Product: EndNote Plus 2.3 for Windows
Author: Elizabeth Kleemeier
Discipline: Political Science
My fellow
contributors to this page are clearly much farther down the Information
Superhighway than I am: I can tell by the way they bandy about words
like "boolean" and mysterious acronyms like HTML and FTP.
Nonetheless, I managed to customize EndNote so that I can use it to
find things on my bookshelf. Spurred by that success, I started using
it to keep track of my searches for documents, as well as remember why
on earth I had ever wanted to track down such obscure references in
the first place.
Using EndNote to Organize Your Bookshelf
Actually,
Lester Chafetz and Kendall Crookston (fellow contributors to this page)
also describe using EndNote to organize documents on their shelves and
in their filing cabinets. They file their reprints by the record number
which EndNote automatically assigns a reference when you first enter
it in the program. However, this means that documents on a particular
subject are scattered all over the place. If Lester or Kendall want
to find all the references dealing with a given subject, they search
their EndNote databases using some appropriate word or phrase, get the
record numbers, and then use these numbers to find the articles in or
on whatever drawers and shelves they have been physically filed.
I took
a more or less opposite approach to the same task, basically because
I'm just a Dewey decimal system sort of person. I arrange my documents
by subject. So, if I want to find references on a particular subject,
I first go to those boxes on my shelves. If I don't find the particular
document I want, or I want a list of all my references having anything
to do with that subject, I do an EndNote search just like Lester and
Kendall. I can then physically find any document on that list because
I have written down its location in one of the fields for that reference.
Those of
you who have already used EndNote know that you enter information on
a new reference by filling out the electronic equivalent of a pre-printed
index card. For the rest of you, this is a little window which pops
up on your screen, and has spaces (fields) to type in the author, title,
publisher, etc. Each window has some "pre-printed" fields,
the number and labels of which may differ slightly depending on whether
the reference is a book, journal, article, personal communication, etc.
(Get it? You don't need a field labelled "journal title" if
the document is a book.)
My filing
system is based on the fact that you can MAKE UP YOUR OWN FIELD LABELS,
either by changing the existing labels or adding labels to otherwise
blank fields. Each Reference Window (as EndNote calls the electronic
index cards) has twenty-seven fields, but only somewhere between eleven
and eighteen come with labels. I took one of the blank fields and labelled
it "Location" to use for writing down the physical location
of the document.
If I own
the document, that Location field will tell me in which box file I stored
it, or where I put the book that has that chapter. In principle, I could
even make a temporary note of when and to whom I lend documents, but
I have not reached that level of conscientiousness yet. If I don't own
the document, the Location field says who lent it to me, or from what
library I borrowed it. Since I use inter-library loan to get books from
all over Denmark and Europe, the latter saves a lot of redundant searching
if I ever want to borrow the book again. Come to think of it, knowing
from which colleague you can borrow a document saves a lot of time,
too.
In short,
I've ended up using EndNote not just to index my bookshelves, but to
keep physical track of documents in a much wider sense. Lester's and
Kendall's system is admittedly less work, but my approach lets you do
more.
Using EndNote to Remember What Documents You're Hunting For
I quickly
started using the Location field to keep track of my progress in getting
hold of documents. First, I have to explain that for me, getting hold
of references is often a major undertaking. For instance, right now
I am trying to lay my hands on an unpublished 1989 report on a water
scheme in Sulawesi, Indonesia. Take my word for it, this is a lot of
work.
I keep
a separate EndNote database for references like this, which I'm sweating
blood to find. In the Location field for these references, I note down
the history of my efforts to get the document: which librarian I asked
to search on-line for it and when, what agencies I wrote asking for
a copy, what the responses were, and so forth. This prevents me from
asking the librarians twice to look for the same document (really
embarrassing), and helps me decide when it's time to try somewhere else,
or just give up.
Using EndNote to Calculate the Worth of Long Forgotten References
Sometimes
when I am reviewing my request database, I wonder why I ever wanted
some of these documents in the first place. My field is African rural
development; do I really need to read about some project in Sulawesi?
And heh!, I'm not too proud to admit it: I've entered references that
I've never read into my main EndNote database. When these references
come up on a search, I stare at the screen dejectedly, trying to decide
whether I can be bothered to read them now.
One could
just use the existing Notes field to jot down the reason for including
a particular document in one's database. However, flushed with my success
in learning to customize fields, I decided to make one called "Source." Here I note (usually using its EndNote record number) the document from whose footnote or bibliography I copied down the reference. Alternatively, I note the library or other on-line database where I found it. If a reference has been cited by several sources, or an author I really respect, I am more likely to keep on searching for it, or finally get around to reading it.
Conclusion
What I
did with EndNote is incredibly simple compared to the sorts of things
which other users describe in their stories on this page. A lesser ego
would have been awed into silence. Not me. If EndNote was only for people
with that level of computer sophistication, the program would not be
nearly as impressive. But EndNote is for everyone, even us who had a
little difficulty in figuring out how to get to this web site.
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