McClean:Bibtex4Word

Overview

Bibtex4Word is a useful Word add-in that allows you to use your existing BibTeX database and favorite bibliography styles in Word.

Installation

To use Bibtex4Word (which only works on a PC) you will need to install the following:

• JabRef (well, actually any reference manager that will allow you to keep track of your BibTex database, but a number of people in the lab prefer JabRef)
• MikTex
• Bibtex4Word macro

There are excellent installation instructions and test documents available at the Bibtex4Word site: http://www.ee.ic.ac.uk/hp/staff/dmb/perl/index.html

Notes

Please feel free to post comments, questions, or improvements to this protocol. Please sign your name to your note by adding '''*~~~~''': to the beginning of your tip.

*Megan N McClean I ran into several problems when trying to get this to work. I am running Windows 7, 32-bit. My solutions were as follows:

• I could not for the life of me get MikTex to install on my computer. Everytime I ran the installer I would get the following error:

An error occurred:

source file: Libraries\MiKTeX\Core\Process.cpp

source line: 296

message: The operation failed for some reason.

info: C:\Program Files\MiKTeX 2.8\miktex\bin\initexmf.exe

I eventually fixed this following the recommendations here: http://entangled.wordpress.com/2009/09/18/installation-of-miktex-2-8-failed/ I did all of the following:

1. Uninstalled Adobe Reader and restarted my computer
2. Installed MikTex 2.8 instead of 2.9
3. Installed MikTex for just myself, instead of all users on the computer
4. Installed MikTex in my Documents folder, instead of in C:\Programs
5. Changed PDF permissions by running regedit.exe from the search line, navigating to HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.pdf, rightclicking .pdf, clicking permissions, and granting everyone full rights (Full Control, Read) to .pdf (that is, administrator, myself, Restricted, and system)

• The first time I tried to find Windows 7: C:\Users\*****\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Word\STARTUP to put the .dot file in the Word startup folder, I could not find the AppData folder. Turns out, you actually need to follow the Bibtext4Word installation instructions and change Windows options so that you can see hidden folders: 'Control Panel->Appearance and Personalization->Folder Options->Show hidden files and folders'. In the dialog box that pops up click Show hidden files, folders, and drives, and unclick Hide extensions for known file types, Hide protected operating system files (Recommended)