VSCode Zotero
An extension to insert reference from Zotero library and add them to a bib file.
The problems
Currently available Zotero extensions for VSCode are not useful for inserting citations from Zotero library. They either:
- Rely on Zotero's citation picker, which can be slow and aesthetically inconsistent with VSCode.
- Require you to first export your Zotero library to a Bibtex file, which is not convenient.
- Do not support
quarto files.
- Has not been updated for a long time.
Also, the official Quarto extension for VSCode only supports Zotero citations in visual mode.
Requirements
- Zotero
- Zotero Better Bibtex
- Zotero needs to be running to add Bib(La)Tex entries.
Features
At the moment, the extension supports quarto and latex for inserting citation from Zotero library.
Insert citation (zotero.searchLibrary)
(macOS: ctrl + cmd + r, Windows/Linux: ctrl + alt + r).
Items in local Zotero database with Bibtex citation key will be shown in Quick Picks.
If you sellect an item, it will automatically add to *.bib file of your project. The extension searches *.bib file in the following order:
*.bib file in quarto or latex file header (for quarto, this includes _quarto.yml)bibliography.bib or references.bib file in the workspace root directory- Any
*.bib file in the workspace root directory.
- If none of above is available, ask user to provide path, or create a new one (you still need to add the file to
quarto or latex header).
Open PDF/Zotero entry/DOI of citation item under cursor (zotero.openItem)
(macOS: ctrl + cmd + o, Windows/Linux: ctrl + alt + o).
For any citations that were inserted using this extension, you can:
- PDF file of the item using Zotero PDF viewer.
- Open and show the item in Zotero library
- Open DOI link using the default browser
Extension Settings
zotero.zoteroDbPath: Path to Zotero database file (default: ~/Zotero/zotero.sqlite).zotero.betterBibtexDbPath: Path to Better BibTex database file (default: ~/Zotero/better-bibtex.sqlite).zotero.betterBibtexTranslator: Better BibTeX translator to use for exporting entries (default: Better BibLaTeX).zotero.serverUrl: URL of the Better BibTeX server (default: http://localhost:23119); could be useful if you run Better BibTeX server on a different port or inside a container.
Release Notes
See CHANGELOG.md
Todo
- [x] Performance optimization
- [x] Rewrite
.bib reader/writer so that it does not require Better Bibtex database.
- [x] Support both bibtex and biblatex formats.
- [ ] Code cleanup
- [ ] Better handling of multiple Zotero libraries
Notes
This extension began as a fork of telescope-zotero.nvim, which is an excellent Zotero extension using Neovim to edit quarto documents. The only reason kept me from migrating to VSCode for editing quarto documents was the lack of a good Zotero extension.
The code is heavily inspired by it, but rewritten in TypeScript for VSCode. I do not speak TypeScript, so I drafted the code using Claude and manually fixed the code to make it work. Hence, if you think I did something wrong, you're probably right.
Has not been tested on Windows or linux. If you find any issues, please let me know.
I'm working on this project as a PhD student in my spare time (which is very, very limited, during the semester). So I apologize in advance if I cannot respond to issues or feature requests in a timely manner.
