msni

MathSciNetImport: import metadata (and article) via MathSciNet to a file-based library

Why

Bibliography reference managers could be awesome if not for the tremendous bloat (Oracle JVM? Srsly?). Using software like RefTeX, most features of bibliography reference managers might be superfluous in a number of cases. msni is a tiny hack closing an annoying gap: the process of importing articles from the MathSciNet.

Workflow

1. Find your favourite article on the MathSciNet, e.g. Tate's The arithmetic of elliptic curves.
2. Find the number of the review, in our case MR0419359.
3. Execute msni MR0419359.
4. A browser opens. Follow the MathSciNet links until you can download a PDF file. Just click Save (don't bother with Save As) and close the browser.
5. A terminal will start up in the directory ~/bib/msni/Tate-TheArithmeticOfEllipticCurves. ls will reveal a file MR0419359.bib containing the BibTeX information pulled from MathSciNet and a file called art%3A10.1007%2FBF01389745.pdf containing the article.
6. The BibTeX-information will automatically be added to ~/bib/msni/complete.bib.

Why is that a good workflow?

In general there should be almost no need to keep more metadata at hand, the MathSciNet provides great options for searching articles and there is no need to replicate that. Articles show up in locate if you search for author, title or review number.

Dependencies

• qutebrowser
• bibtex-ruby
• urxvt