2.2 The author database

From version 2.50, I added the authors database functionality.

2.2.1 What is it for?

Managing an authors database may be useful to edit entries, you just have to choose the author in a list instead of typing the whole name and stuff.

An author database may also be useful to store additional information on authors, like e-mail and address.

2.2.2 How does-it work?

A file named AuthorsDb.xml is created in the user personal directory (~/.B3/authorDb.xml). This XML file will contain all data of the authors database. You can move this file providing you edit the configuration file accordingly. Since it's not in B3's home directory, it will not be overwritten when installing a later version of B3 (different behavior from the Journal's database). This file will automatically be created if you upgrade from a previous version of B3, please check the console for messages.

The authors database may be used in two ways:

1. By clicking on the 'Authors' menu, and then the 'Show authors database' item. This opens the database request dialog, where you can check, edit, add or remove entries.
2. By editing an author field in any entry in your file. The author field as been updated, it is no longer a table. Double-clicking on an author brings a dialog box with several fields. From this dialog box, you can import authors from your database, or add any author both to your entry and the database. Please note that the additional fields ('address', 'e-mail' and 'notes') are only for the database, they will not be stored in your bibliography file.

Figure 2.3: Importing authors and browsing the author database.

2.2.3 Adding entries to the author database

It's possible to manually add entries by going to the 'Authors' menu, and then clicking on the 'Show authors database' item. The 'Add' button in the toolbar will bring a dialog box similar to the one for setting authors in an entry.

The other way is to automatically scan bibliography databases for authors. This is achieved by clicking on the corresponding item in the 'Authors' menu. All authors in the current selected bibliography will be added to the database.

Before adding an author to the base, B3 checks if any author with similar name are already present. If some are found, you'll be asked to either add the author to the database or to drop this one. An other possibility is to replace one of the existing entry by the new one. This is done by selecting the entry you want to replace in the list and then clicking on the 'Replace' button. This functionality may be disabled by checking the corresponding item in the 'Authors' menu. Be careful that this may lead to duplicated entries!

Figure 2.4: Automatic scan for authors.