Zotero — bibliographic citations
The Zotero plugin links records in any table to items in online Zotero libraries (personal or group). Formatted citations are cached locally and refreshed on demand; Zotero remains the authoritative source.
Prerequisites
- At least one Zotero library must be registered in Config → Zotero Libraries.
- The plugin must be enabled per-table (see below).
Enabling the plugin for a table
Go to Config → Tables, select the table, scroll to the System plugins section and toggle Zotero on. Save the table.
Once enabled, a citation panel appears in RecordView for every record of that table — in edit mode even when no citations exist yet, so the user can start adding them.
Adding a citation
In RecordView (edit mode), open the citation panel, choose a library from the dropdown, type a search query, and click the result to attach it. The citation is stored in bdus_zotero_links and the formatted text is cached automatically.
Citation display
Each citation shows:
- Formatted citation (HTML, from the library's configured CSL style)
- Author & year summary
- Pages and notes (editable inline)
- External link to Zotero.org (group libraries only)
- An orange badge if the Zotero item was removed from the library (detached)
Sync
Citations are synced automatically in the background when a record is opened. An admin can trigger a global sync for all libraries from Config → Zotero Libraries.
Data model
| Table | Purpose |
|---|---|
bdus_zotero_libs | Registered libraries (type, Zotero ID, API key, citation style) |
bdus_zotero_links | Links between records and Zotero items; includes citation cache |
Both tables are created automatically by migration M023. Deleting a library cascades to all its links.
See the developer reference for the full API and PHP/Vue internals.