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The user guide for Springer journal author's instructions states the following:

Please always give a \label where possible and use \ref for cross-referencing. The \cite and \bibitem mechanism for bibliographic references is also obligatory.


What does this mean?
Please also advise me how best to proceed as I have over a hundred reference items. I figure from Mendeley I can export the .bib file and use it in LaTeX (via LyX). Will "BIBtex generated bibliography" work fine, especially w.r.t. the above requirements?

mvkorpel
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ng0323
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    Yes, it will, because BibTeX produces a .bbl file that contains the required \bibitem commands and is read in when the \bibliography command is executed. – egreg Jul 14 '14 at 10:30
  • The basic meaning of these instructions is to discourage (mis)usage such as Figure 4 in Section 13 illustrates the results of [42].; encouraging instead Figure~\ref{fig:SmithResults} in Section~\ref{sec:PriorArt} illustrates the results of \cite{Smith1995}. As already stated by @egreg, BibTeX will be fine. – Paul Gessler Jul 14 '14 at 18:22

2 Answers2

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I don't think that the part of the instructions you cite means that you have to generate a PDF with hyperlinked references. However, it's possible that they say this somewhere else. Looking back at my last article published with Springer, I notice that I did in fact include a package to enable hyperlinks of this kind to be made. And I don't think that I would have gone to that trouble if I had not had to. So check and see.

Note that (again, unless they have changed their practice since I published with them) you don't actually generate a PDF yourself. You submit a .tex file and any subsidiary files you need (e.g. a .bib file) to their website and the website generates a PDF.

As for inserting each reference manually, no, I'm pretty sure it does not mean that. See egreg's comment. And, as I said, I used BiBTeX when I published with them.

In case it's helpful, here is the (slightly edited) skeleton of the .tex file from my last Springer publication. The hyperref package is the one that creates hyperlinked citations. You will need to submit a .bib file: mine, as you see at the end, was minibib.bib. And you will need to choose a Bibliography Style (to put where I have apalike). Hopefully the journal instructions will have some advice about that. Otherwise just find one that produces something that looks like the bibliographical style for your journal and see if anyone objects. No-one did with me.

\documentclass[nospthms,natbib,final]{svjour3}
%-------------------------------------------------
\usepackage{color}
\definecolor{ink}{rgb}{0,.2,.4}
\usepackage[colorlinks,linkcolor=ink,citecolor=ink]{hyperref}
%-------------------------------------------------
\journalname{Journal of Deep Pofundity}
%-------------------------------------------------
\begin{document}
%-------------------------------------------------
\title{On the Nature of the World}
\author{ng0323}
\institute{ng0323 \at Department of Profundity, Hahvahd U
\email{ng0323@hahvahd.edu}}
%-------------------------------------------------
\date{Received: date / Accepted: date}
%-------------------------------------------------
\maketitle

\section{Introduction}\label{intro}
This article will argue against the pettifogging work of
\citep{influentialguy2013}.

% Insert profound article here.

\begin{abstract}

\keywords{}
\end{abstract}

\begin{acknowledgement}
I am grateful to various people.
\end{acknowledgement}

%---------------------------------------------------------------------
\bibliographystyle{apalike}  

\bibliography{minibib}
%---------------------------------------------------------------------

\end{document}
lovecraftian
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  • The author's instructions doesn't mention the need for hyperlinking, although most recent papers in the journal seem to implement it. But it looks easy enough to convert to if required. Maybe the editor will do it. Thanks lots. – ng0323 Jul 23 '14 at 08:37
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The part about \label and \ref refers to things like section numbers and (if applicable) example numbers. It means that you should use \label and \ref rather than having actual numbers in your .tex file.

The part about\cite and \bibitem just means that you should use BiBTeX for bibliographical references. I've published with Springer and, unless they've changed their practice in the last couple of years, I can tell you that you do not have to use only \cite to create a reference in the text: more advanced commands, like \citet and \citep are possible; in fact I used the natbib package, and its available citation forms, when I published with them.

lovecraftian
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  • I would not say that the part about \cite and \bibitem is a suggestion to use BibTeX. – mvkorpel Jul 14 '14 at 14:18
  • Well, sure, you could fill out the \bibitems in your bibliography manually or use some other method. Perhaps I misunderstood your question. Taken on its face, the part about \cite and \bibitem is a suggestion (a requirement, actually) to use \cite and \bibitem. What about this is obscure? – lovecraftian Jul 14 '14 at 14:30
  • Note that I did not ask the question. – mvkorpel Jul 14 '14 at 14:35
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    Good point! Perhaps we should await the return of ng0323. – lovecraftian Jul 14 '14 at 14:40
  • maybe it means to use BibTex rather than inserting each reference manually? I hope so, that it's not something more advanced that I do not know about. For a while I thought I had to generate a pdf with citations that are hyperlinked to the references. I hope not. Sorry, I am new to LaTeX and its inner workings. – ng0323 Jul 14 '14 at 15:49
  • @ng0323 Anyway, it is possible to use BibTeX even if a separate bibliography file (.bib) is not allowed in the paper submission. As mentioned by egreg, BibTeX produces a .bbl file. You can copy-paste the contents of the .bbl file to the .tex file. I don't know if such a self-contained document is required in this case. – mvkorpel Jul 14 '14 at 18:04
  • My reply is quite long. See separate reply. – lovecraftian Jul 14 '14 at 18:26