GNU Info

(reftex)Citation Styles

---

Next: Citation Info Prev: Creating Citations Up: Citations

---

Enter node , (file) or (file)node

Citation Styles
===============

   The standard LaTeX macro `\cite' works well with numeric or simple
key citations.  To deal with the more complex task of author-year
citations as used in many natural sciences, a variety of packages has
been developed which define derived forms of the `\cite' macro.  RefTeX
can be configured to produce these citation macros as well by setting
the variable `reftex-cite-format'.  For the most commonly used packages
(`natbib', `harvard', `chicago') this may be done from the menu, under
`Ref->Citation Styles'.  Since there are usually several macros to
create the citations, executing `reftex-citation' (`C-c [') starts by
prompting for the correct macro.  For the Natbib style, this looks like
this:

     SELECT A CITATION FORMAT
     
     [^M]   \cite{%l}
     [t]    \citet{%l}
     [T]    \citet*{%l}
     [p]    \citep{%l}
     [P]    \citep*{%l}
     [e]    \citep[e.g.][]{%l}
     [s]    \citep[see][]{%l}
     [a]    \citeauthor{%l}
     [A]    \citeauthor*{%l}
     [y]    \citeyear{%l}

   Following the most generic of these packages, `natbib', the builtin
citation packages always accept the `t' key for a _textual_ citation
(like: `Jones et al. (1997) have shown...')  as well as the `p' key for
a parenthetical citation (like: `As shown earlier (Jones et al, 1997)').

   To make one of these styles the default, customize the variable
`reftex-cite-format' or put into `.emacs':

     (setq reftex-cite-format 'natbib)

   You can also use AUCTeX style files to automatically set the
citation style based on the `usepackage' commands in a given document.
Note: Style Files, for information on how to set up the style files
correctly.