We're approaching 100 Million document uploads! Tweet papers to win. [UPDATED]

June 23, 2011 drgunn

Excitement levels are high at Mendeley this month because we’ve got several momentous milestones coming up – the release of Mendeley 1.0, crossing 1 million users, and 100 Million document uploads. We’d like to invite you to share in this moment with us by tweeting papers from the Mendeley Research Catalog, using the hashtags #mendeley #100M. Every paper you tweet enters you in a drawing to win a Solar System package free for one year. Tweet as many papers as you like – each tweet counts as a separate entry in our drawing!Read More »

Mendeley Desktop 1.0 Development Preview Released

June 22, 2011 Robert Knight38 Comments

Update: The final version of Mendeley Desktop 1.0 is now available from the downloads page or via the in-client auto-update from Mendeley Desktop 0.9.9 and later. Thank-you to everyone who helped test this release.

A preview of Mendeley Desktop 1.0 is available for testing on Windows, Mac and Linux. The preview can be downloaded from the bottom of the Mendeley Desktop downloads page. Before trying out this preview, please read the compatibility notes at the bottom of this post.

In this update, we have implemented some of the improvements most frequently requested by users in support emails and from our feedback forum.

We appreciate your feedback on this preview. You can leave comments on this blog post or in our feedback forum.

Find and Merge Duplicate Documents

Mendeley Desktop now has a tool which you can use to tidy up your library and merge duplicate documents. To find duplicates in your library, go to Tools -> Check for Duplicates. Mendeley will then search through your library and present a list of duplicates that it finds, along with an indicator of how confident Mendeley is that a set of documents really are duplicates.

Sub-folders and Folders in groups

You can now organize your folders in a hierarchy. To create a sub-folder, right click on a Folder and select ‘New Sub-Folder’.
Folders can now be used in groups.

PDF Viewer

The PDF viewer now remembers your last position and zoom/rotation settings when you close a tab and will restore them when re-opening a paper.
The notes list has been re-designed. Notes now resize to fit their content and website addresses are now auto-converted to clickable links.
Viewing annotations across groups is now easier. When viewing a PDF from one group, any notes or highlights added to the same paper in other groups you are currently a member of will also be shown.

File Organizer

The file organizer now archives files in a separate folder when the corresponding document is removed from Mendeley Desktop, reducing clutter in your file organizer folder. There is also a Tidy Up tool in the file organizer preferences dialog to help you clean up existing organizer folders.
File organizer settings are now saved in your local database, so multiple users sharing the same login on a PC can have separate file organizer directories.

Microsoft Word and OpenOffice Plugins

The Microsoft Word plugin for Windows has a new look in Word 2007 and Word 2010, taking advantage of the extra space available in the ribbon.
Search in the citation editor is now incremental, rather than only updating when whole keywords are entered.
The Word and OpenOffice plugins now store a mini-library of cited publications inside your documents. When updating a Word document, Mendeley Desktop can import citations from the Word document back into your Mendeley library if necessary (for example, if you cited a publication which has subsequently been removed from your library).
Various improvements have been made to citation formatting

Platform-Specific Improvements

Windows: A number of stability problems with the Microsoft Word plugin have been fixed.
Windows: The Mendeley Desktop installer and updater are now signed by Mendeley Ltd.
Mac: The window size no longer expands when many tabs are opened.
Mac: A number of Mac-specific crashes which occurred when importing or viewing certain PDFs have been fixed.
Linux: It is now easier to get Mendeley running on Fedora. Mendeley also integrates better with the system look and feel.

Supported Platforms

Mendeley Desktop 1.0 requires Windows XP or newer on Windows, OS X 10.5 (Leopard) on an Intel Mac and Debian Lenny (or equivalent) and newer on Linux. Macs running OS X 10.4 or PowerPC are no longer supported.

Backwards Compatibility

When Mendeley Desktop 1.0 is run, it will automatically backup your existing database and then upgrade it. The backup will be saved to the archive directory in your Mendeley data folder. If you wish to go back to an earlier version of Mendeley Desktop, you will need to either:

Copy your database from the archive directory into the main Mendeley data folder
Delete your local database and let Mendeley restore your data from the web

The file organizer settings are saved in your local database in Mendeley Desktop 1.0 and are not visible to earlier versions of Mendeley, which stored file organizer settings in a separate file or the registry on Windows.

Microsoft Word and OpenOffice.org Compatibility

Mendeley Desktop 1.0 can edit and update citations and bibliographies in Microsoft Word and OpenOffice.org documents that were originally created by earlier versions of Mendeley. However, earlier versions of Mendeley Desktop will not be able to update citations or bibliographies created with Mendeley Desktop 1.0. This is a consequence of implementing the ‘travelling library’ feature and fixing a long-standing bug with the field types used for Mendeley’s citation and bibliography entries.

BBQ Friday at the Mendeley London offices

June 21, 2011 drgunn

We work hard at Mendeley, so we also take the opportunity, every now and then, to relax and enjoy each other’s company with a little good food and drink. Mainly because we want to meet more folks interested in changing the world, starting with how research is done, but also partly because we need some fresh blood in the foosball league, we thought we’d invite London-based developers to join us this Friday. So developers, if you’re in London this weekend, please join us at the Mendeley HQ for BBQ Friday. Space is limited so please RVSP to zuzana@mendeley.com, including a CV, to let us know if you plan on coming. We’ll have the rooptop deck open and Mendeley staff will be on hand for conversation and perhaps a bit of foosball – if you think you’re up to the challenge.

Friday June 24th, 2011, 6 – 9pm
144a Clerkenwell Road, Ground Floor
London EC1R 5DF

With best wishes, and great anticipation,
The Mendeley Team

Join us for "Mendeley for Librarians", a free online instructional session, on June 23rd @ 8 PM EDT

June 20, 2011 drgunn

Calling all librarian and information science professionals! Come learn about how researchers at your institution are using Mendeley and how you can use it to help patrons find what they’re looking for faster. We’ll discuss topics such as:

What Mendeley is (and what it’s not)
Who’s using Mendeley
How Mendeley works with your existing information systems
Mendeley and intellectual property
Mendeley’s role in the future of libraries

William Gunn, Head of Academic Outreach will be conducting this session. There will be plenty of time for questions after and during the session. If this time doesn’t work for you, please check out the session schedule below or see our events page for an event near you.Read More »

Hack4Knowledge @ Mendeley: living bibliographies, visual search and more #h4k

June 16, 2011 drgunn

This weekend saw dozens of hackers converge on the Mendeley offices in New York and London for a weekend of fun, games, and changing how research is done. Hack4Knowledge arose from internal Mendeley hackdays, where our developers are released from the tyranny of Trac tickets and given free rein to build whatever crazy idea comes to mind. Some of our best ideas have come out of these events, so it only made sense to open our doors and invite in the broader developer community. On Saturday the 11th, the offices in London and New York were opened; food, beer, and entertainment were secured; and a few dozen hackers sat down for a weekend of code and camaraderie. There were 10 teams that presented their work at the end of the weekend. Some of the projects are live and linked so you can check them out, for the others I’ve included screenshots or links to the code repository.
Read More »

PLoS joins Mendeley as co-sponsor of the Binary Battle!

June 7, 2011 drgunn

The Public Library of Science, the world’s largest Open Access publisher, has joined Mendeley in co-sponsoring the Binary Battle, the contest to build the best apps that make science more open using PLoS and Mendeley’s API’s. This brings the prize money to be won up to $16,000 plus other cool gifts and the opportunity to get your entries in front of a panel of influential judges from technology, media and science.

What is the Binary Battle?

The Mendeley & PLoS Binary Battle is a contest to build the coolest, most popular, and most useful application using Mendeley’s open database of over 90 million research papers, usage statistics, reader demographics, social tags, and related research recommendations or PLoS’s Search API which provides PLoS content for your desktop, web, or mobile application. You can find the full details on the Mendeley API Binary Battle page or read the announcement from PLoS.Read More »

Mendeley for Librarians	6/23/2011 08:00 PM EDT
Collaborative Research with Mendeley	6/30/2011 12:00 noon EDT
Mendeley for Life Scientists	7/07/2011 01:00 PM EDT
Introduction to Mendeley	7/13/2011 02:00 PM EDT
Mendeley for Educational Research	7/19/2011 02:00 PM EDT
Mendeley for Librarians	7/26/2011 01:00 PM EDT

Mendeley Blog

Month: June 2011