Feature highlights
From refbase
Main features
An overview of the main features is given below. The refbase package features:
- a clean and standardized interface that attempts to be as web standards compliant as possible
- a multitude of search options, including quick, simple, advanced as well as powerful SQL search options
- various display options:
- list view: offers customizable and sortable columns
- citation view: displays record entries in a citation style chosen by the user
- details view: shows all fields for the given record(s)
- print view: eases printing or copying of records
- search within results functionality which provides an easy way of refining your search query (alternatively, power users can refine any query result by directly editing the raw SQL query)
- the ability to extract literature cited within a text and build an appropriate list of citations
See for yourself!
In our opinion, using an application is by far the best way of exploring the feature set provided by that package. We invite you to actually use the refbase package online at one of our demo databases. This should give you a good overview of the current feature set. Alternatively, you can also explore the screenshots linked below.
Screenshots: click the "Screenshot" links underneath any of the images below to view a full screen snapshot for that feature.
Direct download links & easy upload of files
Direct download links are provided for all records that link to a file. Download links can be made available to either everyone, logged-in users only or on a user-specific basis. In addition, the admin can optionally specify a condition where files will be always made visible. Files can be easily uploaded to the server when adding/editing records, and uploaded files can be automatically moved into subdirectories and renamed according to a customizable naming scheme. File links are included in file exports so that clients such as Zotero are able to automatically download the attached files.
Output formatted citation lists
refbase can make formatted lists of citations in HTML, RTF, PDF, LaTeX, structured text (Markdown) or plain text (ASCII), and supports common citation styles such as AMA, APA, Chicago, Harvard, MLA or Vancouver. This allows for easy integration with desktop applications when writing a term paper or scholarly article. Citations can be grouped by year or resource type (i.e., peer-reviewed publications, monographs, book contributions, theses, etc). Using this, refbase can be used to generate automatically updating author/group bibliographies for your web site or the yearly report of your organization.
Import records
refbase offers batch import of records via the web interface or from the command line, and automatically detects records in various common bibliographic formats (BibTeX, Endnote (tagged text & XML), RIS, PubMed (MEDLINE & XML), MODS XML, RefWorks, ISI Web of Science, CSA Illumina, Copac and SciFinder). Records from PubMed can be imported directly via their PubMed ID. In addition, an Endnote style file and PHP script is provided which allows Endnote users to transfer data into refbase at the command line. (more info)
Export records
refbase supports export of records to common bibliographic formats (ADS, BibTeX, Endnote, ISI Web of Science, RIS, Word XML) by use of Bibutils (bibliography conversion utilities), and can output records in MODS XML format, a bibliographic XML standard developed by the Library of Congress. In addition, refbase can export an OpenDocument Spreadsheet (ODF XML) for use with OpenOffice.org. Upon export, refbase can automatically generate user-specific cite keys which allows users to use the exported data with their desktop reference managers. (more info)
Automatic email announcements
The database can inform you automatically about any newly added records: For each record that has been added to the database, an announcement email will be sent to a mailing list (or any other email address) containing the main record data as well as a direct link to the details page of that particular record entry. This enables users to easily keep track of new database entries. (more info)
RSS support
Users can track queries using RSS, i.e., users are able to convert any query into a dynamic RSS feed and subscribe to it using their favorite news aggregator. The feed will display all recently added/edited records matching the users query. This enables users to easily track modifications to the database. (more info)
User-specific fields
refbase offers nine record fields that are specific to each user: Marked, Copy, Selected, User Keys, User Notes, User File, User Groups, Cite Key and Related. You can use these fields to store personal information for a particular record, for example your personal keywords or notes. These fields are only provided to logged in users and can't be viewed by other users. User-specific fields are available in details view and can be optionally displayed in list & citation view.
User-specific groups & saved queries
Logged-in users can add records to user-defined groups. A drop-down menu on the main page (or any search results list) provides quick access to all records belonging to a particular group. Users will benefit from this feature when collecting literature for a particular seminar or when writing a scientific paper.
In addition, logged-in users are able to permanently save any search query together with the current display settings. Saved queries can be easily recalled or edited from the main page. (more info)
SRU/W, unAPI, OpenURL and COinS
refbase supports modern search and bibliographic standards which can be utilized by the next generation of bibliographic clients and which allow for better indexing by search engines. refbase offers an SRU/W web-service that allows clients to access a refbase database using a standard query syntax and retrieve results in structured XML format. In addition, refbase embeds bibliographic metadata within web pages (COinS) and advertises bibliographic formats associated with database records via it's unAPI service. This allows clients such as Zotero to automatically discover and extract bibliographic data from a refbase database (screenshot). Using these features, visitors to your site will be able to use it more efficiently with the resources they have access to.
Link records to each other
The user-specific field Related enables users to link records to other records in the database. Links can be either static (by explicitly linking to particular record serial numbers) or dynamic (by entering queries like "author:lee; title:ecosystem" which will link to all records that contain "lee" within the author field or where the title field contains "ecosystem"). Power users may even specify full MySQL WHERE clauses to define a dynamic link. (more info)
User management
refbase provides a convenient user management interface to the database admin where one can add or remove users and modify any user data (like changing a user's password or address information). Additionally, the interface allows to group particular database users and offers information about when and how often a user logged in.
User-specific permissions
The admin can assign access rights individually for each user. Permission settings are provided for basic actions such as whether one may add, edit or delete records or whether they may upload or download files. Using this, the admin can provide guest accounts with limited access rights (e.g., browse/download only) to non-members of his site. In addition, permission settings are provided to enable or disable certain parts or functionality of the refbase interface (such as the different views, import, export, etc) for particular users.
Batch SQL modifications
The database admin is allowed to execute SQL queries other than just SELECT statements. By that, one can easily apply batch changes to thousands of records at once. As an example, executing a SQL query like UPDATE refs SET publication = "Polar Research" WHERE publication RLIKE "^Polar Res\.?$" would modify every record whose publication field equals either "Polar Res" or "Polar Res." by setting its publication field to "Polar Research". (more info)
