References notes and floats/Bibliography and citations

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Bibliography guides — Orientation page

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1 1. Bibliography and citations
2 2. How the bibliography system is organised
- 2.1 2.1. Data and presentation are separate
- 2.2 2.2. The main elements
3 3. The four guides
4 4. Choosing a starting point
5 5. Bibliographic data and tools
6 6. Bibliographic styles and specifications
7 7. Scope of this collection
8 8. Related pages and further reading

1. Bibliography and citations

A bibliography is more than a list placed at the end of a document.

A bibliographic workflow normally involves several distinct operations:

recording information about books, articles, editions, translations, chapters, and other sources;
identifying each record with a stable key;
citing selected records in running text or notes;
deciding which records belong in a particular bibliography;
sorting and formatting those records;
placing one or more bibliography lists in the document.

ConTeXt MkIV and LMTX integrate these operations into the bibliography subsystem.

The same bibliographic record may therefore be used in several ways:

as a short citation in running text;
as a numerical or author–page reference;
as a developed reference in a note;
as a complete entry in a bibliography;
as an item in one of several specialised lists.

Citation and bibliography selection are related operations, but they are not the same operation. A citation identifies or refers to a record at a particular point in the document, while a bibliography rendering determines which records belong to a particular list and how they are presented.

This distinction becomes especially important when a document contains chapter bibliographies, several thematic lists, or a final bibliography that reuses records already rendered elsewhere.

This page introduces the main elements of the system and provides a route through four practical guides.

2. How the bibliography system is organised

2.1. Data and presentation are separate

Bibliographic data describe a publication.

A record may contain fields such as:

author
title
editor
translator
publisher
year
volume
pages
doi

These data do not by themselves determine how the publication will appear in a citation or bibliography.

The same record may be presented according to:

an author–date convention;
an author–page convention;
a numerical convention;
a notes-and-bibliography convention;
a publisher's or project's own style.

This separation makes it possible to change the presentation without rewriting the bibliographic records.

Central principle

Store stable publication data in the bibliographic source.

Control citation and bibliography presentation in the ConTeXt setup.

2.2. The main elements

Element	Function
Bibliographic source	A `.bib` file, buffer, Lua table, XML document, or another source containing bibliographic records.
Dataset	A named collection into which ConTeXt loads bibliographic records.
Record key	The identifier used to retrieve a record from a dataset.
Specification	The general rules governing the presentation of citations and bibliography entries.
Citation alternative	The form used to display a record at the point of citation.
Rendering	A named configuration for producing a bibliography list.
`criterium`	The rule determining the scope from which records are selected for a bibliography list, for example a chapter, section, or the whole document.
`method`	A rendering setting controlling how the bibliography list is processed. It should not be confused with the structural scope selected by `criterium`.
`repeat`	Determines whether records that have already been rendered may be rendered again in another bibliography list.
`sorttype`	The rule determining the order of the selected records.
Placement command	The command that inserts a bibliography list at a particular location.

A simplified model is:

bibliographic source
        |
        v
     dataset
        |
        +----------> citations
        |
        v
     selection
    (criterium)
        |
        v
 specification + rendering
        |
        v
 bibliography list

The distinction between selection and rendering is important.

For example, selecting records belonging to the current chapter is a question of scope. Whether already rendered records may be used again is a separate question. Likewise, a local rendering method should not automatically be read as meaning “select only records cited locally”.

The guides explain these elements progressively.

3. The four guides

The guides form a progression.

They begin with a small self-contained example and move toward chapter-level bibliographies, multiple datasets, repeated renderings, and multifile editorial projects.

Guide	Objective	Main contents
Guide 1 — Creating a bibliography and citing sources	Produce a first working citation and bibliography.	Bibliographic records; `.bib` files and buffers; record keys; loading data; first citations; first bibliography; basic troubleshooting.
Guide 2 — Understanding datasets, specifications, renderings, selection, and sorting	Understand the main layers of the ConTeXt bibliography system.	Sources and datasets; specifications; citation alternatives; renderings; `criterium`; `method`; `sorttype`; placement; layer-based diagnosis.
Guide 3 — Creating local and multiple bibliographies	Produce several coherent bibliography lists in the same document.	Chapter-level and document-wide bibliographies; several renderings from one dataset; several datasets; primary and secondary collections; repeated placement; `repeat=yes`.
Guide 4 — Organising bibliographies in complex editorial projects	Integrate bibliography management into a structured multifile project.	Environments; products and components; centralised datasets and renderings; project commands; chapter-level and final bibliographies; backmatter.

4. Choosing a starting point

Immediate need	Recommended guide
Produce a first citation and bibliography	Guide 1
Create a self-contained bibliography example	Guide 1
Understand the difference between a source file and a dataset	Guide 2
Understand specifications, renderings, selection, and sorting	Guide 2
Understand the difference between `criterium`, `method`, and `repeat`	Guide 2
Diagnose why a record is missing, incorrectly selected, or badly ordered	Guide 2
Print a bibliography at the end of each chapter	Guide 3
Produce chapter bibliographies and a final bibliography	Guide 3
Allow the same record to appear in more than one bibliography	Guide 3
Separate primary sources and secondary literature	Guide 3
Build a bibliography for a multifile book or scholarly edition	Guide 4
Centralise bibliography settings in an environment	Guide 4
Place final bibliography lists in the backmatter	Guide 4

5. Bibliographic data and tools

The most common bibliographic source is a UTF-8 BibTeX-format .bib file.

A bibliography manager such as JabRef can help create and maintain the records, but the file may also be edited directly in Emacs or another suitable text editor.

Buffers are useful for minimal working examples because the data and the ConTeXt source can be kept in one file.

Lua and XML may be useful when bibliographic records are generated or transformed as part of a larger automated workflow.

The first guide introduces the ordinary .bib and buffer-based workflows.

6. Bibliographic styles and specifications

A bibliographic style or specification may determine:

the information displayed in a citation;
the order and presentation of names;
punctuation;
the treatment of titles, editions, translations, and series;
the ordering and formatting of bibliography entries;
the treatment of repeated citations or other style-specific conventions.

Major style families include:

author–date;
author–page;
numerical;
notes and bibliography;
project-specific or publisher-specific styles.

In ConTeXt, a bibliographic specification provides the rules used by the bibliography subsystem to implement such conventions.

The names and scope of the specifications available in a particular ConTeXt installation should be verified before they are used in production.

A familiar bibliographic style name does not necessarily imply that every variant of that style is supplied or fully implemented by a corresponding ConTeXt specification.

7. Scope of this collection

The four guides concentrate on current ConTeXt MkIV and LMTX workflows.

They cover:

structured bibliographic data;
citations;
bibliography lists;
datasets and renderings;
selection and sorting;
chapter-level and multiple bibliographies;
repeated rendering of bibliographic records;
structured multifile projects;
common diagnostic methods.

They do not attempt to document every low-level BTX command or every bibliographic specification.

Detailed command information belongs in the command reference and in the official publications manual.

Advanced subjects such as complete note-citation systems, custom bibliographic specifications, complex parent–child records, critical editions, multilingual and multiscript bibliographies, and specialised philological references require separate treatment.

8. Related pages and further reading

8.1. Related pages

8.2. Core commands

8.3. Further reading