About bibtex
JabRef helps you work with your bibtex databases, but
there are still rules to keep in mind when editing your entries, to
ensure that your database is treated properly by the bibtex
program.
Bibtex fields
There is a lot of different fields in bibtex, and some
additional fields that you can set in JabRef.
Generally, you can use LaTeX commands inside of fields containing
text. Bibtex will automatically format your reference lists,
and those fields that are included in the lists will be
(de)capitalized according to your bibliography style. To ensure that
certain characters remain capitalized, enclose them in braces, like in
the word {B}elgium.
Notes about some of the field types:
- Author: This field should contain the complete author
list for your entry. The names are separated by the word and,
even if there are more than two authors. Each name can be written
in two equivalent forms:
Donald E. Knuth or Knuth, Donald E.
Eddie van Halen or van Halen, Eddie
The second form should be used for authors with more than two names,
to differentiate between middle names and last names.
- Editor: This field is analogue to the author field.
- Year: The year of the publication. This field is required
for most entry types.
- Bibtexkey: A unique string used to refer to the entry in
LaTeX documents. Note that when referencing an entry from LaTeX, the
key must match case-sensitively with the reference string.