How to extract references from MS Word file

Hi all,
I am wondering if you can help me to learn how to transfer references from an MS Word file into Zotero? I mean, if I receive a Word file from my co-researcher, how can I extract all references in that file into my Zotero library so that I could start adding my new references. Thanks
  • Are the references in the file just plain text, or are they active citations generated by Zotero or another tool?

    If they're active citations generated by Zotero or Mendeley, Zotero can just use them — they won't show up in your library, but you'll be able to select them in the "Cited" section of the citation dialog.

    Otherwise, see Importing Formatted Bibliographies.
  • Thanks for your reply. References are cited in another tool . I try this but its not working. Any other solution?
  • You tried what? The page explains the various options depending on what exactly you're trying to accomplish.
  • Sorry I meant to say Reference Extractor. I used "For Microsoft Word “.docx” documents with Zotero or Mendeley citation fields that were inserted with the Word plugins from these reference managers, you can use Reference Extractor.

    If you still have the references in a reference manager, you can export them from this program to a file format for exchanging bibliographic metadata, such as RIS or BibTeX, and then import this file into Zotero." ...........but its not extracting references from the file. I am not sure which tool was used to prepare the file. Thanks
  • If they're actually Word fields — e.g., highlighted in gray when you click on them — you can toggle field codes and see the code the fields begin with, which might give you an indication of the tool used. But if they were created with Zotero or Mendeley, Reference Extractor would generally work, so it was probably something else.

    So then you'll need to use the other instructions on the page to get data into Zotero, and then you would have to reinsert any existing citations using Zotero so that Zotero can properly generate citations and a bibliography based on the old and new citations.
  • Hi,
    I did not get your point "So then you'll need to use the other instructions on the page to get data into Zotero, and then you would have to reinsert any existing citations using Zotero so that Zotero can properly generate citations and a bibliography based on the old and new citations."
  • You'd need to give us a bit more than "I did not get your point" to help effectively

    The linked page has a section on Plain-text citations and bibliographies -- that's what you have in your case.
Sign In or Register to comment.