Papers vs Mendeley

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At this point Mendeley does some things better than Papers.  It is currently  
 
At this point Mendeley does some things better than Papers.  It is currently  
*better
+
*better suited for people who write in tex (Paper's accommodation of metadata is a little weak),  
suited for people who write in tex (Paper's accommodation of metadata is a little weak),  
+
*it stores non-PDFs,
*it stores non-PDFs
+
*it is cross platform, and
*it is cross platform
+
*free (but not necc. for long, see below)
*free
+
  
 
Papers also does  some things better than Mendeley
 
Papers also does  some things better than Mendeley
 
*search is + better in Papers,  
 
*search is + better in Papers,  
 
*note taking is ++ better,  
 
*note taking is ++ better,  
*reading
+
*reading is ++,  
is ++,  
+
 
*interface is +++, and
 
*interface is +++, and
 
*speed is ++ or +++)  
 
*speed is ++ or +++)  
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There are also ways that the two are  just
 
There are also ways that the two are  just
 
different:  
 
different:  
*the way they  handle auto-filling of metadata
+
*the way they  handle auto-filling of metadata and
*Mendeley's
+
*Mendeley's social network thing (I'm not going to go ahead and call it an advantage.  I tried it this summer, and it is currently too crippled to be as useful as I'd like).
social network thing.
+
  
 
Until a week or so ago I was a little concerned that my preference for
 
Until a week or so ago I was a little concerned that my preference for
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know it costs money ($40 after a 30 day free trial), and Mendeley doesn't, but I
 
know it costs money ($40 after a 30 day free trial), and Mendeley doesn't, but I
 
also know that the Mendeley folks are crippling certain features so
 
also know that the Mendeley folks are crippling certain features so
that they can start charging soon as well.  So the free-ness of Mendeley, and its advantages, may not last.
+
that they can start charging soon as well.  Even worse, their plan is for a subscription service, which means that to get the most of Mendeley, you will have to keep buying it every month.  They said so in an email to me.  I only bought Papers once.
  
So yeah, Papers by mekentosj is worth a try.
+
So yeah, consider Papers by mekentosj.

Revision as of 10:42, 27 December 2010

Papers and Mendeley are two competing PDF viewer/organizers intended for scientists. I've never really bought much software, but if you are on a Mac, I recommend that you give Papers a try over Mendeley. It must be purchased after 30 days, but is totally worth it. I use it to take all of my notes, build all of my reference lists, and of course organize all of my papers.

When I want ideas for a paper I'm writing, I look at what I've already written on the article. When I want to know what journals to submit to, I sort my paper collection by journal to see what I read the most in what category. When I want to know what Japanese researcher to work with this summer, I type in the word Japan to search PDFs, notes, journal titles, and whatever else to see what institutions I am reading work from. When I am writing a paper, I collect everything relevant to it in a folder. When I want the bibtex for that library of papers, I export it (though I've had to use Bibdesk as an intermediary to clean the .tex). When I want to share a paper, I drag it into Gmail.

At this point Mendeley does some things better than Papers. It is currently

  • better suited for people who write in tex (Paper's accommodation of metadata is a little weak),
  • it stores non-PDFs,
  • it is cross platform, and
  • free (but not necc. for long, see below)

Papers also does some things better than Mendeley

  • search is + better in Papers,
  • note taking is ++ better,
  • reading is ++,
  • interface is +++, and
  • speed is ++ or +++)

There are also ways that the two are just different:

  • the way they handle auto-filling of metadata and
  • Mendeley's social network thing (I'm not going to go ahead and call it an advantage. I tried it this summer, and it is currently too crippled to be as useful as I'd like).

Until a week or so ago I was a little concerned that my preference for Papers over Mendeley was just the sunk costs speaking. It would be really hard to switch at this point. But I tried anyway and moved my entire paper collection over. I gave Mendeley a really fair try, and came out decisively in favor of Papers. No more regret.

Regarding the downsides, the developers are fairly transparent about their future plans and it looks like my biggest qualms with the software are on their todo list. Updates come out about once every six months. I know it costs money ($40 after a 30 day free trial), and Mendeley doesn't, but I also know that the Mendeley folks are crippling certain features so that they can start charging soon as well. Even worse, their plan is for a subscription service, which means that to get the most of Mendeley, you will have to keep buying it every month. They said so in an email to me. I only bought Papers once.

So yeah, consider Papers by mekentosj.