On Thu, Feb 14, 2002 at 10:25:42AM, Jean-Pierre.Chretien wrote:
> In fact, I wanted to stress the fact that database typing
> inside documents (which is a current practice) should be
> avoided because a bibliography tag is by definition an piece of
> data which should be written once correctly forever, and
> available autonomously for copy (that's why I don't like some
> facilities like the STRINGS or crossref features: the bib
> record looses autonomy ant can't be simply copied for reuse).
My previous experience before LaTeX/LyX was with Lout (which I
consider to be much better designed than LaTeX, but it doesn't
have LyX and CTAN, which were the reasons why I switched) and
there it was done in a way, which really made sense to me. Lout
has a command @Reference (char @ is roughly equivalent of \ in
TeX) which contains bibliographical information and with the
syntax similar to @<something> in BibTeX. So for example for
TeXbook, there is this:
{ @Reference
@Tag { knuth1984tex }
@Type { Book }
@Author { Donald E. Knuth }
@Title { The {@TeX}Book }
@Publisher { Addison-Wesley }
@Year { 1984 }
}
And the bibliographical database was just list of such records
(BTW, databases are indexed, so they may be much bigger) to be
included via the equivalent of \input (modified for the
databases, so that only selected records were included).
The point is, that because Lout (not some additional program) was
able to work with these records, it was possible to include
couple of these in the document, which may be helpfull sometimes.
For example, I am now in the graduate school, so I have to write
a lot of small papers with references which are not of direct
interest to me. Therefore, with Lout I was able to put some
refereces (which were not interesting for me) into document and
some other were gotten from the database. Of course, another
advantage of such system (which may be the main issue for AMS to
create such system) is that, it was possible to use
self-contained documents (I know, you can get something similar
with tools for BibTeX too). Now, I have to have special
bibliographical database junk.bib, but it is not the same.
And do not tell me, that I should not be allowed to shoot my foot
off--I am afraid, that such things smell by Mordor (sorry, I mean
Microsoft :-). Truth is, that I cannot do it with BibTeX,
although I would love to and I have some pretty legitimate
reasons to do so.
> So the question is only about the choice of the standard: -
> using latex in an abstract field (which does not exists in the
> original bib data structure (which knows only about note field
Or even worse with me: abstract field is just for real abstracts
of original authors and annotate is for my notes and comments.
> AFAIR) or in titles (which I use often) imports (La)TeX inside
And, BTW I am afraid that weird rules of capitalization in BibTeX
are just another instance, when I am confident to say, that it is
bug, not feature.
> this piece of data this is clearly not recommended for
> portability even if the output is much better; this must be the
> reason why .bib is not a standard for citation outside the
> academic world using LaTeX/LyX; - using on of these standards
> (among which a lot are proprietary AFAIK) needs conversion to
> bib or amsref, if ever possible without licensing.
Most of them have some export/import filters to/from BibTeX.
Have a nice day
Matej
--
Matej Cepl, [EMAIL PROTECTED]
138 Highland Ave. #10, Somerville, Ma 02143, (617) 623-1488
The main idea of the pope's asking for forgivness was not to be
afraid of the truth. DO NOT BE AFRAID OF TRUTH! We have to have
faith in the God's governing power to be able not to be afraid.
-- On NPR The Connection from March 13, 2000
