Your query of 6 FEB 03, re: Using BibTeX

Christina Thiele cthiele at ccs.carleton.ca
Tue Mar 4 10:48:11 CET 2003


[proposed reply to an old query:]


Mr. Hetling, I don't believe we've sent you a reply to your
query. It's of course now almost a month -- you may have already found
your solution -- and we apologise for the delay.

We're in the process of setting up some new mechanisms for dealing
with queries for Y&YTeX support. One change has been to establish a
small technical support group -- which has been immediately swamped
with queries. Another change is imminent -- we're going to set up a
LISTSERV for Y&YTeX users. Stay tuned to the website

              www.yandy.com

for details.

====

And now on to your problem. You had written:

> Hi,
>
> I am trying to use BibTex within LaTeX.  I have several questions on
> how this is done within the Y&Y system.
>
> My bibliography file is called references.bib
>
> I would like it to reside in the folder D:\references.
>
> The LaTeX source file (in this case memo.tex) includes the line:
>
> \bibliography{d:\references.bib}
>
> Upon compilation by LaTeX, I get an error:
>
> ! Undefined control sequence.
> <write> \string \bibdata {D:\references
>                                         .bib}
> l.50 \bibliography{D:\references.bib}
>
> ?
>
> This, of course, does not happen on my Unix system since the
> backslashes are not used.
>
> What is the solution to this problem?
>


The error message is very clear:

   ! Undefined control sequence.
   <write> \string \bibdata {D:\references

That is, the backslash being used as a DOS mechanism for signalling
a path  is being interpreted as a TeX command -- this instruction is
inside your TeX file so of course that backslash is being read by TeX
first ... not the DOS system.

Switch it around to a forward slash, and the path should become
clear.

One caution, however, from a member of the support group:

   A number of tex systems use a .cfg file to specify paths, so that
   they don't clutter up the tex source file.  i don't know whether
   y&y tex has this facility, but it would really be a better practice
   to include only the file names, and let the path be set externally
   -- this is especially relevant if a file is going to be sent to
   someone else who is using a different system or file structure.

Another option is possible, if you have a set of files that are
frequently referenced by files in various directories: put them into a
`myfiles' type of directory, add this path to your dviwindo.ini file,
and you won't have to add path specifications for file
locations. During installation, there is a question asking if you want
to set up such a directory, and to provide its name -- so it's
possible you already have the necessary code in place. In which case,
you might want to consider moving your references.bib file to that
location. This is described on p.7 of the smaller manual which came
with your TeX v.2.2 package.
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