Word plugin citations

maxlovic

There seems to be an issue with Zotero Word plugin, new style.
When I type the text and find a citation, I want to select it. My native instincts are telling me to double clock on the drop-down list to apply a citation, because it is faster. But on the first click the popup zotero window dissapears, and it took some time to figure out, that just loses focus, and the only way to get it back is by Alt+TAB.
Just a usage inconvenience feedback.

Another thing is that I always need to type the citation, why there is no letest or frequently used list already?

Thanks for your work! Really love it so far.

adamsmith

typing ibid will give you the last citation. Frequently cited might be interesting, but would it really save time compared to typing an author name?

Using arrow keys to navigate to a citation and hitting the return key twice is probably the fastest way to select a citation. The QuickFormat dialogue has been optimized for use with the keyboard.
What happens when you double click is that the citation gets selected on the first click and then the second click is outside of the quickformat window so it brings forward the Word document. I don't see how that behavior can be changed without deteriorating other parts of the plugin functionality.

maxlovic

well, the thing when you need to type the author's name is that first you need to remember where the citation is from, then you need to remember the author and it's name. Well, it may take some time to switch from one task to another, and kinda annoying sometimes, at least for me. Also take in consideration different language layout.
Now when you see a list of previously used sources, you don't need to use memory, you just quickly look through it and choose. I'm not stating it is an absolutely better way, I'm just saying the choice is better than one fixed way of doing this.

Concerning double clocking, yeah, I understand how that happens. Maybe a bigger zotero search screen of some more height can solve this? I don't see any advantage of it being a pop up and being so small in height. If it were on a toolbar (or can it be sticked there?) yeah, the smaller the better. But a pop-up... not to me.
So just some thought on my usage experience.

dstillman

the thing when you need to type the author's name

You don't. Type "ibid". You'll see all your cited items.

We could possibly do something like make down-arrow display the same list when the search box is empty.

adamsmith

also, just to clarify - you don't need the author necessarily. Zotero searches the title, date, and author field.

maxlovic

Alright, I'll try "ibid". But still think it's an extra typing, when you can see this list already at the start, while nothing is typed.
Also I wonder if there is a hotkey to insert a citation in Word using Zotero. Because if not, the switching from moise to keyboard also takes time.

adamsmith

you can set the shortcut in word
http://www.zotero.org/support/word_processor_plugin_shortcuts

Simon

I think that Ctrl+Opt+A should also work out of the box, but I'm not sure.