#All about referencing and citations using Mendley

I like the Mendeley reference manager because of it's simplicity in handling tasks at hand. I am specifically intrigued by the fact that it's free online and can run on most operating systems.

Feel free to comment with either a concern or a difficulty you face while using Mendeley, so we sail together as a team.

Mendeley is a good referencing software as it helps to ensure your reference section in a document is well prepared. Mendeley allows you to import citation, format citation and add your reference materials to your Mendeley library. Mendeley is an important tool for use for most researchers as it helps you cite any content from other authors.

Mendeley has been a good reference tool/buddy, as a seasoned writer it is important to acknowledge other research work whether published or just grey literature. And who does this best? Mendeley got you covered from the hustle and bustle of manually creating citations and bibliographies which may waste your time and disorganize your word document

At first, I had an easy time downloading, installing, and using Mendeley Reference Manager. It is so easy to use, and manage your references and the interface is also very friendly. But as time progressed, the app kept hanging and I became frustrated with it. Also as a frequent user of Google Docs, I was stranded working on referencing my document after learning that Mendeley does not work with Docs. I decided to turn to another referencing software (Zotero) which helped quite a lot. I have been alternating the use of these reference tools and all I can say is that it has been good so far.

While Mendeley and Zotero are essential for organizing citations, the real capacity-strengthening question is whether we're also teaching early career African researchers how to critically engage with the literature they cite not just format it correctly. Tools are only as powerful as the research questions they serve.