Zotero Connectors are the browser extensions that power one-click reference saving in Zotero. They inject a translation framework into every webpage, detect bibliographic metadata using thousands of site-specific translators, and send structured items to either the Zotero desktop client or the zotero.org Web API. This documentation covers the connector architecture, core systems, and everything you need to build, test, and extend the connectors.Documentation Index
Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://mintlify.com/zotero/zotero-connectors/llms.txt
Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.
Introduction
Understand what Zotero Connectors are, how they fit into the Zotero ecosystem, and what this codebase contains.
Quickstart
Clone the repo, build the connectors, and load them as unpacked extensions in Chrome or Firefox in minutes.
Architecture Overview
Learn how injected scripts, the background process, the Zotero client, and zotero.org work together.
Message Passing
Deep dive into the inject↔background RPC system that ties the connector together.
Core Systems
Translators
How the connector loads, caches, detects, and runs Zotero translators for bibliographic extraction.
Item Saving
The full pipeline from translated metadata to saving items in Zotero or on zotero.org.
Connector Server
The HTTP API that the connector calls on the Zotero desktop client at port 23119.
Proxy Detection
Automatic detection and transparent URL rewriting for institutional proxy servers.
Zotero Web API
Fallback saving to zotero.org using OAuth and the Zotero Web API v3.
Development
Building
Build system details, Gulp tasks, and how to produce debug and production builds for each browser.
Testing
Running the test suite with Mocha and Puppeteer, and using the built-in translator tester tool.
Preferences
All connector preferences, how to read and write them, and what each option controls.
Browser Differences
Manifest V2 vs V3, browser-specific code paths, and how Safari differs from the WebExtension builds.
Reference
Message API
Complete reference for the MESSAGES registry — every namespaced method available across the inject↔background boundary.
Connector HTTP API
Endpoints exposed by the Zotero desktop client connector server that the extension calls.
Configuration
Environment variables, build flags, and the config.sh options used to customize builds and packaging.