Re: Bibliographic Databases

[Dietrich Rordorf / MDPI <rordorf@mdpi.org>]

Hi All,

Why not try an existing, online tool.? There are severals, most of them 
support export to various formats, e.g. BibTeX, RIS, EndNote, etc.. Some 
of them have a Word plug-in, too.

http://www.connotea.org/
Free online reference management tool for scientists
Nature Publishing Group

http://www.citeulike.org/
Free online reference management tool for scientists
Oversity Ldt.

http://www.bibsonomy.org/
Free online reference management tool for scientists
University of Kassel

http://www.zotero.org/
Free online reference management tool for scientists
WordPress

http://www.2collab.com/
Free online group collaboration tool for scientists
Elsevier B.V.


Otherwaise, for Desktop solutions see a comparision:


Reference Management Software Comparison:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_reference_management_software
http://mahbub.wordpress.com/2007/03/04/comparison-of-free-bibliographic-managers/

Dietrich 


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Mr. Dietrich Rordorf
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>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Subject:
> Re: [NTG-context] Bibliographic Databases
> From:
> Robin Kirkham <robin.kirkham@csiro.au>
> Date:
> Sun, 20 Apr 2008 19:13:28 +1000
> To:
> ntg-context@ntg.nl
>
> To:
> ntg-context@ntg.nl
>
>
> On 20 April 2008, "George N. White III" <gnwiii@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> On Thu, Apr 17, 2008 at 11:19 AM, Robin Kirkham 
>> <robin.kirkham@csiro.au> wrote:
>>
>>>  I want to set up a shared bibliographic reference database for my
>>>  research group, [...]
>>
>> I can tell you a few things that don't work!  In our lab we have both
>> TeX and Word users.  Many of them had been using a DOS package
>> called papyrus, using a special markup that could be translated
>> to tex (.bbl) files.  Nothing we found was really satisfactory, so
>> we bought EndNote, which could import from papyrus via "refer"
>> format and can export to "almost bibtex".  One problem is that
>> EndNote uses unicode, so we end up with è, etc. that must
>> be translated for some user's versions of bibtex.  The database
>> now has a nearly infinite variety of different quote marks:
>> `a`, 'a', ``a'', "a", etc. depending on how the entry was made
>> (many are pasted from online or pdf sources).
>>
>> EndNote is really designed for individual users, although sold
>> in bulk.  If 2 people open the same database on a shared
>> drive they end up with a corrupt database.
>>
>> In my view, a bibliographic database needs to store each
>> reference in the "source" or original format, whether bibtex,
>> refer, or one of the newer forms, and provide translators
>> and version tracking, so each file can have forks for different
>> uses (e.g., ascii vs unicode char. sets) and edits can be
>> preserved for the next user.  In practice, people just dump
>> selected refs to a bib file, make the .bbl file, and fix problems
>> there, so fixes rarely make it back to the master database.
>> If they did, we would still have accents and quote marks
>> being switched back and forth depending on who last used
>> the entry.
>
>
> Thanks George. EndNote is I believe the corporately-approved solution 
> here, and similar disasters occur when people try and share its data 
> files. For this reason I don't call these sorts of personal-level 
> programs "databases" (any more than I'll call a .bib file a database).
>
> The TeX folk don't fare much better. Multiple personal .bib files are 
> common, often with duplicate references but different citation keys, 
> leading to rather variable results depending on who run LaTeX/ConTeXt 
> on the file. Inconsistency in data entry is also a problem, although 
> for us, accents and quotes don't seem to too big a problem. 
> (`Authorless', i.e., corporate author documents, like data sheets, 
> seems to be more of an issue).
>
> For this reason I'm looking for a proper SQL database solution like 
> refdb or refbase (or maybe wikindx, thanks Andreas) with a web 
> front-end that will hopefully enforce somewhat more consistent data 
> entry, and maybe even auto-generate citation keys. Taco, your remarks 
> regarding interchange formats are valuable (both refdb and refbase 
> support MODS XML output).
>
> Robin
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
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