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REFER(1)

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NAME    [Toc]    [Back]

       refer - preprocess bibliographic references for groff

SYNOPSIS    [Toc]    [Back]

       refer [ -benvCPRS ] [ -an ] [ -cfields ] [ -fn ]
             [ -ifields ] [ -kfield ] [ -lm,n ] [ -pfilename ]
             [ -sfields ] [ -tn ] [ -Bfield.macro ]
             [ filename... ]

DESCRIPTION    [Toc]    [Back]

       This file documents the GNU version  of  refer,  which  is
       part  of  the  groff  document  formatting  system.  refer
       copies the contents of filename...  to the  standard  output,
  except that lines between .[ and .]  are interpreted
       as citations, and lines between .R1  and  .R2  are  interpreted
  as  commands  about  how  citations are to be processed.


       Each citation specifies a  reference.   The  citation  can
       specify  a  reference that is contained in a bibliographic
       database by giving a set of keywords that only that reference
  contains.   Alternatively it can specify a reference
       by supplying a database record in the citation.  A  combination
 of these alternatives is also possible.

       For  each  citation, refer can produce a mark in the text.
       This mark consists of some label which  can  be  separated
       from  the text and from other labels in various ways.  For
       each reference it also outputs groff commands that can  be
       used  by  a macro package to produce a formatted reference
       for each citation.  The output of refer must therefore  be
       processed using a suitable macro package.  The -ms and -me
       macros are both suitable.  The commands to format a  citation's
 reference can be output immediately after the citation,
 or the references may be accumulated, and  the  commands
  output  at some later point.  If the references are
       accumulated, then multiple citations of the same reference
       will produce a single formatted reference.

       The  interpretation  of  lines between .R1 and .R2 as commands
 is a new feature of GNU refer.  Documents making use
       of  this feature can still be processed by Unix refer just
       by adding the lines

              .de R1
              .ig R2
              ..
       to the beginning of the document.  This will  cause  troff
       to  ignore  everything between .R1 and .R2.  The effect of
       some commands can also  be  achieved  by  options.   These
       options  are  supported mainly for compatibility with Unix
       refer.  It is usually more convenient to use commands.

       refer generates .lf  lines  so  that  filenames  and  line
       numbers  in  messages produced by commands that read refer
       output will be correct; it also interprets lines beginning
       with  .lf  so  that filenames and line numbers in the messages
 and .lf lines that it produces will be accurate even
       if  the  input  has been preprocessed by a command such as
       soelim(1).

OPTIONS    [Toc]    [Back]

       Most options are equivalent to commands (for a description
       of these commands see the Commands subsection):

       -b     no-label-in-text; no-label-in-reference

       -e     accumulate

       -n     no-default-database

       -C     compatible

       -P     move-punctuation

       -S     label  "(A.n|Q) ', ' (D.y|D)"; bracket-label " (" )
              "; "

       -an    reverse An

       -cfields
              capitalize fields

       -fn    label %n

       -ifields
              search-ignore fields

       -k     label L~%a

       -kfield
              label field~%a

       -l     label A.nD.y%a

       -lm    label A.n+mD.y%a

       -l,n   label A.nD.y-n%a

       -lm,n  label A.n+mD.y-n%a

       -pfilename
              database filename

       -sspec sort spec

       -tn    search-truncate n
       These options are equivalent  to  the  following  commands
       with the addition that the filenames specified on the command
 line are processed as if they were arguments  to  the
       bibliography command instead of in the normal way:

       -B     annotate X AP; no-label-in-reference

       -Bfield.macro
              annotate field macro; no-label-in-reference

       The following options have no equivalent commands:

       -v     Print the version number.

       -R     Don't recognize lines beginning with .R1/.R2.

USAGE    [Toc]    [Back]

   Bibliographic databases
       The  bibliographic  database  is a text file consisting of
       records separated by one or more blank lines.  Within each
       record  fields  start with a % at the beginning of a line.
       Each field has a one character name that immediately  follows
  the  %.  It is best to use only upper and lower case
       letters for the names of fields.  The name  of  the  field
       should  be  followed by exactly one space, and then by the
       contents of the field.  Empty  fields  are  ignored.   The
       conventional meaning of each field is as follows:

       A      The  name  of  an  author.   If the name contains a
              title such as Jr.  at the end, it should  be  separated
  from the last name by a comma.  There can be
              multiple occurrences of the A field.  The order  is
              significant.  It is a good idea always to supply an
              A field or a Q field.

       B      For an article that is part of a book, the title of
              the book

       C      The place (city) of publication.

       D      The date of publication.  The year should be specified
 in full.  If the month is specified, the  name
              rather than the number of the month should be used,
              but only the first three letters are required.   It
              is  a  good idea always to supply a D field; if the
              date is unknown,  a  value  such  as  in  press  or
              unknown can be used.

       E      For  an article that is part of a book, the name of
              an editor of the book.  Where the work has  editors
              and  no authors, the names of the editors should be
              given as A fields and , (ed) or , (eds)  should  be
              appended to the last author.
       G      US Government ordering number.

       I      The publisher (issuer).

       J      For  an article in a journal, the name of the journal.


       K      Keywords to be used for searching.

       L      Label.

       N      Journal issue number.

       O      Other information.  This is usually printed at  the
              end of the reference.

       P      Page  number.  A range of pages can be specified as
              m-n.

       Q      The name of the author, if the author is not a person.
   This  will  only  be  used if there are no A
              fields.  There can only be one Q field.

       R      Technical report number.

       S      Series name.

       T      Title.  For an article in a book or  journal,  this
              should be the title of the article.

       V      Volume number of the journal or book.

       X      Annotation.

       For  all  fields except A and E, if there is more than one
       occurrence of a particular field in  a  record,  only  the
       last such field will be used.

       If accent strings are used, they should follow the character
 to be accented.  This means that the AM macro must  be
       used  with  the  -ms macros.  Accent strings should not be
       quoted: use one rather than two.

   Citations    [Toc]    [Back]
       The format of a citation is
              .[opening-text
              flags keywords
              fields
              .]closing-text

       The opening-text, closing-text and  flags  components  are
       optional.   Only one of the keywords and fields components
       need be specified.
       The keywords component says to  search  the  bibliographic
       databases  for  a reference that contains all the words in
       keywords.  It is an error if more than  one  reference  if
       found.

       The  fields  components  specifies  additional  fields  to
       replace or supplement those specified  in  the  reference.
       When  references  are  being  accumulated and the keywords
       component is non-empty, then additional fields  should  be
       specified  only  on  the  first occasion that a particular
       reference is cited, and will apply  to  all  citations  of
       that reference.

       The  opening-text  and  closing-text  component  specifies
       strings to be used to bracket the  label  instead  of  the
       strings specified in the bracket-label command.  If either
       of these components is non-empty, the strings specified in
       the bracket-label command will not be used; this behaviour
       can be altered using the [ and ] flags.  Note that leading
       and  trailing spaces are significant for these components.

       The flags component is a list of non-alphanumeric  characters
 each of which modifies the treatment of this particular
 citation.  Unix refer will treat these flags  as  part
       of  the  keywords  and  so will ignore them since they are
       non-alphanumeric.  The following flags are currently  recognized:


       #      This  says to use the label specified by the short-
              label command, instead of  that  specified  by  the
              label  command.   If no short label has been specified,
 the normal label will be used.  Typically the
              short  label  is  used  with author-date labels and
              consists of only the date  and  possibly  a  disambiguating
  letter;  the # is supposed to be suggestive
 of a numeric type of label.

       [      Precede opening-text with the first  string  specified
 in the bracket-label command.

       ]      Follow  closing-text  with the second string specified
 in the bracket-label command.

       One advantages of using the [  and  ]  flags  rather  than
       including the brackets in opening-text and closing-text is
       that you can change the style of bracket used in the document
  just by changing the bracket-label command.  Another
       advantage is that sorting and merging  of  citations  will
       not necessarily be inhibited if the flags are used.

       If  a  label  is  to be inserted into the text, it will be
       attached to the line preceding the .[ line.  If  there  is
       no  such  line, then an extra line will be inserted before
       the .[ line and a warning will be given.
       There is no special notation for making a citation to multiple
  references.   Just use a sequence of citations, one
       for each reference.  Don't put anything between the  citations.
   The labels for all the citations will be attached
       to the line preceding the first citation.  The labels  may
       also  be  sorted or merged.  See the description of the <>
       label expression,  and  of  the  sort-adjacent-labels  and
       abbreviate-label-ranges  command.   A  label  will  not be
       merged if its citation has  a  non-empty  opening-text  or
       closing-text.   However,  the  labels for a citation using
       the ] flag and without any closing-text  immediately  followed
 by a citation using the [ flag and without any open-
       ing-text may be sorted and merged even  though  the  first
       citation's  opening-text or the second citation's closing-
       text is non-empty.  (If you wish to prevent this just make
       the first citation's closing-textCommands    [Toc]    [Back]
       Commands are contained between lines starting with .R1 and
       .R2.  Recognition of these lines can be prevented  by  the
       -R  option.  When a .R1 line is recognized any accumulated
       references are flushed out.  Neither .R1  nor  .R2  lines,
       nor anything between them is output.

       Commands  are separated by newlines or ;s.  # introduces a
       comment that extends to the end of the line (but does  not
       conceal  the  newline).   Each  command  is broken up into
       words.  Words are separated by spaces  or  tabs.   A  word
       that  begins with " extends to the next " that is not followed
 by another ".  If  there  is  no  such  "  the  word
       extends  to  the  end  of  the line.  Pairs of " in a word
       beginning with " collapse to a single ".  Neither # nor  ;
       are recognized inside "s.  A line can be continued by ending
 it with; this works everywhere except after a #.

       Each command name that is marked with * has an  associated
       negative  command  no-name that undoes the effect of name.
       For example, the no-sort command specifies that references
       should not be sorted.  The negative commands take no arguments.


       In the following description each argument must be a  single
  word;  field is used for a single upper or lower case
       letter naming a field; fields is used for  a  sequence  of
       such letters; m and n are used for a non-negative numbers;
       string is used for an arbitrary string; filename  is  used
       for the name of a file.

       abbreviate* fields string1 string2 string3 string4
                                Abbreviate  the  first  names  of
                                fields.  An initial  letter  will
                                be separated from another initial
                                letter by string1, from the  last
                                name   by   string2,   and   from
                                anything else (such as a  von  or
                                de) by string3.  These default to
                                a period followed by a space.  In
                                a hyphenated first name, the initial
 of the  first  part  of  the
                                name  will  be separated from the
                                hyphen by string4; this  defaults
                                to  a period.  No attempt is made
                                to handle  any  ambiguities  that
                                might  result  from abbreviation.
                                Names  are   abbreviated   before
                                sorting  and  before  label  construction.


       abbreviate-label-ranges* string
                                Three  or  more  adjacent  labels
                                that  refer to consecutive references
 will be  abbreviated  to  a
                                label  consisting  of  the  first
                                label, followed  by  string  followed
 by the last label.  This is
                                mainly   useful   with    numeric
                                labels.   If string is omitted it
                                defaults to -.

       accumulate*              Accumulate references instead  of
                                writing  out each reference as it
                                is encountered.  Accumulated references
 will be written out whenever
 a reference of the form

                                       .[
                                       $LIST$
                                       .]

                                is encountered, after  all  input
                                files  hve  been  processed,  and
                                whenever .R1 line is  recognized.

       annotate* field string   field  is an annotation; print it
                                at the end of the reference as  a
                                paragraph preceded by the line

                                       .string

                                If   macro  is  omitted  it  will
                                default to AP; if field  is  also
                                omitted  it  will  default  to X.
                                Only one field can be an  annotation.


       articles string...       string...  are definite or indefinite
  articles,  and  should  be
                                ignored  at  the  beginning  of T
                                fields when sorting.   Initially,
                                the,  a  and an are recognized as
                                articles.

       bibliography filename... Write out all the references contained
   in   the   bibliographic
                                databases filename...

       bracket-label string1 string2 string3
                                In the text, bracket  each  label
                                with  string1  and  string2.   An
                                occurrence of string2 immediately
                                followed   by   string1  will  be
                                turned into string3.  The default
                                behaviour is

                                       bracket-label *([.*(.]
                                       ", "

       capitalize fields        Convert fields to caps and  small
                                caps.

       compatible*              Recognize  .R1  and .R2 even when
                                followed  by  a  character  other
                                than space or newline.

       database filename...     Search      the     bibliographic
                                databases filename...   For  each
                                filename  if  an index filename.i
                                created  by  indxbib(1)   exists,
                                then it will be searched instead;
                                each  index  can  cover  multiple
                                databases.

       date-as-label* string    string is a label expression that
                                specifies a string with which  to
                                replace  the  D  field after constructing
  the  label.   See  the
                                Label  expressions subsection for
                                a description  of  label  expressions.
  This command is useful if
                                you do not want  explicit  labels
                                in   the   reference   list,  but
                                instead want to handle any necessary
 disambiguation by qualifying
                                the date in some way.  The  label
                                used  in the text would typically
                                be some combination of the author
                                and  date.   In  most  cases  you
                                should also use the  no-label-in-
                                reference command.  For example,

                                       date-as-label
                                       D.+yD.y%a*D.-y
                                would  attach  a   disambiguating
                                letter  to the year part of the D
                                field in the reference.

       default-database*        The default  database  should  be
                                searched.   This  is  the default
                                behaviour, so the  negative  version
 of this command is more useful.
   refer  determines  whether
                                the  default  database  should be
                                searched on  the  first  occasion
                                that  it  needs  to  do a search.
                                Thus a  no-default-database  command
  must  be given before then,
                                in order to be effective.

       discard* fields          When  the  reference   is   read,
                                fields  should  be  discarded; no
                                string  definitions  for   fields
                                will   be   output.    Initially,
                                fields are XYZ.

       et-al* string m n        Control use of et al in the evaluation
  of @ expressions in label
                                expressions.  If  the  number  of
                                authors needed to make the author
                                sequence unambiguous is u and the
                                total number of authors is t then
                                the  last  t-u  authors  will  be
                                replaced  by string provided that
                                t-u is not less than m and  t  is
                                not  less  than  n.   The default
                                behaviour is

                                       et-al " et al" 2 3

       include filename         Include  filename  and  interpret
                                the contents as commands.

       join-authors string1 string2 string3
                                This  says  how authors should be
                                joined together.  When there  are
                                exactly two authors, they will be
                                joined with string1.  When  there
                                are  more  than  two authors, all
                                but the last two will  be  joined
                                with  string2,  and  the last two
                                authors  will  be   joined   with
                                string3.   If string3 is omitted,
                                it will default  to  string1;  if
                                string2  is  also omitted it will
                                also  default  to  string1.   For
                                example,
                                       join-authors  " and " ", "
                                       ", and "

                                will restore the  default  method
                                for joining authors.

       label-in-reference*      When  outputting  the  reference,
                                define the string [F  to  be  the
                                reference's  label.   This is the
                                default behaviour; so  the  negative
  version  of this command is
                                more useful.

       label-in-text*           For each reference output a label
                                in  the  text.  The label will be
                                separated  from  the  surrounding
                                text as described in the bracket-
                                label  command.   This   is   the
                                default  behaviour;  so the negative
 version of this  command  is
                                more useful.

       label string             string   is  a  label  expression
                                describing how to label each reference.


       separate-label-second-parts string
                                When   merging  two-part  labels,
                                separate the second part  of  the
                                second label from the first label
                                with string.  See the description
                                of the <> label expression.

       move-punctuation*        In the text, move any punctuation
                                at  the  end  of  line  past  the
                                label.  It is usually a good idea
                                to give this command  unless  you
                                are  using  superscripted numbers
                                as labels.

       reverse* string          Reverse the  fields  whose  names
                                are  in  string.  Each field name
                                can be followed by a number which
                                says  how many such fields should
                                be reversed.   If  no  number  is
                                given   for  a  field,  all  such
                                fields will be reversed.

       search-ignore* fields    While  searching  for   keys   in
                                databases   for  which  no  index
                                exists, ignore  the  contents  of
                                fields.   Initially,  fields  XYZ
                                are ignored.
       search-truncate* n       Only require the first n  characters
  of  keys  to  be given.  In
                                effect when searching for a given
                                key  words  in  the  database are
                                truncated to the maximum of n and
                                the length of the key.  Initially
                                n is 6.

       short-label* string      string is a label expression that
                                specifies an alternative (usually
                                shorter) style of label.  This is
                                used  when the # flag is given in
                                the citation.  When using authordate
  style  labels, the identity
                                of the author or authors is sometimes
 clear from the context, and
                                so it may be  desirable  to  omit
                                the  author  or  authors from the
                                label.  The  short-label  command
                                will typically be used to specify
                                a label containing  just  a  date
                                and   possibly  a  disambiguating
                                letter.

       sort* string             Sort  references   according   to
                                string.  References will automatically
  be  accumulated.   string
                                should  be a list of field names,
                                each followed by a number,  indicating
  how  many fields with the
                                name should be used for  sorting.
                                +  can  be  used to indicate that
                                all  the  fields  with  the  name
                                should  be  used.  Also .  can be
                                used to indicate  the  references
                                should  be sorted using the (tentative)
   label.    (The    Label
                                expressions  subsection describes
                                the  concept   of   a   tentative
                                label.)

       sort-adjacent-labels*    Sort  labels that are adjacent in
                                the text according to their position
 in the reference list.  This
                                command should usually  be  given
                                if   the  abbreviate-label-ranges
                                command has been given, or if the
                                label  expression  contains  a <>
                                expression.  This  will  have  no
                                effect   unless   references  are
                                being accumulated.

   Label expressions    [Toc]    [Back]
       Label expressions  can  be  evaluated  both  normally  and
       tentatively.   The result of normal evaluation is used for
       output.  The result of tentative  evaluation,  called  the
       tentative  label,  is  used to gather the information that
       normal evaluation needs to disambiguate the label.   Label
       expressions specified by the date-as-label and short-label
       commands are not evaluated tentatively.  Normal and tentative
  evaluation  are the same for all types of expression
       other than @, *, and % expressions.  The description below
       applies to normal evaluation, except where otherwise specified.


       field
       field n
              The n-th part  of  field.   If  n  is  omitted,  it
              defaults to 1.

       'string'
              The characters in string literally.

       @      All  the  authors  joined as specified by the join-
              authors command.  The whole of each  author's  name
              will  be  used.   However,  if  the  references are
              sorted by author (that is  the  sort  specification
              starts  with  A+), then authors' last names will be
              used instead, provided that this does not introduce
              ambiguity,  and  also an initial subsequence of the
              authors may be used instead  of  all  the  authors,
              again provided that this does not introduce ambiguity.
  The use of only the last name  for  the  i-th
              author  of  some  reference  is  considered  to  be
              ambiguous if there is some  other  reference,  such
              that  the  first  i-1 authors of the references are
              the same, the i-th authors are not  the  same,  but
              the  i-th  authors'  last  names  are  the same.  A
              proper  initial  subsequence  of  the  sequence  of
              authors  for  some  reference  is  considered to be
              ambiguous if there is a reference with  some  other
              sequence of authors which also has that subsequence
              as a proper initial subsequence.  When  an  initial
              subsequence  of  authors  is  used,  the  remaining
              authors are replaced by the string specified by the
              et-al  command; this command may also specify additional
 requirements that must be met before an initial
 subsequence can be used.  @ tentatively evaluates
 to a canonical representation of the  authors,
              such  that authors that compare equally for sorting
              purpose will have the same representation.

       %n
       %a
       %A
       %i
       %I     The  serial  number  of  the  reference   formatted
              according  to  the  character following the %.  The
              serial number of a reference is 1 plus  the  number
              of  earlier references with same tentative label as
              this  reference.   These  expressions   tentatively
              evaluate to an empty string.

       expr*  If  there is another reference with the same tentative
 label as this reference, then expr,  otherwise
              an  empty  string.   It tentatively evaluates to an
              empty string.

       expr+n
       expr-n The first (+) or last (-) n  upper  or  lower  case
              letters  or  digits of expr.  Troff special characters
 (such as ('a)  count  as  a  single  letter.
              Accent  strings  are  retained  but  do  not  count
              towards the total.

       expr.l expr converted to lowercase.

       expr.u expr converted to uppercase.

       expr.c expr converted to caps and small caps.

       expr.r expr reversed so that the last name is first.

       expr.a expr  with  first  names  abbreviated.   Note  that
              fields  specified  in  the  abbreviate  command are
              abbreviated before any labels are evaluated.   Thus
              .a  is  useful  only  when  you  want a field to be
              abbreviated in a label but not in a reference.

       expr.y The year part of expr.

       expr.+y
              The part of expr before the year, or the  whole  of
              expr if it does not contain a year.

       expr.-y
              The part of expr after the year, or an empty string
              if expr does not contain a year.

       expr.n The last name part of expr.

       expr1~expr2
              expr1 except that if the last character of expr1 is
              - then it will be replaced by expr2.

       expr1 expr2
              The concatenation of expr1 and expr2.

       expr1|expr2
              If expr1 is non-empty then expr1 otherwise expr2.
       expr1&expr2
              If expr1 is non-empty then expr2 otherwise an empty
              string.

       expr1?expr2:expr3
              If expr1 is non-empty then expr2 otherwise expr3.

       <expr> The label is in two parts, which are  separated  by
              expr.   Two adjacent two-part labels which have the
              same first part will be  merged  by  appending  the
              second  part  of  the  second  label onto the first
              label separated by the string specified in the sep-
              arate-label-second-parts   command   (initially,  a
              comma followed by a  space);  the  resulting  label
              will  also  be a two-part label with the same first
              part as before merging, and  so  additional  labels
              can be merged into it.  Note that it is permissible
              for the first part to be empty; this  maybe  desirable
  for  expressions used in the short-label command.


       (expr) The same as expr.  Used for grouping.

       The above expressions are listed in  order  of  precedence
       (highest first); & and | have the same precedence.

   Macro interface    [Toc]    [Back]
       Each  reference  starts  with a call to the macro ]-.  The
       string [F will be defined to be the label for this  reference,
  unless  the  no-label-in-reference command has been
       given.  There then follows a series of string definitions,
       one for each field: string [X corresponds to field X.  The
       number register [P is set to 1 if the P field  contains  a
       range  of  pages.   The [T, [A and [O number registers are
       set to 1 according as the T, A and O fields end  with  one
       of the characters .?!.  The [E number register will be set
       to 1 if the [E string contains more than  one  name.   The
       reference  is  followed  by  a  call to the ][ macro.  The
       first argument to this macro gives a  number  representing
       the  type  of  the reference.  If a reference contains a J
       field, it will be classified as type 1,  otherwise  if  it
       contains  a  B field, it will type 3, otherwise if it contains
 a G or R field it will be type 4, otherwise if  contains
  a  I  field it will be type 2, otherwise it will be
       type 0.  The second argument is a symbolic  name  for  the
       type:  other,  journal-article,  book,  article-in-book or
       tech-report.  Groups of references that have been  accumulated
 or are produced by the bibliography command are preceded
 by a call to the ]< macro and followed by a call  to
       the ]> macro.

FILES    [Toc]    [Back]

       /usr/share/dict/papers/Ind  Default database.
       file.i                      Index files.

SEE ALSO    [Toc]    [Back]

      
      
       indxbib(1), lookbib(1), lkbib(1)

BUGS    [Toc]    [Back]

       In  label  expressions,  <> expressions are ignored inside
       .char expressions.


Groff Version 1.15         9 April 2000                        15
[ Back ]
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