1, about 'look up'
In the case of searching by 'look up', we can choose the field in a drop-down list. The field names are not fully shown. For example, 'reference id', 'reference type', and 'reference mark' appear as 'reference'. This will induce confusion.
Secondly, can we choose the fields we are interested in? Usually, we are only interested in several fields. We may want to only list these fields in the drop down list.
2, about add to 'collection'
In the bib 8, there is only one way to add a reference to a collection. We can drag the reference and drop to a collection by mouse. It is not very convenient, because we need to move the mouse accurately over a collection folder which is among many other folders. Is it possible to add a command to quickly add a reference to a collection?
Thanks
The field selection box
The field selection box width will be increased. All the fields have to be listed. You can type a letter to jump to a selection. Can you suggest another way to add references to a collection besides drag and drop? If we use a command, user still need to select which collection the references should be sent to. Thanks, Paul
Suggestion for adding reference to collections
Paul,
The drag and drop way is not convenient. One reason is that we must make sure the collection is visible in the project pane. Secondly, to select the target collection is really difficult when the number of folders in the project pane increases.
In fact, google reader provides a very easy and convenient way to tag items. It use a hot key 't' to pop up an input form, in which we can type the collection names. Usually, users only need to type several letters to locate the tag they want.
I suggest to implement similar function for Bib 8 to add references to collections.
Maybe we can add an function "add to collection→" in the right click button. When the mouse moves on this item, a secondary menu will appear like "find all". Maybe the existing collections are listed. So we can just choose the collection we want. This means that the menu dynamically changes when we add or delete a collection. This maybe difficulty to achieve.
Another possibility is that we can introduce a dialog box, in which only the collections are listed. We can choose the collection here. Maybe you can put a button on the space between the menu bar and the reference module or add a command in the 'reference' menu. Then users can click this button to pop up the dialog box.
It's true that we still need to select the collection. But in the above ways, we do not need to go to the project pane to make sure the collection is visible, and don't need to carefully drag the reference to a collection among many folders. It can save users much time.
Thanks.
Biblioscape already has a
Biblioscape already has a similar feature. If you click on the "Categorize..." button, you can type categories directly in the box. In order to use this featuer, you need to use categories as tags to organize references intead of using collections. Collections has little advantage over tags for the references module. The only thing extra is that you can have seprate parent child relationship when using collections. In the final v8 release, Ctrl+G will be assigned to "Categorize..." command. You can then start typing, Biblisocape will suggest the cloese match. You can press the Enter key to use the suggestion. When there is no match suggested, press the Enter key will close the Window. Thank you for your suggestion. Paul
Is it possible to list some candidates of categories?
When typing the name of the categories, I suggest to list some candidates whose name match the typed letters. For example, if users type 'ne', the 'news' and 'news from science' should be listed. Then we can choose the category we want using 'up' and 'down' button. Just like google reader.
If only one category is listed, it will not bring much more convenience than using 'categorize..' command.
Thanks.