[Tex/LaTex] bibtex – how to check .bst for errors

bibtex

I'm trying to create a bibliography with bibtex. It took me quite a long time to find good styling file for bibtex which suits my needs. The deal is, that it hadn't ONLINE reference function, so I used another .bst file. After I copied this fc. it was calling another, so I copied it as well – this exact problem was gone. I'm using XeLatex.
BUT NOW IT SAYS:

! File ended while scanning use of \texttt .
<inserted text>
\par
l.159 \bibliography{literatura}
I suspect you have forgotten a `}', causing me
to read past where you wanted me to stop.
I'll try to recover; but if the error is serious,
you'd better type `E' or `X' now and fix your file.
! Missing $ inserted.
<inserted text>
$
l.160
I've inserted a begin-math/end-math symbol since I think
you left one out. Proceed, with fingers crossed.
! Missing } inserted.
<inserted text>
}
l.160
I've inserted something that you may have forgotten.
(See the <inserted text> above.)
With luck, this will get me unwedged. But if you
really didn't forget anything, try typing `2' now; then
my insertion and my current dilemma will both disappear.
! Extra }, or forgotten \endgroup.
\par ...m \@noitemerr {\@@par }\fi \else {\@@par }
\fi
l.160
I've deleted a group-closing symbol because it seems to be
spurious, as in `$x}$'. But perhaps the } is legitimate and
you forgot something else, as in `\hbox{$x}'. In such cases
the way to recover is to insert both the forgotten and the
deleted material, e.g., by typing `I$}'.
[30
] [31
]
! LaTeX Error: \begin{thebibliography} on input line 1 ended by \end{document}.
See the LaTeX manual or LaTeX Companion for explanation.
Type H <return> for immediate help.
...
l.171 \end{document}
Your command was ignored.

AND WHAT I HAVE ADDED:

FUNCTION {format.url}
{ url empty$
{ "" }
{ new.block "Dostupn{\'{e}}~z: $\texttt{<{" url * "}>}$" * }
if$
}

FUNCTION {online} %  CHANGE mudrd8mz 2005-10-12 addign new item type
{ output.bibitem
format.authors output
new.block
format.btitle " [online]" * output
new.sentence
publisher missing$
'skip$
{ publisher output }
if$
year missing$
'skip$
{ format.date "year" output.check }
if$
new.sentence
cited missing$
'skip$
{ "[cit.~" cited * "]" * output }
if$
new.sentence
note output
new.sentence
format.url output
fin.entry
}

THIS IS WHAT BIB ENTRY SHOULD LOOK LIKE FOR .BST I COPIED FROM:

@ONLINE{eurydiceictedu2000,
author = "Eurydice",
title = "Information and communication technology in the education systems in
Europe: National education policies, Curricula, Teacher training",
cited = "8.\,6.\,2004",
year = "2004",
url = "http://www.eurydice.org/Doc_intermediaires/others/en/ict.html"
}

I AM WELL AWARE THAT THERE IS SOME PROBLEM WITH MY MODIFIED BST FILE, SO I WOULD LIKE TO ASK… IS THERE A WAY TO CHECK IT FOR ERRORS (from what I understood 'latex makebst' isn't the one)? I will gladly provide more info, or files.

EDIT:

MY ENTRY:

@ONLINE{houser,
author = {Pavel Houser},
title = {Collegium pro arte antiqua},
cited = {30.\,6.\,2014},
year = {2014},
url = {http://www.collegium.cz/waldorf/hudba/kurzy/rytmicke%20texty.pdf}
}

As you can see I tried to replace "" with {}, but to no avail… so I suppose that they have the same meaning for compiler.

BBL ENTRY:

\begin{thebibliography}{1}

\bibitem{houser}
{\sc Houser, P.}
\newblock {\em Collegium pro arte antiqua} [online]. 2014.
[cit.~30.\,6.\,2014].
\newblock Dostupn{\'{e}}~z:
$\texttt{<{http://www.collegium.cz/waldorf/hudba/kurzy/rytmicke%20texty.pdf}>}$.

\end{thebibliography}

Best Answer

The error is unrelated to bibtex (other than it was bibtex that generated the bad latex) In

$\texttt{<{http://www.collegium.cz/waldorf/hudba/kurzy/rytmicke%20texty.pdf}>}$.

The % is TeX's comment character so latex just sees

$\texttt{<{http://www.collegium.cz/waldorf/hudba/kurzy/rytmicke

so the \texttt and the math $ are never closed and you get the errors that you quoted.

the $ were never doing anything useful, so they could just be deleted, but rather than \texttt you need a command that deals with special characters in URL such as %, ~ and #. Obvious choice is \url from the url (or hyperref) package that will make those characters safe and also allow line breaking at good places like /.

So something like

{ new.block "Dostupn{\'{e}}~z: \url{" url * "}" * }

and

\usepackage{url}

in your document (or package).

Related Solutions

[Tex/LaTex] Adding condition into BibTex .bst file

you need an entry language in the list of entries (at the beginning of the bst-file) and then:

FUNCTION {format.language}
{ language empty$
    { "" }
    { "English" language = % 0 is on stack if _not_ english
      { }
      { ", in German" * }
      if$
    }
  if$
}

If your style file has no entries for the language then you have to add something like:

FUNCTION {book}
{ output.bibitem
  author empty$

[...]

  format.date "year" output.check
  new.block
  format.language
  new.block
  note output
  fin.entry
}

My example output looks like

enter image description here

with the following bib data:

@BOOK{Kern2009_01,
  title = {Entwicklung haptischer Geräte},
  publisher = {Springer},
  year = {2009},
  language = {English},
  editor = {Thorsten A. Kern},
  isbn = {978-3540876434},
  doi = {10.1007/978-3-540-87644-1},
  keywords = {key:Haptik,key:Technik,key:PDF},
  subtitle = {Ein Einstieg für Ingenieure}
}

@BOOK{Wilcox2005,
  title = {Introduciton to robust estimation and hypothesis testing},
  publisher = {Elsevie},
  year = {2005},
  author = {Wilcox, R. R.},
  language={German},
  address = {Burlington, MA},
  edition = {2}
}

[Tex/LaTex] In bst file, check if variable contains string

We use the string.length function from Tame the Beast, the or function should be contained in your bst file already. Then we define a simple search function that tests whether a string is contained in another string. Using this, we can test for "collaboration" and "Collaboration" in the collaboration field. Note that we do not need to test for the plural forms, as searching for the singular form will find those plurals, too.

INTEGERS{ l }
FUNCTION{ string.length }
{
  #1 'l :=
  {duplicate$ duplicate$ #1 l substring$ = not}
    { l #1 + 'l :=}
  while$
  pop$ l
}

INTEGERS {find.length search.start search.end done}
STRINGS {find.string find.pattern}
FUNCTION {contains}
{
  'find.pattern :=
  'find.string :=
  find.pattern string.length 'find.length :=
  #1 'search.start :=
  find.string string.length find.length - #2 + 'search.end :=
  #0 'done :=
  { search.start search.end < }
  {
    find.string search.start find.length substring$ find.pattern =
      { 
        #1 'done :=
        search.end 'search.start :=%% stop searching
      }
      { #1 search.start + 'search.start := }
    if$
  }
  while$
  done
}

FUNCTION {format.collaboration}
{ collaboration empty$
    { "" }
    { collaboration num.names$ #1 >
        { " (" collaboration *
          collaboration "collaboration" contains
          collaboration "Collaboration" contains or
            { ")" * }
            { " Collaborations)" * }
          if$
        }
        { " (" collaboration *
          collaboration "collaboration" contains
          collaboration "Collaboration" contains or
            { ")" * }
            { " Collaboration)" * }
          if$
        }
    if$
    }
  if$
}

As a final note I would advice against those hacks, and change the bib file instead. BibTeX is meant to just format the bibliography, not to alter the content. If you would like to use another style, or switch to biblatex, those inconsistent BibTeX entries come back to bite you, again.

Best Answer

Related Solutions

[Tex/LaTex] Adding condition into BibTex .bst file

[Tex/LaTex] In bst file, check if variable contains string

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