ability to edit "disabled in Preferences"

[opsimathphd]

Bookends window.tiff (48.17 KiB) Viewed 7888 times

I seem to have lost the editing window completely. This is what I get when "All" is selected in the View menu, and if I try to edit it, I am told that the ability to edit has been disabled in Preferences. I have been through Preferences three times, and can't seem to locate any place where that is possible. Also looked at the manual, and can't find anything that seems to apply. My guess is that it's something stupidly simple, but I can't find it, so help....

[Jon]

That's the Concise view, showing All.

You want to change it's appearance? You want to change the Concise view to something else (like Summary, or to the edit pane)? Or what exactly?

Jon
Sonny Software

[opsimathphd]

I'd like to go back to the edit pane, but the option is grayed out in the View menu, and if I click on the "Edit" button it tells me that the option to edit has been disabled in Preferences.

[opsimathphd]

I have now managed to get to the Edit pane by double-clicking the reference in the library, but I'm obviously still missing something, because I should be able to toggle back and forth in the right-hand pane, no?

[Jon]

Yes. If you scroll down in the picture you posted, you'll see 4 icons along the bottom. From right to left, they are 1. edit pane, 2. note stream, 3. concise view (summary), 4. concise view (all).

Note that the edit pane icon will be greyed out if you have set Bookends to edit references in a separate window in preferences. If you don't want this, you should go to preferences, Refs tab, and set the Edit References option to Library Window (not Reference Window).

Jon
Sonny Software

[opsimathphd]

From the way that preference is described, I would have thought it meant the exact opposite.

I have to say that this is the most confusing piece of software I have ever tried to use (including both DevonThink and Scrivener)! It has many good features, but I don't seem to be able to make use of any of them. I have been trying for a year, and so far I have been unsuccessful at
importing references
exporting references
setting up a filter for my university library.

So here's a question:
I don't feel that I can spend any more time with Bookends. I spend more time right now trying to figure out how to make it work than I do getting actual references into it. Since I have also been unsuccessful at exporting my (over 200, manually entered) Bookends entries into a BibTex database, can you tell me how to do that? I have of course attempted to follow the instructions, but nothing seems to be working.

[Jon]

From the way that preference is described, I would have thought it meant the exact opposite.

Why? The choices in Preferences for "Edit references" is "Library Window" or "Reference Window". If you choose the former the editable reference pane is displayed in the Library Window, if the latter it's displayed in its own window. I don't see how that's confusing (note that the two different windows are described in the User Guide in their own sections, p. 22 and p. 43).

I have to say that this is the most confusing piece of software I have ever tried to use (including both DevonThink and Scrivener)! It has many good features, but I don't seem to be able to make use of any of them. I have been trying for a year, and so far I have been unsuccessful at
importing references
exporting references
setting up a filter for my university library.

So here's a question:
I don't feel that I can spend any more time with Bookends. I spend more time right now trying to figure out how to make it work than I do getting actual references into it. Since I have also been unsuccessful at exporting my (over 200, manually entered) Bookends entries into a BibTex database, can you tell me how to do that? I have of course attempted to follow the instructions, but nothing seems to be working.

Perhaps you didn't see that there is a User Guide in the Help menu? In case, here is one way to export your references as BibTeX:

1. Mark the references you want to export (there are many ways to do this).
2. File -> Export References (Hits)
3. Select Bibliography Formats from the dialog's popup menu.
4. Select BibTeX in the next dialog (labeled Bibliography Formatter), Plain Text (or UTF-8, whichever you prefer), and send the bibliography to Disk.
5. Click Make Bib and tell Bookends where to save the .bib file.
6. Import that file into your BibTeX database.

Jon
Sonny Software

[opsimathphd]

I don't know what the problem is--I'm generally not considered stupid, and obviously other people use your software very successfully--but clearly there is one. I have read the User Guide, repeatedly. I had already tried exactly what you suggested without success, but I have now done it again: exactly what you described, step by step, to export to BibTex, and it simply didn't work. Here's what I got when I followed your instructions:

BibliogFormatter.tiff (28.19 KiB) Viewed 7820 times

error message.tiff (24.92 KiB) Viewed 7820 times

According to the BibTex program I was trying to use, there is a syntax error: "at end of input, expected "@""

I've tried altering the preferences, I've tried using temporary cite keys, I've tried manually adding @, but nothing seems to work. I am sure there is a way to do this, but I am unable to figure it out, or find anything in the User Guide to help me.

I have also tried importing references into Bookends in every format I can think of, following all the instructions, and I'm getting nowhere with that either. I'm really at my wits' end by now, and I would certainly appreciate any help you can give me.

[Jon]

You're exporting in the Chicago format, not the BibTex format. That's the problem (the BibTeX you've selected indicates that Bookends will use BibTeX conventions to mark up styled text (italics, bold, etc.) -- you could do that with any format. But in your case you want to do it with the BibTeX format).

If you don't see BibTeX as an option in the "Output the hits in the format of" pop-up menu, enable (check) BibTeX in Biblio -> Bibliography Formatter (it's enabled when we ship Bookends, but you might have disabled it).

As for importing, please contact tech support directly with the details of what you are doing (and send an example of a file you're trying to import). We'll figure out what the problem is.

Jon
Sonny Software

[opsimathphd]

The Enable BibTex preferences is checked, and has been, but there is no BibTex format showing up in the drop-down list which contains the Chicago format. This is precisely the problem I keep having: nothing seems to work as expected, and I don't know why.

[Jon]

It's not a preference setting. It's in Biblio -> Bibliography Formatter. That's where you can mark the formats you want to show up in popup menus (there are ~260 formats, and most people just use a small subset).

Let's move this over to tech support, shall we? (support@sonnysoftware.com)

Jon
Sonny Software