I just finished writing a grant proposal and learned a lot of cool tricks in bookends. Did you know Bookends can scan a document formatted manually and find references in your database? Just change (Smith, 1995) to {Smith, 1995} and it will try to find matching references. If it can't find an exact match it'll even present you with the context of your citation and a list of possible matches. Is that cool or what? Bookends is so cool I'm going to get my collaborators to buy it.
So, on to my question. Can multiple users access (read from and write to) the same database? I want to put a database on a shared folder so when multiple authors are writing a paper, we can all access the same database. I could use the web server function for this but it won't give everyone access to all the functions of bookends. I have a feeling bookends won't like two people writing to the same database... Will it work?
Not well. I haven't tried this myself, but there would certainly be problems if two people tried to write to Bookends at the same time (i.e. change data). The odds of that may be low with only two people using it simultaneously, but it could happen. Bookends is intended for one user at a time. You could have a central storage location for dbs, but have users transfer them to their own computers to use.
Having said that, we do have some plans to aid collaboration for Mellel users in the future.
I really don't want to say, because if our plans don't work out for some reason I don't want a lot of disappointed/annoyed people. All I can say is that the Redlers and I have discussed new features in detail, and I think you'll be pleased with them if/when they are implemented.
Seems like I can make bibliographies from multiple authors if 1) I merge all author's databases prior to making the final bibliography, 2) I use cite by content rather than 'author, date, unique ID'. That way, if multiple authors cite 'Smith, 1995' I can resolve the duplication at scan time instead of getting multiple instances of the smith, 1995 article in my bibliography.
Only problem is that I don't like 'cite by content'. The in text citation is too long, in my opinion. Is there any way to control what bookends puts in the 'in text citation' when I use cite by content?
Mike wrote:Seems like I can make bibliographies from multiple authors if 1) I merge all author's databases prior to making the final bibliography, 2) I use cite by content rather than 'author, date, unique ID'. That way, if multiple authors cite 'Smith, 1995' I can resolve the duplication at scan time instead of getting multiple instances of the smith, 1995 article in my bibliography.
Why can't you use unique ID in the citation? When you merge databases, Bookends preserves unique ID (unlike EndNote), except in the extremely rare case where there is a collision.
Only problem is that I don't like 'cite by content'. The in text citation is too long, in my opinion. Is there any way to control what bookends puts in the 'in text citation' when I use cite by content?
You can't modify what Bookends inserts, but you can delete portions of it after it is inserted (as you noted before, it's just text, so you can remove parts of it and Bookends will still find the reference -- although if you remove too much you may make the citation ambiguous).
Why can't you use unique ID in the citation? When you merge databases, Bookends preserves unique ID (unlike EndNote), except in the extremely rare case where there is a collision.
unique IDs work but if two authors are working from different databases then they could run into a situation where they use the same reference but with different unique IDs. Then, they merge the databases, allowing for duplicates. Now, the bibliography would have two entries for the same reference.
True. But it wouldn't matter (except esthetically) because the unique ID in the citation would always find the same one. But yes, you might have duplicates in the database.
What I meant was that if there are two authors for a document, each using a different database, then the document could have {smith, 1995 #123456} AND {smith, 1995 #994573}. When you build the bibliography, you'll have the smith 1995 reference listed twice.
You are right. And cite by content is the way to go. So as I said, if you want less "stuff" in the citation, you can delete it after insertion. FWIW, Bookends tries to put in the minimal amount that makes a citation unambiguous. For journal articles it also throughs in the volume number, which is rarely needed, because that is conventient if you want to use the temporary citation to actually go to a library and look up the work.
Bookends is so cool I'm going to get my collaborators to buy it.