Zotero is a free, open source citation manager.

What that means, is, this desktop app stores the information about information sources you've found and added to your storage area in the app so that Zotero has the info it needs to generate citations for you.

But Zotero ALSO stores (when available) the full-text PDF of any article you've found and added to your Zotero library! That means that Zotero can store and (because Zotero includes a free, web-based backup of your account/library) also back-up any literature you've found for an assignment - especially useful for the big literature reviews/capstones many students do just before they graduate!  And if you have to get full-text of something via interlibrary loan...when it arrives, you can add the PDF to your Zotero library and attach it to the right citaton info as easily as dragging and dropping it into the app and onto the article's title.

But why wait until you're a junior or senior to keep things in order with Zotero?

Our recommendation: download, install Zotero, and start using it early and often. Zotero makes it easy to organize using folders, and even a folder inside another folder - you could have one folder for a class, and sub-folders for each assignment that involves finding scholarly papers, for example.

  Our Zotero Help Guide