12 replies to this topic

[toejam]

hi guys,
has any of you tried Mendeley??

http://www.mendeley.com/

it's supposed to work similar to endnote, therefore zotero, but you can also create a profile and do networking with other people. looks good, might try it later and post my comments.

[HomeBrew]

Yeah, it does look pretty good.  I'll probably try it out later today, see what's up...

[Doki]

looks good. the collaborating feature is there in Zotero also but I have never used it.  . am not sure how many would really want to share their library. Plus, what I love about Zotero is that 'it lives where we are working' - right on the browser. Just a click and everything is added to the library. Otherwise, looks like this also shares all the other features.

[toejam]

yeah, and it seems to sync somehow on different computers. useful if you don't have a specific computer assigned in the lab as it is my case.

[hobglobin]

toejam, on Aug 14 2009, 03:37 PM, said:

yeah, and it seems to sync somehow on different computers. useful if you don't have a specific computer assigned in the lab as it is my case.

Thanks for the tip. I just tried it out, this drag and drop for pdfs sounded really tantalizing. It works but one has to do lots of corrections. Anyway it's a beta version and needs some more time to develop I guess.

[HomeBrew]

I haven't played with it yet (likely this weekend), but if it syncs up between multiple computers, it's probably like DropBox, a program I use all the time...?

[toejam]

didn't know about Dropbox until now, looks good. thanks for the tip HB!

[noelmathur]

I am currently using EndNote and Yep (last freeware version they had).
After reading about Mendeley and watching the demo video, I liked the concept but after playing it around, I didn't like much (comparing my current setup of EndNote and Yep)
1. I like Yep interface more, its lot easier to find document using keyword that you used from tag cloud.
2. Mendeley is very limited with respect the journals it supports for making your bibliography.
3. Note taking feature isn't as good as it seems. If I managed to work it properly, it doesn't save the notes to pdf but actually in Mendeley, so if your pdf is out of that program, your notes are gone. (I have Acrobat too so I make notes in pdf itself before putting in Yep and they are there forever)

But I agree, its definitely a good program if you don't have the softwares I am using.

[Doki]

HomeBrew, on Aug 15 2009, 03:38 AM, said:

I haven't played with it yet (likely this weekend), but if it syncs up between multiple computers, it's probably like DropBox, a program I use all the time...?

Dropbox looks like what we have been always looking for. . .

[Doki]

not quite. .  just giving 2GB for free.

TJ, if you are with Windows (or Mac), you should be using Live Mesh or Windows Live sync. It should be much better than Dropbox.. when are they getting something of that sort for Linux?

[toejam]

hi bb san

latest update: ubuntu comes now with the cloud, also called ubuntu one, which does the same as windos live sync

https://one.ubuntu.com/

hope you find it useful.

[Mateusz]

Mendeley is pretty useful. I don't like FF so Zottero isn't a good choice for me.

Is it possible to delete pdfs from on-line library but only on-line leaving this pdfs on hdd? I don't want to buy more space on server... ;/

[Dr. Gunn]

Mateusz, on 26 July 2010 - 02:13 AM, said:

Mendeley is pretty useful. I don't like FF so Zottero isn't a good choice for me.

Is it possible to delete pdfs from on-line library but only on-line leaving this pdfs on hdd? I don't want to buy more space on server... ;/

Hi Mateusz!  Yes, you can delete the PDF from your online library and nothing will happen to the PDF on disk.  That's actually why Mendeley doesn't write the annotations to the PDF file directly.  Having them separate means that a group of people can collaboratively annotate a group of documents, and the annotations continue to work as expected no matter what someone does with the underlying file.  As you mention, not being tied to the browser is a big advantage and allows Mendeley to do more without depending on the browser.  When I was using Zotero, I had to keep closing and re-opening the browser because it would get sluggish over time.

Occasionally Mendeley has trouble with the metadata extraction, but even in those cases where it doesn't, it will get at least the title and DOI, so you can do a lookup using the little magnifying glass icon to the right and get everything automatically corrected.

If anyone wants to know more, just ask me.