Scholar Sidekick CLI is a command-line client for resolving scholarly identifiers and producing clean bibliographic output, straight from your terminal.
Give it any supported identifier - DOI, PMID, PMCID, ISBN, arXiv ID, ISSN, NASA ADS bibcode, or WHO IRIS URL - and:
- Format citations in 10,000+ CSL styles (Vancouver, APA, AMA, IEEE, CSE, and any CSL style ID)
- Export bibliographies to BibTeX, RIS, CSL JSON, EndNote, RefWorks, MEDLINE, Zotero RDF, CSV, or plain text
- Check retraction status (retractions, corrections, expressions of concern; Crossref / Retraction Watch)
- Check open access status and the best legal copy (Unpaywall)
- Verify that a claimed citation actually matches the paper at its identifier — catching the AI-driven "real DOI + invented title" fabrication pattern
No API key is required for the free, rate-limited tier - npm install -g scholar-sidekick-cli (or npx) and go. Add a key to raise limits. Requires Node.js >= 20. MIT licensed; source on GitHub.
Features
- Resolve DOI, PMID, PMCID, ISBN, arXiv, ISSN, ADS bibcode, WHO IRIS
- Format in 10,000+ CSL styles (Vancouver, APA, AMA, IEEE, CSE...)
- Export BibTeX, RIS, EndNote, RefWorks, MEDLINE, Zotero RDF, CSV
- Detect fabricated citations - real DOI + invented title
- Check retraction status (Crossref / Retraction Watch)
- Check open-access status & best legal copy (Unpaywall)
- No API key required for the free tier - npm install and go
- Batch-friendly: pass a list of identifiers in one command
- Cross-platform, Node.js ≥ 20
- MIT licensed, source on GitHub