly enough for most purposes, with soime limitations that are slowly being worked out.

This may mean that you will need to take a lot of care in importing your data, but at least you can then be sure that it can be exchanged and cited reliably.

ajlyon

Also, if there are specific types of data that you're having trouble modeling using the existing Zotero item types and fields, please post-- people here have managed to model a remarkable range of materials using the existing types.

hmartinho

Would it still be possible to include an "sort of blank" item template?
It could be called blank or something and would include perhaps three or four named fields, like for instance: Name, Author, Year, Summary and afterwards about 10 or 15 fields only with numbers as titles and all text type with a reasonable number of characters:

Publication Title/Name:
Author(s):
Year:
Summary:
1:
2:
3:
...
9:
10:

that way a certain flexibility would be available for us users
I could then, when sharing my Zotero exported file include some sort of "understandable" explanation file like:

Field nº Purpose
1 This field contains keywords in original language
2 This field contains keywords in english
....

Don't know if this makes any sense to you but I would find it most welcome and usefull, and it wouldn't compromise the db sharing, as far as I can see.

Cheers.

bdarcus

Don't know if this makes any sense to you but I would find it most welcome and usefull, and it wouldn't compromise the db sharing, as far as I can see.

Maybe I'm just misunderstanding you, but it seems to me it would absolutely "compromise ... db sharing" since by definition the custom data is meaningless. What am I missing?

hmartinho

Thank you for answering.

Not if mean to use within a closed circle of friends/users, not saying I'd use for everything, I'm currently using zotero's standard items for its general purpose, but in this particular case, I would/could also use it for sharing any sort of library/data collection, since I could define wich data goes onto wich field.
One of my intentions is for example to collect portuguese legislation (I'm portuguese, hence my english), I don't quite see where I could insert these sort of documents, in wich item category I mean.
Just saying it would make zotero more flexible, besides everyone could still use, no matter what definition i assign to each field, as long as I'd include in that library a document intitled "READMEFIRST" (or instructions or whatever) in wich it would be defined each field, I mean in that document fields description would de filled (ex: field 1: Theme).
The data in the fields would be customizable, but defined by each collector.

Cheers.

Gracile

One of my intentions is for example to collect portuguese legislation (I'm portuguese, hence my english), I don't quite see where I could insert these sort of documents, in wich item category I mean.

I'm using Zotero for French law; it's not perfect but it's getting better and better. You should have a look there.

fbennett

User-defined types are generally not a good idea (especially for content like legislation that is likely to be widely shared). We do need a better, more transparent and more reliable process for proposing and vetting item type and field proposals, though. It's pretty opaque at the moment, and that naturally makes the prospect of local customizations very tempting.

With a view to moving that conversation forward, I've extracted a set of mapping tables that show which item types and fields in Zotero currently correspond to which item types and variable names in CSL. (Note that the CSL "legislation" type isn't even referenced by the Zotero "statute" type, which seems to invite a bit of housecleaning.)

alexuw

nice index fbennett!

Just a minor hair-splitting comment here. That zotero has few and tightly-controlled types is a design decision. Yes, it has the advantages noted. But it's not the only way things could be done.

One could argue for entirely the opposite approach: let users customize however they like, recognizing that you're giving them the rope to hang themselves. No doubt all hell would break loose in terms of interoperability. But, one could argue, in the long run the "crowd" would do a better job defining types. And, those who need obscure types and are currently out of luck could roll their own. (Obviously any customizing likely means types and styles both.)

I'm not suggesting the zotero project do that, just that there's more than one way to approach the problem. However, given the strategy followed by zotero, I couldn't agree more that

We do need a better, more transparent and more reliable process for proposing and vetting item type and field proposals

gusv2007

Hi. I agree with some of you. I need, for instance, Order-in-Councils, Memorandums, Inquiries, Magazine (whole, not article in) and I don't know how to save them. Perhaps a custom field or something, not shared, only for your own use, would be pretty appreciated. Thanks

ajlyon

For seemingly odd item types that you are trying to handle, consider (1) what pieces of data you would like to maintain for them and (2) what you would like them to look like when cited. Remarkably many types of items boil down to essentially the types currently in Zotero, at least in terms of fields needed and citation styles. Remember that the nominal item type is not important-- the important thing is whether it allows for useful management of item data.

Try posting a list of fields that you would need for each item type and an example of how it would be cited, and perhaps we can find a way for you to model your data successfully in Zotero.

gusv2007

Well, it's not only the citation, but the way I sort the items when I search them in the database. I can sort by title, author, date, type, etc, etc, but the documents I need to be sorted do not fit into any category. So, if I have several Order in Council, for instance, I don't have a category to find it, I have to browse figuring out which one fit. OK, unless I create a new folder and put determined items there, so I can find them easily.

fbennett

Or use tags, or a note in the Extra field, or a saved search.

For legal materials, there is a group for working out conventions for which item types and fields are appropriate for particular types of content, and for working up proposals for new item types where the existing infrastructure really can't cope with the case. The traffic in the group is not very heavy, but material that you add there will persist as part of collective memory whenever there's a push for revision. Please feel free to join.

ajlyon

That sounds like a good use case for tags (http://www.zotero.org/support/tags).

edit: I see that Frank is faster than I am in responding to Zotero forum notifications.