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Chat Panel

The chat panel lets you ask questions across your indexed library and keep conversations in Obsidian.

Open the chat view

Use the command palette:

  • Open Zotero Research Assistant chat panel

The panel opens in Obsidian (right sidebar by default).

Manage sessions

Chats are saved as sessions so you can pick up where you left off. - New chat: Start a fresh session. - Rename: Give the current session a better title. - Delete: Remove the current session (you must keep at least one).

While a response is still streaming, session switching and session-management actions are disabled. Finish or cancel the current response first so chat history from one session cannot affect another in-flight request.

Copy a chat to a note

Click Copy to export the current session to a Markdown note. The note is saved in your Saved chats folder (configurable in settings).

History and citations

  • The chat uses recent messages for conversational continuity.
  • If Rewrite follow-up queries is enabled, recent chat history is also used to rewrite the current message into a standalone retrieval query before search.
  • Answers include citations that link back to the exact chunks used.
  • If the retrieved chunks don’t contain enough information, the model is instructed to say it doesn’t know.