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EndNote 5 for Windowsby Carol Theodore, LACS EndNote 5 is the latest version of the bibliography program used by students, librarians and authors. The program allows you to organize your references for a paper, book or article you are writing and then insert the citations easily into your written work. Documentation One of the first things you notice about this program on opening the box is the substantial manual enclosed with the software. Usually software, even operating systems such as Windows, comes with a very slender manual containing little information. This manual is complete with a tutorial on how to use the basic functions of the program. Operation Main features of EndNote 5 include a reference database which allows you to store and manage your references, an online search tool for searching online bibliographic databases from universities, the Library of Congress and other public and private libraries, and a bibliography maker building a list of cited works automatically. The software program will work with Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows 2000, Windows ME and Windows NT 4 or later. You will need an IBM compatible PC with a Pentium processor and a minimum of 16 MB of RAM and 25 MB of hard disk space. Of course you will need a modem and Internet connection for use of the online features. Compatibility EndNote 5 is compatible with Microsoft Word for Windows, versions 1 to Word 2000, Word Perfect for Windows 5 through 9, RTF, ANSI Text and HTML. The "Cite While you Write" feature has add-ins for Microsoft Word and Word Perfect. These add-ins allow the user to access EndNote from their word processing program. Installation Installation was easy. If you have an earlier version of EndNote installed you are prompted with an option to backup or overwrite the older files. Backed-up files are stored in a Backup directory. You can register the program online or send in the enclosed Registration Card. If you have not used the program before, I recommend following the tutorial in the manual. Included with the software is a sample bibliography and a sample document in Word or WordPerfect format with which to work. The entry screen for a new bibliographic entry is easy to use. You can choose the type of entry and, when you do so, the fields change to match what is needed for that entry. Bibliographies can be sorted by various criteria. You can search by author, title and other criteria a well as finding duplicates. This feature can be quite helpful if you have a very large database. Bibliographies You can import bibliographies from other programs such as Bookends, ProCite and others. There are also detailed instructions in the user’s manual for creating tab-delimited or tagged formatted files from bibliographies created in unsupported formats so that they can be imported into EndNote. Creating these files is time-consuming. For instance, if you have a bibliography in Word, you will need to remove all formatting by converting the document into a Text file and adding specific characters in front of each field. Usage You can access online databases from virtually any public or private library database to which you have access. There are hundreds of pre-installed connection files and many more you can download from the Endnote website. Many of the sites require a user name and password. Some, such as Pubmed and the Library of Congress sites are available to the public. Accessing Pubmed was easy, as I did not need a user name or password. Once connected EndNote presented me with an entry screen to enter my search criterion. After the search was completed I was notified how many entries were found. I could limit the display up to the amount of entries found. Conclusion Although this program has a steep learning curve, it is well worth the time and attention, as it will save you hours of work in the long run. I recommend EndNote 5 to anyone who is going to write a book, article or paper requiring a bibliography and footnotes. EndNote 5 for Windows
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