ADDBIB(1)

📦 version 191015, in alpine 3.24

✨ ADDBIB(1) ✨

okay so this is the General Commands Manual page for addbib(1), and bestie, it’s literally here to help you create or extend a bibliographic database. librarian main character energy, no cap 💅📚

💖 NAME 💖

addbib — create or extend bibliographic database

🛠️ SYNOPSIS 🛠️

addbib [-p promptfile] [-a] database

🌸 DESCRIPTION 🌸

When this program starts up, it hits you with an “Instructions?” prompt. Type y and you get directions; type n or RETURN and you skip them. easy peasy 🫶

Then addbib prompts you for various bibliographic fields, reads your responses from the terminal, and sends output records to a database. The little rules are kind of iconic:

  • A null response (just RETURN) means leave that field out.
  • A minus sign (-) means go back to the previous field.
  • A trailing backslash (\) lets a field be continued on the next line.

The repeating “Continue?” prompt is your little checkpoint 💫 It lets you resume by typing y or RETURN, quit the current session by typing n or q, or edit the database with any system editor — vi, ex, edit, ed.

Now the options, bestie:

  • -a — suppresses prompting for an abstract. Asking for an abstract is the default. Abstracts are ended with CTRL+d.
  • -p promptfile — causes addbib to use a new prompting skeleton, defined in promptfile. This file should contain prompt strings, a tab, and the key-letters to be written to the database.

The most common key-letters and their meanings are given below. addbib insulates you from these key-letters, since it gives you prompts in English, but if you edit the bibliography file later on, you will need to know this information — iykyk 👀

  • %A — Author's name
  • %B — Book containing article referenced
  • %C — City (place of publication)
  • %D — Date of publication
  • %E — Editor of book containing article referenced
  • %F — Footnote number or label (supplied by refer)
  • %G — Government order number
  • %H — Header commentary, printed before reference
  • %I — Issuer (publisher)
  • %J — Journal containing article
  • %K — Keywords to use in locating reference
  • %L — Label field used by -k option of refer
  • %M — Bell Labs Memorandum (undefined)
  • %N — Number within volume
  • %O — Other commentary, printed at end of reference
  • %P — Page number(s)
  • %Q — Corporate or Foreign Author (unreversed)
  • %R — Report, paper, or thesis (unpublished)
  • %S — Series title
  • %T — Title of article or book
  • %V — Volume number
  • %X — Abstract — used by roffbib, not by refer
  • %Y,Z — ignored by refer

Except for A, each field should be given just once. Only relevant fields should be supplied. An example is:

%A           Bill Tuthill
%T           Refer — A Bibliography System
%I           Computing Services
%C           Berkeley
%D           1982
%O           UNX 4.3.5.

📁 FILES 📁

  • promptfile — optional file to define prompting

👀 SEE ALSO 👀

indxbib(1), lookbib(1), refer(1), roffbib(1), sortbib(1)

📝 NOTES 📝

Written by Al Stangenberger & Bill Tuthill.

and that’s the whole page, brought to you by the Debian build dated December 12, 2005 🫶✨ go build a bibliography, bestie, periodt 💌

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