features don't get implemented because there are limited resources and things that can be approximated using existing features are further down the priority list.
I still don't quite understand the difference between filtering by tags and sorting by rating - you don't need a saved search for that, you just click on the tags "Five Stars" and "Four Stars" and only see the highest "ranked" references. I think the other issue here is that tags are poorly implemented in the word processor plugin, but that's a different topic altogether.
I don't see a lot of enthusiasm for creating individual-level rating systems for that reason - color-coded tags that are more versatile are more likely to happen, but that's harder to do.
The other issue are aggregated citation "rankings" but that is a complicated design question for the reasons discussed above and frequency of google citation counts might be a superior measure here.
In Zotero if you make the tag selector visible on the bottom of the right hand panel
http://www.zotero.org/support/tags#using_the_tag_selector
In the word processor plugin, as I say, something similar is not currently possible. I think that should be addressed.
OK, I stand corrected, indeed with this usage the rating feature can be approximated.
However, I would still prefer to have a "rating column" to show how many stars each paper on the paper list currently showing has, and to be able to quickly sort this list by the rating.
I know that resources are limited, and I don't know how complex would be to add this to the code... I still think however that it would make a nice addition to the anyway excellent software Zotero is.
I'm a new user to Zotero, so maybe I'm missing something in this discussion. If so, apologies.
I am looking for a tool to create an annotated bibliography that can be crowdsourced - i.e. added to and annotated by any member of the group. In most ways, Zotero seems well suited to this. But I would love to have a rating system of some sort.
If you have a star system (either a simple 1-5, or with 1-5 in several categories such as originality of research, clarity of thesis etc.) then many people can presumably award stars and the system will calculate and display the average (as in Amazon book reviews). But if you just use tags, then if more than one member adds a tag it will be totally confusing, won't it? (e.g. one tags it "four-star" and another "two-star"). Am I missing something?
If I'm understanding it right, then I think a star system would be far preferable.
One more vote for a simple single-user 5 star rating system. I think people are over-thinking things a little - it would be up to you to figure out if you want to use it for impact or for likeability or for use of a pretty font.
The use of tags is a good idea but a little clumsy.
How about the ability to have multiple ratings, the headers for which are nameable? So you'd "Add new rating..." and name it "Impact" and rate articles with a high impact as 5 stars. Then if you want to have a "Likeability factor" you'd "Add new rating..." and name it Likeability, so you'd have to rankings with independent scores. That way, if you want none you have none, you want 10 you can have 10.
However, my vote is still for a simple, single-user 1 to 5 score. Let the users use it for what they want.
here as well a vote for a 5-star ranking system. But I would like to see it in general for each item/entry.
We have several papers under one topic. Ranking would be a way to recommend other group members where to start reading. Also, it helps to identify what articles should be cited in my future articles...
Though,I see that there is actually a difficulty in aggregating the votes (you need store at least the number of votes and the average/median).
I use tags from "*" to "*****" to rate my items, and have 5 saved searches for that. It didn't take much to set up.
The only thing missing is to visually distinguish them in the items list, but it seems that colored tags are already implemented and should make it to the release soon, so we have a working system :)
I'm seeing the last couple of posts as possible useful workarounds from an individual point of view. But, for groups, I'd be interested in a way that "cumulative" expressions of importance (or interestingness, or coolness, whatever the group decides) can be registered.
Perhaps the YouTube (thumbs up or down) model would be closest to what I have in mind. It's easy (one click) and then if you can see the number of "votes" in folders or search results (or even select by anything that's gotten x number of positive votes).
I think if it's not cumulative and "one vote per member," then one individual could skew things quite a bit -- you could get the person who always "thumbs ups" anything they add... it needs to have some social meaningfulness.
I agree with Ogriffin,
I would be in favor of a simple 1-5 Star rating system that only I can see. I don't really care as much what everyone else thinks about a source as much as I would like to find the ones most relevant to what I am currently working on fast. I would like to see this feature visible in the columns, that way I could simply "sort by rating". Having an individual rating would cut out allot of the controversy of how to rate a source.
I would love to see a rating/ranking system put in place. A college showed me Papers, and the ranking system used by that software, and I must say it is nice to be able separate the truly great publications from mediocre. I think 1-5 would be sufficient.
Also, it seems some people misunderstand the ranking system. This should only be for publications in my library, visible to only me.
+1... Waiting for that one since 2011, doubt it'll ever be considered. No clue as to why not. I'm also using tags with stars from one to five, which is clumsy though. It needs to be separated from the tags so thee can be a column in the list view and only one rating applied per item.
Edit: Funnily enough, the thread is five (5!!) years old and no such feature has been added, I wonder why.
Please add a 5 star rating system. I see a lot of people crying for this feature (including me).
I have switched from Endnote, and thats the only feature I am missing. Zotero Rockz....
Definitely, it's still an important feature to add to Zotero !
There was a ticket (https://www.zotero.org/trac/ticket/580) 7 years ago, but it was then deleted from milestone goals...
I would LOVE to see this feature added to Zotero. As far as I'm concerned, star ratings have nothing to do with what other people think of a source, ergo tallying votes is not at all necessary. I would use it the same way I use star ratings in iTunes - to mark the things that are most interesting/relevant to me, in order to be able to better sort through a list of 50-100 sources.
Zotero is my favorite piece of software I've discovered in years, and the only things that I would ask for to make it better are in-text searching of sources like PDFs (a big ask, I know), and star ratings!
A more flexible rating could be realized with the ability to mark sources with different colors. This could be used for ranking and for other types of categorization. Colors could easily recognized even when the sources are ordered by another parameter (like year) Such a feature would help me much to organize my sources.
I have been using Zotero for two years now, for my bibliography in a professional scientific environment. It is really a wonderful software.
One thing is missing : a five star ranking. Such a feature would help me to immediately find the most relevant articles in a directory containing 50 or more references.
Tagging is not what I am expecting, because it implies going into markers tab, and moreover we can't see the note directly as a column.
Thanks
Edit : I think I've found a usable workaround, simply by adding the extra column and adding stars in this field. Of course that is not as user-friendly as clicking on a star number, but that is easy and directly visible.
This is the one feature I would love to see. A feature I miss from Endnote. Please add a 5-star rating system. I'm using tags now, but you can't view tags directly in a column, and using those tags uses up my 6 colored tags.
Upgrade Storage
I still don't quite understand the difference between filtering by tags and sorting by rating - you don't need a saved search for that, you just click on the tags "Five Stars" and "Four Stars" and only see the highest "ranked" references. I think the other issue here is that tags are poorly implemented in the word processor plugin, but that's a different topic altogether.
I don't see a lot of enthusiasm for creating individual-level rating systems for that reason - color-coded tags that are more versatile are more likely to happen, but that's harder to do.
The other issue are aggregated citation "rankings" but that is a complicated design question for the reasons discussed above and frequency of google citation counts might be a superior measure here.
One question so I can better understand your usage suggestion: what do you mean exactly by "clicking" on the tags? Where do I click on them?
http://www.zotero.org/support/tags#using_the_tag_selector
In the word processor plugin, as I say, something similar is not currently possible. I think that should be addressed.
However, I would still prefer to have a "rating column" to show how many stars each paper on the paper list currently showing has, and to be able to quickly sort this list by the rating.
I know that resources are limited, and I don't know how complex would be to add this to the code... I still think however that it would make a nice addition to the anyway excellent software Zotero is.
I am looking for a tool to create an annotated bibliography that can be crowdsourced - i.e. added to and annotated by any member of the group. In most ways, Zotero seems well suited to this. But I would love to have a rating system of some sort.
If you have a star system (either a simple 1-5, or with 1-5 in several categories such as originality of research, clarity of thesis etc.) then many people can presumably award stars and the system will calculate and display the average (as in Amazon book reviews). But if you just use tags, then if more than one member adds a tag it will be totally confusing, won't it? (e.g. one tags it "four-star" and another "two-star"). Am I missing something?
If I'm understanding it right, then I think a star system would be far preferable.
The use of tags is a good idea but a little clumsy.
How about the ability to have multiple ratings, the headers for which are nameable? So you'd "Add new rating..." and name it "Impact" and rate articles with a high impact as 5 stars. Then if you want to have a "Likeability factor" you'd "Add new rating..." and name it Likeability, so you'd have to rankings with independent scores. That way, if you want none you have none, you want 10 you can have 10.
However, my vote is still for a simple, single-user 1 to 5 score. Let the users use it for what they want.
here as well a vote for a 5-star ranking system. But I would like to see it in general for each item/entry.
We have several papers under one topic. Ranking would be a way to recommend other group members where to start reading. Also, it helps to identify what articles should be cited in my future articles...
Though,I see that there is actually a difficulty in aggregating the votes (you need store at least the number of votes and the average/median).
thanks for your work.
The only thing missing is to visually distinguish them in the items list, but it seems that colored tags are already implemented and should make it to the release soon, so we have a working system :)
Perhaps the YouTube (thumbs up or down) model would be closest to what I have in mind. It's easy (one click) and then if you can see the number of "votes" in folders or search results (or even select by anything that's gotten x number of positive votes).
I think if it's not cumulative and "one vote per member," then one individual could skew things quite a bit -- you could get the person who always "thumbs ups" anything they add... it needs to have some social meaningfulness.
I would be in favor of a simple 1-5 Star rating system that only I can see. I don't really care as much what everyone else thinks about a source as much as I would like to find the ones most relevant to what I am currently working on fast. I would like to see this feature visible in the columns, that way I could simply "sort by rating". Having an individual rating would cut out allot of the controversy of how to rate a source.
regards
I am also interested in a paper rating system. 1-5 stars would be perfect.
Christoph
Also, it seems some people misunderstand the ranking system. This should only be for publications in my library, visible to only me.
Waiting for that one since 2011, doubt it'll ever be considered. No clue as to why not. I'm also using tags with stars from one to five, which is clumsy though. It needs to be separated from the tags so thee can be a column in the list view and only one rating applied per item.
Edit:
Funnily enough, the thread is five (5!!) years old and no such feature has been added, I wonder why.
I have switched from Endnote, and thats the only feature I am missing. Zotero Rockz....
There was a ticket (https://www.zotero.org/trac/ticket/580) 7 years ago, but it was then deleted from milestone goals...
Zotero is my favorite piece of software I've discovered in years, and the only things that I would ask for to make it better are in-text searching of sources like PDFs (a big ask, I know), and star ratings!
Colored Tags
Zotero 4.0 lets you to assign colors to up to six of your favorite tags to highlight important “to read” articles or other items that you would like to find quickly at a glance.
=> See : http://zoteromusings.wordpress.com/2013/04/11/whats-new-in-zotero-part-1/
What your asking for is "tags". Which has already been implemented. This thread is for a ranking system (i.e. 1 star, 5 stars, etc.).
I have been using Zotero for two years now, for my bibliography in a professional scientific environment. It is really a wonderful software.
One thing is missing : a five star ranking. Such a feature would help me to immediately find the most relevant articles in a directory containing 50 or more references.
Tagging is not what I am expecting, because it implies going into markers tab, and moreover we can't see the note directly as a column.
Thanks
Edit : I think I've found a usable workaround, simply by adding the extra column and adding stars in this field. Of course that is not as user-friendly as clicking on a star number, but that is easy and directly visible.
I miss you.