Latex References

Use BibTeX for References management

Preface

This article introduces how to add references in $\large \LaTeX$ . The tutorial includes following contents:

A full tutorial on BibTeX reference management
How to compile LaTeX documents with BibTeX
How to modify the format of in-text citations
How to modify the format of the "References" section at the end
A complete demo on above contents
FAQs and solutions related to BibTeX

tip

Please make sure you can compile LaTeX Projects before proceeding

For Your Information, you need to(suggested):

Install TeXworks
Use VS Code for writing and compiling
Install LaTeX Workshop plugin in VS Code

Now let's dive in

BibTeX References Management

$\Large \mathrm {B\mathbf {\scriptstyle \text{IB}}} \TeX$ is a Bibliography Management Tool used for formatting reference lists. Its name originates from the word $(bibliography)$ and $\TeX$ formatting tool. Using BibTeX to manage your bibliography includes the following steps, I suggest you click here to download the demo and follow the guide below

Create a BibTex database file (.bib file)
Add reference entries in the .bib file
Set the format of in-text citations and references
Use commands to cite references in the article
Use commands to list references at the end of the article

Step 1: Create a BibTeX database file

First, I suggest the following project structure: After opening the project root folder with VS Code, create a thesis.tex file in the root directory, create a references folder and create a references.bib file within

And it's for the best to create a workspace settings file in VS Code, which means creating a .vscode folder and a settings.json file within it to modify workspace settings

There are two reasons for this:

first, under different requirements, you may need to use different compilation orders, which allows each project to run normally without affecting global settings

Second, when moving the project to other devices or sharing it with others, we can make sure it still compiles in the way we expect

TL,NR;
Project Structure:
│  thesis.tex
│
├─.vscode
│       settings.json
│
└─references
        references.bib

Step 2: Add Reference Entries to the `.bib` File

.bib file is a JSON-like file format. It contains a series of entries, each representing a reference, and stores detailed information about the reference in a specific format. Each entriy starts with a format like:

@type{citation_key,
    key1 = {value1},
    key2 = {value2},
    ...
}

info

The format of a BibTeX reference entry typically starts with @type, The type might be @article, @book, @inproceedings, etc.

And then follows a set of curly braces. Inside these curly braces, the first field is a unique identifier key, It allows you to cite the reference in the article using the command \cite{key}

The rest of the entry consists of various attributes in key-value pairs, providing detailed information about the reference

In the Common BibTeX Reference Types section, I listed the reference standards and BibTeX reference types. Below is an example of the .bib file in the demo:

@article{Castamere2024AddReference,
  author  = {Castamere and Todayred and others},
  title   = {How to add Reference to your LaTeX},
  journal = {\LaTeX \enspace cookbook},
  url     = {https://www.castamerego.com/en/docs/Latex/Reference},
  year    = {2024}
}

@article{Castamere2024HowToAdd,
  author  = {W. Castamere and W. Todayred and others},
  title   = {{BibTeX References Management}},
  journal = {\LaTeX \enspace cookbok},
  url     = {https://www.castamerego.com/en/docs/Latex/Reference},
  year    = {2024}
}

To new beginners, there are some faqs about the format of .bib file, which can be found in the BibTeX FAQs section

Next, the problem is to find BibTeX format references. Google Scholar provides BibTeX format references. You can first find some papers on other websites or platforms (such as some AI paper review websites: semless). Then search these articles directly in Google Scholar, click Cite, and find BibTeX in the pop-up box. Click it to get the BibTeX format reference, which can be copied directly and added to the .bib file

GoogleScholar

Step 3: Set the Format of Citations and References

Here I separate this step into three parts

Modify the format of how the references are listed (e.g., journal style: author. title [J]. journal name, year, volume (issue): page range)
Modify the format of in-text citations (e.g., whether it shows as [1], (1), or (Castamere et al., 2024)[1])
Modify the format of the final References text (e.g., whether it shows as "References" or "Bibliography", and modify font and size)

Modify the format of how the references are listed

When using BibTeX, you need to import the hyperref and natbib packages. Use the \bibliographystyle{} command to change the style of how references are listed. Common styles are listed below, and if there are no special requirements (e.g., just for a small assignment), it is recommended to use unsrtnat, which lists references in the order they are cited

\RequirePackage{natbib}          % BibTeX library
\usepackage[hidelinks]{hyperref} % for hyperlinks
\bibliographystyle{unsrtnat}     % reference style

plainnat: author - year format, and sorted by author's last name
abbrvnat: Similar to plainnat, but names and months are abbreviated
unsrtnat: author - year format, but references are listed in the order they are cited
apalike: APA format, such as the style of publications by the American Psychological Association
alpha: author - year format, but uses a label system based on author's last name and publication year, not a complete author-year citation format

Modify the format of in-text citations

tip

The following examples use the unsrtnat style in the demo

Use \bibpunct to modify the style of in-text citations. The first two parameters are the bracket styles, normally using square brackets or parentheses. The third parameter is the separator for multiple references. You can also use \newcommand to define custom citation commands

%  The first and second parameters are bracket styles, which can be replaced with parentheses.
\bibpunct{[}{]}{;}{s}{,}{,} 
\newcommand{\fullcite}[1]{(\citeauthor{#1}, \citeyear{#1})\cite{#1}} % Custom reference commands

Modify the format of the final References text

To modify the final References text, you can use the \renewcommand function. It rewrites an existing function, where the first parameter is the name of the existing function, and the second parameter is the specific implementation of the function.

note

Add this command after \RequirePackage{natbib}

\RequirePackage{natbib}

% display "Bibliography" in the center, with a custom font size
% \sihao is a custom font size 
\renewcommand{\refname}{\begin{center} \sihao Bibliography \end{center}}

% Or maybe display "References" in the center
\renewcommand{\refname}{Reference}

Step 4: Use Commands to Cite References in the Article

You can use the \cite command to cite references in the article. The parameter is the citation key defined in the .bib file. To cite in the format of (Castamere et al., 2024)[1], I have written a custom command \fullcite for you to use, as shown in the following example. Readers can study it in the Demo

\newcommand{\fullcite}[1]{(\citeauthor{#1}, \citeyear{#1})\cite{#1}} % Custom reference commands

Reference Demo

Step 5: Use Commands to List References at the End of the Article

Now that we have cited references in the article, we need to list them at the end. In LaTeX, we can use the \bibliography command to list all references. The parameter is the relative path of the .bib file, without the file extension

✔ references/references
✖ references/references.bib

But this command does not automatically add a "References" to your table of contents (TOC). To do this, you can use the \phantomsection command to create a phantom section.

This trick allows you to add an entry to the TOC without actually creating a visible section in the document, such as References, Abstract, Keywords, Appendix, etc., where you don't want to use the \section command

% Add "References" to TOC
\phantomsection\addcontentsline{toc}{section}{Reference}

% List all references
\bibliography{references/references}

Full Demo

Click here to download Demo

I provide a simple demo here. After installing Texworks, using VS Code, and installing the latex-workshop plugin, you can compile it directly

demo

Project Structure：
demo-01-reference:
│  templates.pdf
│  templates.tex
│
├─.vscode
│       settings.json
│
└─references
        references.bib

Demo

Demo
% Author: Castamere
\documentclass{ctexart}

\RequirePackage{natbib}          % BibTeX library
\usepackage[hidelinks]{hyperref} % for hyperlinks
\bibliographystyle{unsrtnat}     % reference style
\bibpunct{[}{]}{;}{s}{,}{,} %  The first and second parameters are bracket styles, can be replaced with parentheses.
\newcommand{\fullcite}[1]{(\citeauthor{#1}, \citeyear{#1})\cite{#1}} % Custom reference commands

\pagestyle{empty} % Remove headers, footers, etc. that are not related to the citation.
\renewcommand{\refname}{References}

\begin{document}

% Use \cite{} to cite a reference
This is a demo of $\backslash cite\{ref\}$ command\cite{Castamere2024AddReference} 

% Use custom command \fullcite{} to cite a reference
This is a demo of $\backslash fullcite\{ref\}$ command\fullcite{Castamere2024AddReference} 

% Cite multiple references separately
This is a demo of $\backslash cite\{ref1\}\backslash cite\{ref2\}$ command\cite{Castamere2024AddReference}\cite{Castamere2024HowToAdd}

% Cite multiple references together
This is a demo of $\backslash cite\{ref1, ref2\}$ command\cite{Castamere2024AddReference, Castamere2024HowToAdd}

\phantomsection\addcontentsline{toc}{section}{References} % Add “References” to TOC

\bibliography{references/references} % Use \bibliography{} to list all refs

\end{document}

How to Compile LaTeX Documents with BibTeX

One simple, plain text article that needs LaTeX for formatting, when it contains Unicode characters like Chinese, only compile once with XeLaTeX should be necessary

But when writing a thesis or paper, the two most important reason we use Latex: Figure/Table numbering and citation, reference citation, requires a more complex compilation process

info

XeLaTeX(XƎTEX) is a Unicode-based TeX typesetting engine

XeLaTeX is a TeX typesetting engine using Unicode and supporting modern font technologies such as OpenType, Graphite and Apple Advanced Typography (AAT).

Therefore, users can easily use different fonts, including multi-byte character sets such as Chinese, Japanese, and Korean.

To complete figure numbering and referencing, and reference citations, the compilation configuration I use is as follows: xelatex -> bibtex -> xelatex -> xelatex. The detailed content can be found in .vscode/settings.json in the Demo, and also in the latex-workshop configuration section at the end of this article. Readers who are not concerned about the underlying logic can directly use it

Compilation Logic

xelatex -> bibtex -> xelatex -> xelatex

The 1st xelatex compile: xelatex processes the LaTeX source file and generates an auxiliary file (.aux file), which contains labels for figures, equations, and references. However, at this stage, cross-references are not resolved, so they appear as question marks (?)

bibtex compile: we process the .aux file, and based on the citations (e.g., \cite{...} commands) in it, we look up the corresponding entries in the .bib file to generate a bibliography list (usually a .bbl file). This list will be included in the subsequent LaTeX compilation

The 2nd xelatex compile: we process the LaTeX source file again, this time it reads the .bbl file and inserts the correct references into the document. It also updates the cross-reference information in the .aux file

The 3rd xelatex compile: the final compilation is to ensure that all cross-references (including those appearing after references or figure numbering) are correctly resolved. Since cross-references may depend on bibliographic citations (which can affect the order of references), another compilation is needed to ensure everything is resolved, and all references in the document are correct

VS Code Plugin latex-workshop Configuration

The content of .vscode/settings.json file

latex-workshop Configuration

latex-workshop Configuration
{
  "latex-workshop.latex.tools": [
    {
      "name": "xelatex",
      "command": "xelatex",
      "args": [
        "-synctex=1",
        "-interaction=nonstopmode",
        "-shell-escape",
        "-file-line-error",
        "-pdf",
        "%DOCFILE%"
      ]
    },
    {
      "name": "bibtex",
      "command": "bibtex",
      "args": ["%DOCFILE%"]
    }
  ],
  "latex-workshop.latex.recipes": [
    {
      "name": "Castamere",
      "tools": ["xelatex", "bibtex", "xelatex", "xelatex"]
    }
  ]
}

BibTeX Reference Types

info

Following Are Chinese Standards

Reference Types and Identification Codes

According to GB/T 7714-2015 信息与文献参考文献著录规则

Type	Code	Type	Code
普通图书	M	会议录	C
汇编	G	报纸	N
期刊	J	学位论文	D
报告	R	标准	S
专利	P	数据库	DB
计算机程序	CP	电子公告	EB
档案	A	舆图	CM
数据集	DS	其他	ZB

Type	Code	Type	Code
磁带(magnetictape)	MT	磁盘(disk)	DK
光盘(CD-ROM)	CD	联机网络(online)	OL

Bibtex Reference Types

Journal [J]

@article

Thesis in journal
- necessary property: author, title, journal, year.
- optional property: volume, number, pages, month, note.

Monograph [M]

@book

Publicly published books
- necessary property: author/editor, title, publisher, year.
- optional property: volume/number, series, address, edition, month, note.
@incollection

A chapter in a book
- necessary property: author, title, booktitle, publisher, year.
- optional property: editor, volume/number, series, type, chapter, pages, address, edition, month, note.

Conference proceedings [A] in: [C]

@proceedings

Conference proceedings
- necessary property: title, year.
- optional property: editor, volume/number, series, address, month, organization, publisher, note.
@inproceedings

equal to @conference
- necessary property: author, title, booktitle, year.
- optional property: editor, volume/number, series, pages, address, month, organization, publisher, note.

thesis [D]

@mastersthesis

Master's thesis
- necessary property: author, title, school, year.
- optional property: type, address, month, note.
@phdthesis

Doctoral thesis
- necessary property: author, title, year, school.
- optional property: address, month, keywords, note.

BibTeX FAQs

escape characters

Sometimes citation errors may occur due to special characters in the article name that need to be escaped in LaTeX, such as _%&. The most common issue is the bloody underscore causing compilation failure

character	Latex command	character	Latex command
_	\_	{	\{
%	\%	}	\}
&	\&	^	\^
$	\$	\	\backslash

Case Sensitivity

Some fields in BibTeX, such as title, booktitle, etc., automatically convert letters in sentences to lowercase. To keep the original case, you can wrap the content in {}

大小写问题

@article{Castamere2024AddReference,
  author  = {Castamere and Todayred and others},
  // highlight-start
  % The 'R' in 'Reference' and 'L', 'T', 'X' in 'LaTeX' will be converted to lowercase
  title   = {How to add Reference to your LaTeX},
  // highlight-end
  journal = {\LaTeX \enspace cookbook},
  url     = {http://www.castamerego.com/docs/Latex/reference},
  year    = {2024}
}

@article{Castamere2024HowToAdd,
  author  = {W. Castamere and W. Todayred and others},
  // highlight-start
  % Wrap the title in {} to keep the original case
  title   = {{BibTeX References Management}},
  // highlight-end
  journal = {\LaTeX \enspace cookbook},
  url     = {http://www.castamerego.com/docs/Latex/reference},
  year    = {2024}
}

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This article is licensed under CC 4.0 BY-SA

References

[1] Baidu Baike, 2024, Reverse Polish notation

[2] Wikipedia, 2024, Xelatex

Preface​

BibTeX References Management​

Step 1: Create a BibTeX database file​

Step 2: Add Reference Entries to the .bib File​

Step 3: Set the Format of Citations and References​

Modify the format of how the references are listed​

Modify the format of in-text citations​

Modify the format of the final References text​

Step 4: Use Commands to Cite References in the Article​

Step 5: Use Commands to List References at the End of the Article​

Full Demo​

How to Compile LaTeX Documents with BibTeX​

Compilation Logic​

VS Code Plugin latex-workshop Configuration​

BibTeX Reference Types​

Reference Types and Identification Codes​

Bibtex Reference Types​

BibTeX FAQs​

escape characters​

Case Sensitivity​

References

Preface

BibTeX References Management

Step 1: Create a BibTeX database file

Step 2: Add Reference Entries to the `.bib` File

Step 3: Set the Format of Citations and References

Modify the format of how the references are listed

Modify the format of in-text citations

Modify the format of the final References text

Step 4: Use Commands to Cite References in the Article

Step 5: Use Commands to List References at the End of the Article

Full Demo

How to Compile LaTeX Documents with BibTeX

Compilation Logic

VS Code Plugin latex-workshop Configuration

BibTeX Reference Types

Reference Types and Identification Codes

Bibtex Reference Types

BibTeX FAQs

escape characters

Case Sensitivity