From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 From: tsd@tsdye.com (Thomas S. Dye) Subject: Re: Citation syntax: Underscore MUST(?) be allowed in cite keys? Date: Mon, 09 Mar 2015 06:37:02 -1000 Message-ID: References: <874mq0399a.fsf@gmx.us> <54F75222.8030805@gmail.com> <87pp8o1t9f.fsf@gmx.us> <87pp8o6nt9.fsf@berkeley.edu> <87fv9i9z8s.fsf@nicolasgoaziou.fr> <87bnk60zhc.fsf@berkeley.edu> <54FA9AA9.9070505@gmail.com> <87r3t05okc.fsf@nicolasgoaziou.fr> <87ioeci6f6.fsf@gmx.us> <87r3szk6q9.fsf@gmx.us> <87oao3yluf.fsf@berkeley.edu> <87k2yqyx55.fsf@berkeley.edu> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain Return-path: Received: from eggs.gnu.org ([2001:4830:134:3::10]:48248) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1YV0gF-0001Ld-Ge for emacs-orgmode@gnu.org; Mon, 09 Mar 2015 12:37:25 -0400 Received: from Debian-exim by eggs.gnu.org with spam-scanned (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1YV0g9-0006jA-9C for emacs-orgmode@gnu.org; Mon, 09 Mar 2015 12:37:23 -0400 Received: from gproxy10-pub.mail.unifiedlayer.com ([69.89.20.226]:35828) by eggs.gnu.org with smtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1YV0g9-0006if-24 for emacs-orgmode@gnu.org; Mon, 09 Mar 2015 12:37:17 -0400 In-Reply-To: <87k2yqyx55.fsf@berkeley.edu> (Richard Lawrence's message of "Mon, 09 Mar 2015 09:05:10 -0700") List-Id: "General discussions about Org-mode." List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Errors-To: emacs-orgmode-bounces+geo-emacs-orgmode=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Sender: emacs-orgmode-bounces+geo-emacs-orgmode=m.gmane.org@gnu.org To: Richard Lawrence Cc: emacs-orgmode@gnu.org Richard Lawrence writes: > Hi Tom and all, > > "Thomas S. Dye" writes: > >> Richard Lawrence writes: >> >>> But my opinion probably shouldn't count for much on this >>> point, because I don't use a citation manager myself (I use org-bibtex), >>> and I write my own keys. >> >> Oh my. This is a lot to keep in your head as a bibliographic database >> grows. The one I've created with my colleagues over the last two >> decades has more than 5,000 entries. > > Yes, I realize this method probably isn't going to scale well in the > long run, but it's working for me for now. The vast majority of my keys > are just the author's last name plus the year. I just write a key like > that when I add something to my reading list, and fix the rare duplicate > cases as necessary. > > (Just to explain why it makes sense to me to do it this way: I used to > work in a psychology lab, where I had to write a lot of little programs > to do data analysis. The worst part of that job was always dealing with > malformed, missing, and otherwise-corrupt data captured by someone else. > Since then, my attitude has always been that it's much easier to correct > that data at the point where it's captured than figure out what to do > with it somewhere further down the processing pipeline, after the reason > *why* it is malformed has been lost. In the context of this discussion, > that translates to: a work doesn't get a key in my reading list unless I > have complete citation information for it. Sometimes I put items on my > reading list that I don't have citation data for yet, but I don't do > org-bibtex-create-in-current-entry on that item until I have the > citation data and can assign it a key.) > We've had a couple dozen contributors to our bibliography over the years. Initially, we assigned keys by hand but we found this led to very many duplicate entries. Generating keys has helped a lot in this situation because most duplicates are caught when we merge the project-specific database, which has already been edited, with the central one. >>> I don't disagree, but I think there is an empirical question that needs >>> to be answered here: within the keys people actually use, how many do >>> not conform to the syntax? Of those that don't, do they represent >>> `normal' cases or not? >> >> A good friend of mine is a military historian who writes books >> describing how the Army habitually plans to fight the last war over >> again, then has to adapt hurriedly when the next war turns out to be >> different. It strikes me that basing core features of the citation >> syntax on the software users happen to be using today is a bit like >> this--at some point the design of the system will prove unprepared for >> new developments. >> >> I think Vaidheeswaran C's example of a citation scraped off the internet >> with Zotero should carry a lot of weight. This kind of thing is bound >> to happen more and more as authors increasingly harvest citation >> information on-line (my generation typically looks on this with horror, >> but we'll be swept aside). > > That's a fair point. > >> I kind of like Rasmus' idea to make the citation insertion routines >> aware of punctuation and use a full citation where a shortcut would >> introduce ambiguities. > > That would work for me. Like Rasmus, I don't particularly like the idea > of letting the syntax of keys vary in the shortcut case and the full > citation case, but if the only difference is whether or not they can end > in clause-ending punctuation, maybe this is the least-bad option. > > Another option would be to allow clause-ending punctuation in all keys, > but introduce some kind of optional syntax to express `this key ends > here'. This could be used to disambiguate the key from any following > punctuation in those cases where this is needed. Perhaps something like > '{}', since even LaTeX won't allow '}' at the end of a key, or maybe > just '\'. Thus, in these examples: > > This is an in-text citation, as was shown by @Doe99{}. The next sentence. > This is an in-text citation, as was shown by @Doe99\. The next sentence. > > the key would be parsed as `Doe99', but in this example: > > This is an in-text citation, where @Doe???? is mentioned mid-sentence. > > the key would be parsed as `Doe????'. > > What do you think? The {} terminator is used elsewhere in Org mode, so it might be the least bad option in this instance. All the best, Tom -- T.S. Dye & Colleagues, Archaeologists 735 Bishop St, Suite 315, Honolulu, HI 96813 Tel: 808-529-0866, Fax: 808-529-0884 http://www.tsdye.com