Re: [Ebib-users] feature request: searching online databases

[Robbie M. <ro...@ac...>]

Hi Mandar

------------------------------------------------------------
To:           ebib users <ebi...@li...>
Subject:      Re: [Ebib-users] feature request: searching online databases
Message-ID:  <201...@gm...>
From:         Mandar Mitra <man...@gm...>
Date:         Sat, 1 Sep 2012 16:46:52 +0530
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>> Two approaches were traversed:
>>
>>  * interoperability with Zotero -- through their public
>>    APIs (what ever they are)
>>
>>  * more-or-less what was indicated by Mandar --
>>    moreover, pybliographer (sourceforge.net), now
>>    inactive, had code to do this:
>>
>>    http://pybliographer.org
>>
>>   "search external databases like PubMed, Web of
>>    Science, Citeseer, and more"
>>
>>    I never used pybliographer, although I registered
>>    for their mailing list five years ago.
>>
>>    This kind of code will no doubt require ongoing
>>    maintenance because the URLs/APIs/data
>>    interfaces are liable to drift over time.
>
> So I guess the upshot of your earlier discussion was
> that it would be preferable to leverage Zotero? If
> their API remains stable, then ebib would not have to
> worry about the various individual interfaces.
>
> mandar

---

Here is that conversation, starting with my original
comments (at >>>>>).  I trust Joost does not mind his
offline text being copied to a public forum.  Actually,
going offline was an accident -- I much prefer to
keep the list in the loop for these kind of discussions.

One other suggestion too: if you want to develop this
line, perhaps create a new file: 'ebib-harvest.el' or
'ebib-net.el' or some such.

cheers, Robbie

>>>> Something that might be interesting (but that I do
>>>> not use) are the command for extracting BibTeX
>>>> entries from referencing websites -- known as
>>>> database connectivity:
>>>>
>>>>   http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_reference_management_software#Database_connectivity
>>>>   http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Academic_databases_and_search_engines
>>>>
>>>> As noted, I don't use these because my work tends to
>>>> be too eclectic to bother.  Maybe if I had a clear
>>>> home discipline, that would be different.
>>>
>>> Yeah, I've never bothered with any online databases
>>> either...
>>>
>>> One thought I've been playing with from time to time
>>> is Zotero. But it seems quite a lot of work to create
>>> an interoperability layer. And I suspect people using
>>> Zotero generally don't use LateX, because Zotero is
>>> more geared toward MS Word etc.
>>
>> 'JabRef' is the competition.  I have had trouble
>> installing JabRef on Linux in the past.  JabRef used to
>> demand the proprietary Sun Java runtime, but now works
>> on IcedTea.
>>
>>> The thing is, I don't use any online databases or
>>> reference management sites, so there's little
>>> incentive on my part to add it to Ebib. ;-)
>>>
>>> From a technical point of view, the problem with all
>>> of this is that Ebib has its own database and any
>>> database connectivity would require keeping two
>>> databases in sync.
>>
>> Are we talking about the same thing?
>
> Yes and no. ;-)
>
>> I was suggesting the ad-hoc download of BibTeX
>> records, not synchronizing a local database with
>> some cloud resource.
>
> Yeah, I know. The reason I mentioned Zotero is that
> it has the ability to import BibTeX records from
> other sources. So with Zotero interoperability, one
> would kill two birds with one stone, so to speak.
> You'd get database connectivity and powerful
> interoperability options.

I note Zotero "ingests content".  :)

Okay, I can see how a bridge between Zotero and 'ebib'
and then on to 'LaTeX' could prove useful.  You need to
know what kind of APIs Zotero exposes.  But then if
Zotero/LaTeX integration is the goal, then maybe
developing Zotero might be the better approach.

---
Robbie Morrison
PhD student -- policy-oriented energy system simulation
Institute for Energy Engineering (IET)
Technical University of Berlin (TU-Berlin), Germany
University email (redirected) : mor...@ie...
Webmail (preferred)           : ro...@ac...
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