Zotero

Zotero is the recommended reference management software for Law. It's only possible to export certain types of reference from legal databases, however, so please note the following:

• It's not possible to export references to case law and legislation. These need to be added manually.
• It's not possible to export from Lexis Library to any of the three reference management packages we support (Zotero, EndNote, Mendeley) only RefWorks.
• It's not possible to export book references from Westlaw UK, only journal articles.
• To export from Hein Online, you need to create a MyHein account first.

The preferred citation style for legal references is the Oxford Standard Oxford University Standard for Citation of Legal Authorities (OSCOLA).

There are three OSCOLA styles in the Zotero Style Repository. Students should use the first one on the list and not the 'no ibid' style or the 'University of York' style.

For further guidance about using OSCOLA with Zotero (e.g. for examples of which fields to use when entering case references manually), students may find it useful to refer to the OSCOLA webpages.

You can drag-and-drop PDF files into 'My Library' in Zotero and if you have checked the 'Automatically retrieve metadata for PDFs' option in Zotero preferences, Zotero will find the metadata and create a bibliographic reference for the PDF.