CitationDesk FAQ

CitationDesk is a Mac academic writing app in development from ESP Software. It is designed to help students collect sources, verify metadata, take structured notes, draft papers, insert citations, and export to Word.

CitationDesk is currently in active development and private preview. The public release timing, App Store availability, and final feature set may change as testing continues.

No. Zotero and Mendeley are strong reference managers. CitationDesk is taking a different angle: assignment-first writing. The goal is to make the path from source to note to draft easier to learn and easier to finish.

CitationDesk is organized around school, course, and assignment. References, notes, and Writing Desk drafts are intended to belong to the assignment so Week 1, Week 2, and future papers do not blend together.

Browser capture is designed to review article-heavy pages, identify candidate references, and let the user decide what to save. The app should not blindly save every item it sees; reviewing and keeping the assignment clean is part of the workflow.

Yes. CitationDesk is being designed to support bulk paste/import workflows for students who already have references in a Word document, web page, or another source list.

CitationDesk is being built to treat DOI data as a strong metadata anchor when available. DOI lookup can help correct titles, authors, journal details, and other citation fields before a source is trusted.

APA 7 is a first-class focus, including student and professional paper workflows. CitationDesk is also being built around CSL-backed citation rendering for MLA 9, Chicago Author-Date, and IEEE. Chicago Notes/Bibliography is being handled carefully because real Word footnotes must be reliable before that workflow is considered ready.

Notes are for source-level thinking: summary, methodology, findings, assessment, reflection, and how a source may support the paper. Writing Desk is for the actual paper draft, with references and notes nearby for context.

Yes. The intended workflow is to draft in CitationDesk, then export to Word for final formatting, proofreading, and submission. School profiles and Word templates are intended to reduce repetitive formatting work. Download template files from the CitationDesk Word Templates page.

CitationDesk is being designed as a local-first Mac app. References, notes, drafts, and app data are intended to stay on the user's Mac unless the user chooses to export, share, back up, or use a feature that clearly requires external access.

Download the CitationDesk Read-Ahead PDF or visit the CitationDesk preview page.