Live Bib, chapters, and my Dissertation

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jzents
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Live Bib, chapters, and my Dissertation

Post by jzents »

I thinking of moving my dissertation in Mellel with Bookends. I was writing it in Pages with Sente. The latest Pages broke Sente. In its latest updates, Dragon Dictate don't work as well with the old Pages. My question is this: I would like to use the live bibliography feature combined with Bookends. But I also would prefer to write each dissertation chapter as a separate document until I'm done, and then combine them. My dissertation advisor prefers handling chapter by chapter. So my question is this: can I do that easily in Mellel and use the live bibliography feature, or would I need to do it in Mellel but not used to live bibliography feature? Thank you in advance for your consideration, and your advice. Cheers!
Declan
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Re: Live Bib, chapters, and my Dissertation

Post by Declan »

I don't know if live bibliography is really of particular significance in this case.
The thing is that you will write each chapter as a separate document, and before submitting it you will scan the document to get the bibliography.
When, towards the end of your work, you will be working on the whole document, you could unscan the individual parts before putting them together, and then rescan the whole document to get a single bibliography at the end.
Live bibliography just seems like a way to see your citations in "scanned form" while writing the document.

Declan
rpcameron
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Re: Live Bib, chapters, and my Dissertation

Post by rpcameron »

If you're writing in segments, perhaps your best option is something like Scrivener and RTF rather than Mellel ...
— Robert Cameron
jzents
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Re: Live Bib, chapters, and my Dissertation

Post by jzents »

Declan wrote:I don't know if live bibliography is really of particular significance in this case.
The thing is that you will write each chapter as a separate document, and before submitting it you will scan the document to get the bibliography.
When, towards the end of your work, you will be working on the whole document, you could unscan the individual parts before putting them together, and then rescan the whole document to get a single bibliography at the end.
Live bibliography just seems like a way to see your citations in "scanned form" while writing the document.

Declan
Excellent point. Thank you for that observation. Cheers!
jzents
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Re: Live Bib, chapters, and my Dissertation

Post by jzents »

rpcameron wrote:If you're writing in segments, perhaps your best option is something like Scrivener and RTF rather than Mellel ...
I am aware of that option and have not ruled it out. Scrivener does seem designed for that approach. I shall probably revisit that path as well.
DanZac
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Re: Live Bib, chapters, and my Dissertation

Post by DanZac »

Is there a reason you are moving to Bookends rather than staying with Sente? They are both excellent Ref managers and both integrate with Mellel - both do live bibliography as well.

I am just on the last draft of my dissertation and I also worked chapter by chapter, but that didn't stop me from just keeping it in one document. The reason I highly suggest this is that you can do your cross-references while you write. When the time comes to submit a chapter, just print or PDF the chapter pages.
jzents
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Re: Live Bib, chapters, and my Dissertation

Post by jzents »

DanZac wrote:Is there a reason you are moving to Bookends rather than staying with Sente? They are both excellent Ref managers and both integrate with Mellel - both do live bibliography as well.

I am just on the last draft of my dissertation and I also worked chapter by chapter, but that didn't stop me from just keeping it in one document. The reason I highly suggest this is that you can do your cross-references while you write. When the time comes to submit a chapter, just print or PDF the chapter pages.
Sente struggles with the custom bib format desired. You are correct, both Ref Managers are excellent. If it was not for the difficulty with the format—and I have tried to work it out with the staff at Sente—I would not have done this to myself. Otherwise, I was not displeased with Sente.

Your point about cross references is good, but I will need very few if any. Lucky I guess.
DanZac
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Re: Live Bib, chapters, and my Dissertation

Post by DanZac »

I'm a former Bookends user and know it well. Sente's bibliography format editor is probably the most powerful on the market. This issue is probably better on the Sente forum, but I'm happy to try and help if I can.
jzents
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Re: Live Bib, chapters, and my Dissertation

Post by jzents »

DanZac wrote:I'm a former Bookends user and know it well. Sente's bibliography format editor is probably the most powerful on the market. This issue is probably better on the Sente forum, but I'm happy to try and help if I can.
It will not put a return into the bibliography. I want my bib to look like this:
Author
Date Title. Pub information.

The paragraph that begins with the date needs to be a hanging paragraph with the left edge at the title and date indented about .25 inch. Sente has paragraph marker in its format but it will not actually create the return. Bookends will and then all I have to do it tweak the tabs and margins in the bib. If you can do it in Sente, I am willing to learn. Cheers!
DanZac
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Re: Live Bib, chapters, and my Dissertation

Post by DanZac »

Hmm, yes that seems to be a bug in Sente. I would send an email to the support. You can add an element, and there is an element called "paragraph separator" but it doesn't seem to be working. Is this how you tried?
jzents
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Re: Live Bib, chapters, and my Dissertation

Post by jzents »

DanZac wrote:Hmm, yes that seems to be a bug in Sente. I would send an email to the support. You can add an element, and there is an element called "paragraph separator" but it doesn't seem to be working. Is this how you tried?
Yes. That is what they told me to do. I when I pointed it that did not work, I was ignored.
DanZac
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Re: Live Bib, chapters, and my Dissertation

Post by DanZac »

I got a reply on the Sente forum, haven't tested it yet though.
It does sound like a bug. We normally recommend putting "\n" wherever you want a newline (paragraph separator), like in the append text field. It sounds like you may need to do this until we track down the problem.
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