Personal Bibliographic Software

Roger Mills

PBS

• A replacement for the card index

• Originally intended to manage references downloaded from abstracting/indexing sources

• Takes a variety of file formats and stores fields in a consistent manner

• Allows them to be reformatted at will

• Competing products all bought by same company (Thomson ISI)

• Brand leader is EndNote

• Not cheap: A$500

Using EndNote

• Input data– Save records from bibliographic databases in a

variety of formats– Or create your own

• Data stored in internal proprietary format• Search and select in a variety of ways• Output data

– In a variety of pre-defined formats– Or create your own

Why’s it called EndNote?

• Originally devised to format endnotes/footnotes automatically in the format required by the journal you plan to publish in

• Change reference format almost instantly with no retyping

But it’s more

• Very convenient method of managing reference lists, and now documents

• Keep everything in one place and produce variety of outputs as needed – quotations in text, stand-alone bibliographies etc as well as standard foot/endnotes.

It’s got the power

• Plug-ins for Word and WordPerfect

• Many other powerful features and almost endlessly customisable

• No-one will use all the features

• So retains an aura of mystery

• Unintuitive interface shows its age

Out of the box

• Save references from standard databases e.g. WoS, Biol Abs, Medline and import direct to EndNote

• Or use Endnote to search these databases direct through its own interface

• Write an article for Nature in Word• Use Word plug-in to add references from your EndNote

database• EndNote will automatically format as required by Nature• Nature doesn’t want your article and you decide to send

it to Science: EndNote will reformat your references at the touch of a button

Getting clever

• If EndNote does not provide filters for your input source or your required output format, you can write your own

• Straightforward but a little complex

• Best to modify existing styles and play till it works

• Can become addictive…

B. Editing data

• EndNote does its best

• You may want to make changes

Style Manager

• Allows you to see exactly how a style is designed

• And edit it

• And create your own

• Easiest to copy an existing style and modify

• This is an advanced task!

Editing styles: many options

C. Getting it out

• 1. Creating a bibliography direct

• 2. Adding references to a Word document

• EndNote 8 Tip: Searching for References and Creating an Independent Bibliography

C1. Creating a bibliography direct from EndNote

• Search for the references you want: References>Search references [Ctrl-F]

• The selected references are displayed in the library window

• Sort as required: References>Sort references• Choose an output style• File>Print, or File>Export to file:

– .txt – plain text– .rtf – rich text, preserving formatting– .htm – HTML for web page– .xml - XML

Export as a list

Like so – here in ‘annotated’ style

‘Show all’ style

‘Numbered’ style exported as web page

Or as XML

C2. Adding references to a document

• Very easy in Word with plug-in

• Same effects but different processes in WordPerfect and rtf files

• Cite-while-you-write allows formatting on-the-fly (in Word 97 upwards with EndNote 5 upwards)

• EndNote 8 Tip: Creating Bibliographies

Adding references to a Word document

• Open document• Move cursor to point for reference insertion• Tools>EndNote 8>Find Citations…• Or Tools>EndNote 8>Go to EndNote• Search/Select citation and insert• Word inserts temporary citation in {}• DON’T EDIT THESE

Creating the bibliography

• Tools>EndNote 8>Format bibliography• Select output style

• OK

• Temporary citations replaced with references

• Bibliography created at end in selected style

• To change, Tools>EndNote 8>Unformat citations

• And repeat, choosing different style

Adding references to a document

Search EndNote and Insert

Temporary citation

Add more

Format bibliography

…inserts numbers in text…

…and list of refs at end

To change, unformat citations

…and select new style

Now in Harvard style

…and the list

D. Other ways of getting stuff in

• 1. Search from within EndNote

• 2. Export direct to EndNote from certain databases

D1. Search from within EndNote

• EndNote search window can be used to search EndNote libraries and external databases

• Works (in theory) with any database with a Z39.50 (library) interface. Uses ‘connection file’ which contains logon information

• For subscription databases, this must local information – connection files supplied with EndNote will not work

Searching

• Search for ‘tropical rain forest ecology’ in title• ‘Confirm remote search’ window tells you how

many references found, and allows you to discard last search if required

• OK and references will download and display in other window

• If happy (use preview), copy all or selected references to your library

E. Attaching files

• ‘image’ field can be used to store graphics – or anything, e.g. pdf of article reference refers to.

• Build you own self-contained digital library