I would also recommend Papers. It's available for Macs and Windows and functions similarly to ITunes. It is pretty powerful as well. The program is easy to use, they have a great message board for addressing technical issues. While not free, they do have student discounts. Also, if you can afford it, go with a Mac, you can run boot camp which allows you to take advantage of booting Windows 7 of OsX at startup. That way you can run ArcGIS if necessary (in the Windows environment if needed).
On Jul 29, 2012, at 2:09 PM, "Rachel Mitchell" <[email protected]> wrote: > I would like to suggest Mendeley as a fantastic and powerful citation > program. I switched from Endnote to Mendeley about a year ago, and have > been thrilled. It is free to people at universities, and combines citation > software with paper organization. You just download pdfs of papers to > populate your citation program, the citation information is added > automatically (but may need some checking and editing), and both the pdfs > of the papers and the citations are all stored and accessible in the same > place. It also has a plug-in that works with Microsoft word, which makes > adding, deleting and editing citations in documents a breeze, as well as > having apps for both android and iphone, allowing you to read papers on the > fly. It has a powerful search function, and best of all, you can sync and > backup your library in the Mendeley cloud. There is also an interesting > social media-like function, where you can share libraries and your own > publications with other users very easily. > > I really can't recommend Mendeley enough. It is the most straight forward > and powerful citation program I have ever used. > > Rachel > > > On Fri, Jul 27, 2012 at 2:05 PM, Cat Adams <[email protected]>wrote: > >> Hi Eco-lovers, >> >> I have the intense pleasure of starting grad school this fall, and was >> wondering if this list-serv could generate any kind of consensus regarding >> what a "best" personal computer might be for me. I converted to the Mac >> religion a few years ago, and while I don't feel intractable in my new >> computer world-view, I am pretty comfortable with it. >> >> I don't intend to do heavy climate modeling or the like on my personal >> computer - I mostly want a computer for web browsing, running R, writing >> papers, citation programs (Zotero? Endnote?), blogging (perhaps shifting to >> host my own server), some video editing, and using not-too-complicated >> graphics programs. Until I make new friends, I might also want to run >> Netflix =P Regardless, I doubt I'll do all these things simultaneously, so >> my needs aren't extravagant. In addition to adequate processing speed and >> storage space, I want something that will be the least finicky with other >> types of equipment, for doing presentations and networking and such. It >> needs to be something sturdy that can do some globe-trotting with me; ie >> not too fragile for airport security in Bolivia. A built-in webcam would be >> quite handy for Skype, too. >> >> I plan to bring ~30 gb of files from my old lab to my new school, so I have >> all the protocols I worked on and easy access to all the old data. Do you >> highly recommend an external hard-drive for that? Or should I just throw it >> on the new computer? Or both?! I'm thinking both, but I'm very curious >> about your insight, and would be grateful for advice that can help me avoid >> lost data and other tech-disasters. >> >> Ideally, I'd get a new computer before ESA, but if I'm still shopping come >> the conference feel free to give me advice early Thursday morning when my >> lab mate presents on our awesome research! >> http://eco.confex.com/eco/2012/webprogram/Paper37476.html >> >> Or, just come talk to me about fungus :) I'm super stoked to dive into grad >> school. Hope to see many of you at the conference! >> >> Cheers, >> Cat >> >> -- >> Rachel M. Mitchell >> PhD Candidate >> Project for Interdisciplinary Pedagogy Fellow, 2012 >> School of Environmental and Forest Resources >> University of Washington >> https://students.washington.edu/rachelmm/home.html >> >>
