Getting Started

After starting the application, you may customize colours and sound effects on the tab "Options".

Edit data

The fields available for editing data depend on the document type that you can select at the top. In the field “annotations”, you can enter comments and ideas concerning a reference. This information, as any other, will be stored in the BibTeX file on export, but it will not appear in the references when running BibTeX. The same is true for the field “Code”, where you can enter information about your personal document storage system. The field “note”, however, is an official BibTeX field.

The URL field: You can drag & drop files directly from your file manager into the field, or you can manually enter a web site or the location of a file. A click on the link next to will start the linked application (or direct your standard browser to the web site).

Necessary fields and unique keys

Required are only fields "Key", "Document" und "Year", though there is little sense in leaving fields like "Author" empty if it is not an anonymous text. Please note that the key MUST be unequivocal.

The Search function

To look up any entry in any field from inside the edit window, click on the “Search” field and enter a search text, or press CTRL-F. You may also use the filter function at the very top of the application.

Note that even incomplete words can be searched for. You can use the wildcard '?'. A question mark precisely replaces one character. (The asterisk wildcard "*" is added automatically, do not use this character.) For example, entering "hel" will deliver “hello”, and "?ello" will give you the same. Upon entering a writing mistake, however, e.g. “helo”, WibTeX will not find anything. Therefore, it is better to enter less if unsure about the exact word or phrase.

Entering an abstract and key words

If you wish to add an abstract and key words to a literature record, click on the tab sheet “Abstract”. You may also format your text with the buttons below the edit field (bold, underline, italic, font). Formatting will be stored in the database but lost when the record is exported to the BibTeX (plain text) file format.

Optional entries and JuraBib

WibTeX offers support for JuraBib. Optionally, you can enter additional information on a record by clicking on the button “JuraBib” in the single view window. For instance, the fields “ISBN” or “shorttitle” might also be of interest to users who are unfamiliar with JuraBib. You can reach these field by clicking on the tab sheet “Extended”.

If you want to rank your favourite articles or media within the database, or if you have to mark documents, you can award points on a scale from 0 to 100. You can also set a category or a status for a document and define a value (e.g. the price for which a book was purchased).

You may also add optional own fields. To do this, click on the tab sheet “Optional” and then "+" button. You will be asked for the field name. Then you can enter data into the field, which will be treated just as any other WibTeX field. If you no longer need the extra fields, you can delete them. This will erase data contained in the fields.

BibTeX Import and Export

You can import records from BibTeX files or export data from WibTeX to that file format. WibTeX recognizes whether the file to be imported has a Windows/DOS-Format with CR/LF line ending, or whether the file is stored in UNIX or Macintosh format. If you encounter difficulties while trying to import a UNIX or Macintosh formatted file, open this file with a text editor like Notpad, save it as plain text, then try importing it again. Please make sure that the file to be imported is really a BibTeX database file.

The format of the export file is determined by your operating system.

Example for a BibTeX entry:

@article{migliaccio-etal:04,

author = {Migliaccio, F. and M. Reguzzoni and F. Sansò},

title = {Space-wise approach to satellite gravity field determination in the presence of coloured noise}

}

How to insert a BibTeX Preamble

Click on the icon to enter a preamble for BibTeX. It will be inserted into all subsequent BibTeX files that are going to be created by using the export function (until you remove the preamble again). Hint: Most users will not need this function.

Creating PDF or HTML documents

In order to create a new PDF or HTML document with a list of references, click on the corresponding buttons. You will be asked to enter the file name of the new file. Note that this function exports the entire database. Note that these lists of references are very different from the document-type list of references that you create within Word, LyX or Libre-/OpenOffice.

Data exchange via CSV

You may export your records to the spreadsheet CSV format. This can be read and edited by table calculation programs such as Microsoft Excel or Libre-/OpenOffice. Since it is really a text format, it can also be viewed using any text editor.

More interestingly still might be the option to import external data into WibTeX. Make sure, however, that the structure of the file to be imported matches exactly the WibTeX database structure. To verify this, export a few records from WibTeX, then open the resulting file with Excel or alike. Now you can copy your data into the table and save the file in the CSV format. Open WibTeX and import the data.

Create a list of references in Microsoft Word, LyX and Libre-/Open Office

Before you can create an autmatic list of references inside a word processor, you must first pass the data from WibTeX to the word processor. Microsoft Word, LyX und Libre-/OpenOffice all have their own, integrated functions that differ fundamentally. However, with WibTeX, you can use your data with all of them.

anwendungen

Microsoft Word can import bibliographic data via XML. To create such a file, just click on the corresponding button in WibTeX. Libre-/OpenOffice however uses an integrated database ("biblio.dbf"). With WibTeX, you can pass records directly into this database.

Formatting of quotations and the list of references in Word is controlled by a so-called style sheet. This file can also be generated with WibTeX (tab template). There you can change the layout, order of fields, separators etc.The configuration can also be stored for later.

If you prefer to work with LyX, you can directly pass individual quotations from WibTeX to LyX. For the list of references, use BibTeX.

Table view

Use the table at the bottom to manipulate several records at once or to quickly jump to a record. You can adapt the size of the columns to your needs and decide what columns you want to have displayed. Clicking on the column headers will sort the list according to that column and select the best fitting width.

Filter function: