Create an easy 'test' page for Zotero plugin

sxflynn
I teach Zotero workshops and something that would be helpful is a webpage with an easy URL that can test that you have the Zotero plugin installed correctly. For example, a page like http://www.zotero.org/test and when you visit the page the Zotero icon lights up and you can click to add the metadata and it then adds some test bibliographic item to your Zotero library.

Right now what I have to do is make workshop attendees go to a random library database on their laptop, and type in a search and find an article and then click the button to make sure it works fine. This is cumbersome since I have to say "ok go to the library website, then click on this database, then type in a random search term". Instead it would be great to say "ok go to www.zotero.org/test in your browser, see that Zotero icon in the top right corner? Click it. It works? Yay great!"
  • dstillman
    I don't think we'll do that — among other things, that would be somewhat confusing in terms of communicating how Zotero functions differently when there's high-quality metadata vs. on a regular webpage. And (alas) most people generally don't type in web addresses manually anymore, so I think it's somewhat of a strange thing to ask people to do.

    I would just pick an easier example — any Google Scholar search, for example.
  • dragonfly
    You might find Sikuli Slides useful for such "automation" of a Zotero workflow.

    http://slides.sikuli.org/

    Basically you first need to capture images which are the targets for the automation script. I use a Firefox add-on QSnap which does this quite nicely.

    Then it is a matter of writing your automation script in PowerPoint.
  • sxflynn
    Dan, I agree that if the audience you're thinking of are PhD students and scholars, then asking folks to manually enter a URL is strange, but the population I work with primarily are undergraduates in technology workshops, so asking them to go to certain URLs is quite routine. In this case, while I agree that Google Scholar searches are the easiest way to quickly reach scholarly Zotero-compatible webpages, it's still possible to run into webpages that Zotero cannot interpret, thus creating confusion. If there was a simple test page that I knew activated the Zotero metadata input icon in the browser, then I could have all the students go to that page on their laptops and verify that they have Zotero installed correctly. This is especially needed given that they're all coming in with different platforms, different versions, different browsers and versions. It's too much.
  • adamsmith
    It's trivially easy to do this locally. Just create a bibliography in Zotero in html and put in on a webpage that you link to from your libguide or whatever you use as your course landing page.

    Zotero bibliographies contain COinS, which Zotero picks up.

    @dragonfly -- those are cool, thanks!
  • sxflynn
    Thanks Adam maybe I'll try that.
  • dstillman
    edited October 27, 2015
    while I agree that Google Scholar searches are the easiest way to quickly reach scholarly Zotero-compatible webpages, it's still possible to run into webpages that Zotero cannot interpret
    On Google Scholar? That should be pretty close to impossible. Pretty much every time I've ever wanted to verify that metadata-saving in Zotero was working, I've just typed "test" into Google Scholar and clicked on the folder icon. (Now, it's possible that starting with the folder icon isn't best, but there are other single-page examples that are as reliable as Google Scholar and that still represent normal usage.)

    While adamsmith's suggestion is clever, I think it's actually somewhat confusing to show saving from a regular webpage with embedded metadata to start, since that's far from the norm. In nearly every other case that they encounter later they'll just get a generic webpage item on a regular webpage and no extended metadata.

    Remember, too, that Zotero no longer has a "metadata icon", exactly — it just has a toolbar icon that's always present if Zotero is installed. Given that change, I might argue that it actually makes more sense to show saving a regular webpage that doesn't have embedded metadata (e.g., your course page) first — which would just as sufficiently verify that Zotero is installed — and then follow that up with a page with metadata to show what Zotero can do on some pages.
  • adamsmith
    Remember, too, that Zotero no longer has a "metadata icon", exactly — it just has a toolbar icon that's always present if Zotero is installed.
    well, except if you're on Chrome. Safari is yet another different case.
  • dstillman
    True. That will hopefully change soon, though.
  • dragonfly
    All have key options to launch Zotero so a workflow can be easily scripted.

    In Ubuntu Firefox, Zotero is launched from Ctrl+Shift+Z keys.

    Presumably these keys differ across clients so there could be a simple pre-test to establish each student's client and OS environment.
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