Papers is a

reference management software Reference management software, citation management software, or bibliographic management software is software for scholars and authors to use for recording and utilising bibliographic citations (references) as well as managing project references ...

for

Mac OS X macOS (; previously OS X and originally Mac OS X) is a Unix operating system developed and marketed by Apple Inc. since 2001. It is the primary operating system for Apple's Mac computers. Within the market of desktop and la ...

and

Windows Windows is a group of several proprietary graphical operating system families developed and marketed by Microsoft. Each family caters to a certain sector of the computing industry. For example, Windows NT for consumers, Windows Server for ser ...

, used to manage

bibliographies Bibliography (from and ), as a discipline, is traditionally the academic study of books as physical, cultural objects; in this sense, it is also known as bibliology (from ). English author and bibliographer John Carter describes ''bibliography ...

and references when writing essays and articles. It is primarily used to organize references and maintain a library of PDF documents and also provides a uniform interface for document repository searches, metadata editing, full screen reading and a variety of ways to import and export documents.

Overview

Papers was developed by Alexander Griekspoor and Tom Groothuis while studying towards their Ph.D.s at the Netherlands Cancer Institute. The pair worked on Papers to provide an iTunes-like approach to document management, after they were faced with working with hundreds of digital publications in PDF format. Papers was originally released as a public preview in February 2007, followed by the full 1.0 version a few months later. A new version of the software was released and put for sale in the third quarter of 2013, along with a new iPhone/iPad app. Both products went under a considerable amount of criticism from new and returning users, who experienced a number of issues, ranging from lost databases and annotations to incompatibility between mobile and desktop apps. Users criticised Mekentosj and Springer, respectively developer and owner of Papers, for putting up for sale a

beta version A software release life cycle is the sum of the stages of development and maturity for a piece of computer software ranging from its initial development to its eventual release, and including updated versions of the released version to help impro ...

of the software and their slowness in addressing problems that effectively rendered the software unusable. On March 16, 2016,

ReadCube ReadCube is a technology company developing software for researchers, publishers, academic and commercial organizations. ReadCube’s product line includes the reference manager ReadCube Papers, Anywhere Access and custom services for publishers ...

acquired Papers from Springer Nature for an undisclosed amount. ReadCube Papers has been available since Fall 2019.

Versions

Mac

With the release of Papers 2 in March 2011, Papers provides

EndNote A note is a string of text placed at the bottom of a page (paper), page in a book or document or at the end of a chapter, volume, or the whole text. The note can provide an author's comments on the main text or citations of a reference work in ...

-style reference citation features. Papers 2 also allows for users to access their library and insert citations across a variety of different applications, whether in documents, presentations, or in web browsers. Papers offers a familiar user interface and a number of features for collecting, curating, merging and linking articles. A new version for Mac was released in late 2013: Papers 3. This version introduces a redesigned user interface and

Dropbox Dropbox is a file hosting service operated by the American company Dropbox, Inc., headquartered in San Francisco, California, U.S. that offers cloud storage, file synchronization, personal cloud, and client software. Dropbox was founded in 2007 ...

-based syncing, which has subsequently been expanded to other cloud-based repositories. As of November 1 2018, Papers 3 is no longer available for sale and will no longer be actively developed. The new version of Papers is developed by ReadCube.

Windows

Papers 3 for Windows was first released in 2012. A new version, now Papers 3 for Windows, was released late July 2014 following the redesign of the Mac and iOS applications earlier. This version was intended to streamline the user experience and the features available from the Mac application. Papers 3 for Windows also added unified search to its platform. It supported Dropbox syncing between Mac and iOS devices running Papers 3 as well as Papers Online. The Windows version of Papers 3 has been withdrawn from sale and is no longer available.

Browser

The online version of Papers runs in most modern

Web browsers A web browser is application software for accessing websites. When a user requests a web page from a particular website, the browser retrieves its files from a web server and then displays the page on the user's screen. Browsers are used on ...

. Users can access their library by signing in through their institutional or personal email address. Libraries will automatically sync and have unlimited cloud storage.

iPhone and iPad

Versions of Papers are available for free from the

Apple App Store The App Store is an app store platform, developed and maintained by Apple Inc., for mobile apps on its iOS and iPadOS operating systems. The store allows users to browse and download approved apps developed within Apple's iOS Software Devel ...

for iPhone and

iPad The iPad is a brand of iOS and iPadOS-based tablet computers that are developed by Apple Inc. The iPad was conceived before the related iPhone but the iPhone was developed and released first. Speculation about the development, operating ...

. A version was released with the Papers 3 for Mac launch and features unified search on the iOS app as well. The newest version of Papers is available via the

Mac App Store The App Store (also known as the Mac App Store) is a digital distribution platform for macOS apps, often referred to as Mac apps, created and maintained by Apple Inc. The platform was announced on October 20, 2010, at Apple's "Back to the Mac ...

. It has the article management features, and in addition to the standard annotation features the new Papers for iOS also features freehand annotations and supports Apple Pencil. Papers for iOS can be synchronized via a cloud storage system provided by ReadCube.

Android

A version of Papers is available for Android users and can be downloaded for free via Google Play. It automatically syncs to the Papers desktop and web applications.

Papers Online (legacy)

Papers Online was a set of services released in conjunction with Papers 3 for Windows. It worked across a variety of platforms and offers users a means of sharing collections of articles. Papers 3 users can create shared collections and access them from a browser on most devices and share collections to be accessed by other Papers 3 users as well as individuals who are not currently using Papers 3. This version is no longer available.

Awards

Papers won an Apple Design Award#2007 in 2007, for the best Mac OS X Scientific Computing Solution.

References

External links

* {{Reference management software MacOS-only software Reference management software