Reference Management

Tracy Kent, Librarian for Physics and Computer Science University of Birmingham t.k.kent@bham.ac.uk

There are a number of new reference software packages which are of interest. If there are any that are missing, please feel free to let me know.

CiteBite

This package link directly to quotes in Web pages. To use it, add the quote and the url and – hey presto – you are presented with a link to the page with the quote highlighted. There is also the chance to add it to other social bookmarking tools such as del.icio.us or stumble upon (a social Web browser). A useful service for busy professionals.

CiteIt

http://citeit.com

Aimed at the legal profession and provides support for the Harvard Bluebook style.

Citation: Legal Edition

This package also supports the BlueBook style and is aimed at the legal profession. A useful feature is the Journal and Publisher Abbreviation support. http://citationonline.net

EasyBib

http://easybib.com

This is useful free bibliography composer aimed at schoolchildren, with limited styles, but a commendable aim.

LibraryThing

http://www.librarything.com

This service gives everyone the chance to catalogue their own material and to mash up services to provide other touches, like suggestions for further reading.

Endnote on the Web Experiences

Many academic institutions now have access to Endnote on the Web as part of their site licence for Endnote. Here at the University of Birmingham we have access to the Web version but have been disappointed with it – partly because we are unable to produce local output styles. This is at a time when we have just produced a local output style for Birmingham Harvard – the local output style recently standardised on for the University of Birmingham, and for which we have set out guidance notes . There have also been reports of problems with the interaction between Endnote on the Web and Word on the public clusters due to the firewall/proxy server issues. If anyone would like to share their experiences on Endnote on the Web then please get in touch.

Teaching Referencing

Teaching researchers the skills necessary to reference appropriately can be quite a challenge. Therefore any guide available that supports that challenge is useful. The LearnHigher information site is just that. It provides advice and guidance on the how and why of referencing along with practical exercises to reinforce the various points. Usefully there is a discussion and research section that you can register for on referencing issues.

The Scholarly Electronic Publishing Bibliography 2006: Annual Edition

This extensive bibliography on all things related to Scholarly publishing – including open access – can be found at http://www.digital-scholarship.org/sepb/annual/annual.htm

Over recent months this service has been transferred to the new address with an RSS feed added for good measure.

Open Source Referencing

If you have decided to develop your own reference software package using open source software or want to use open source software for database management then you may find it useful to talk to OSS Watch. This is a service run by the Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC) for Further and Higher Education. They provide hints and tips on selecting open source software as well as a consultation service. For more details go to the website at http://www.oss-watch.ac.uk