I'm looking for software to manage a large number of txt files and extract content from them into a new document, all while retaining reference to the original txt file. I posed the issue on a reddit forum and Zotero was a recommendation. Most of the example usage I've seen so far, though, is outside of what I would want to use it for. However, it does seem very capable and, being a complete novice with this type of software, it seems very possible that Zotero can, in fact, do what I want and that my use case is just far enough outside the norm that it doesn't readily turn up in searches.

My use case is this: I have lots, maybe hundreds of txt files that are transcriptions of audio files. I want to find software that will let me scroll through these txt files, copying lines or paragraphs into a new document as I go. I've assumed the new document would be a new txt file but maybe not. I also need the new document to retain reference to the original txt file. I'd envision this as working by, say, highlighting or placing the cursor within some of my new document's text and another panel would show the original txt file with the text in question highlighted.

Everything I've seen so far has pointed to the web and webpages or pdfs found on the web as the source material. My source material is all txt files and is all local as I've made the transcription txt files myself from audio file sources. If it's possible to create a workflow like I'm describing within Zotero, could anyone point me to some info or tutorials on how to do so?

thanks,
BabaG