1

For whatever reason I'm unable to produce bibliography with the BibLaTeX package in MiKTeX. I'm running the 32-bit MiKTeX 2.9.5105 on Windows 7. I've conjured the simplest code I could think of and it still wouldn't work:

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{biblatex}
\addbibresource{justin.bib}

\begin{document}

Hello! \cite{justinB}

\printbibliography

\end{document}

The bib file looks like this:

@article
  {justinB,
   AUTHOR  = "Bieber, Justin",
   TITLE   = "{Baby baby baby (ohh)}",
   PUBLISHER = "Ludacris Inc.",
   YEAR = 2010
  }

And this generates the next PDF (while not producing a .bbl file):

enter image description here

Now, I suspect it has something to do with the Biber package, which seems to me to be the default engine. I suspect this, based on similar threads I found regarding similar issues with Biber [1] [2] [3], and from the fact that when I either force it to run with BibTeX or run it as-is in ShareLaTeX it seems to work.

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage[backend=bibtex]{biblatex}
\bibliography{justin}
\begin{document}

Hello! \cite{justinB}
\printbibliography

\end{document}

Producing:

enter image description here

[3] made me suspect the error may be due to me using a 64-bit installation of MiKTeX, but this persisted in the 32-bit version as well.

Neither could I find the temporary files suggested in [2] and [3], which point to different folders, making me suspect that Biber might generate a new folder name with a different number in each installation. I deleted whichever folders starting with the phrase 'par-' that I found on my hard drive but non of that helped to solve the problem.

Kind help would be appreciated :)

Community
  • 1
Alex
  • 11
  • Welcome to TeX.SX! You can have a look at our starter guide to familiarize yourself further with our format. Did you run biber? You must run biber to produce the .bbl file (just as you must run bibtex if using that backend). That is, you want something like pdflatex filename.tex -> biber filename -> pdflatex filename.tex -> pdflatex filename.tex. – cfr Nov 27 '14 at 00:33
  • Welcome to TeX SX! There is no 64 bits version of biber, and if one has a 64 bit version of MiKTeX, one must install the 32-bit version of biber by hand in a local TeXMF tree. That said, biber uses a binary cache that may get corrupted. The solution consists in deletin,g the cache first. You will find it in C:\Users\Your_User_Name\AppData\Local\Temp\par-4265726e617264. Note that by default this is a hidden file. – Bernard Nov 27 '14 at 00:44
  • @Bernard Just to clarify: Your comment applies, I take it, to Windows. There are certainly 64 bit versions of Biber for other systems! [For example, filewhich biber`` gives me /usr/local/texlive/bin/biber: ELF 64-bit LSB executable, x86-64, version 1 (SYSV), dynamically linked (uses shared libs), for GNU/Linux 2.6.15, stripped] ;). – cfr Nov 27 '14 at 02:21
  • @cfr and Bernard, thank you for the quick responses. I tried running the commands from the cmd console as cfr suggested and it produced the correct output, again thank you. However, to the best of my knowledge when compiling in MikTeX (pressing the typeset button) this sequence should be automatic, at most needing to typeset it a couple of times. It thus seems important to mention that there is probably some problem with at least this latest version of MikTeX when trying to produce bibliography using biber. – Alex Nov 27 '14 at 16:05
  • Update - verified that using backend=bibtex only took pressing the typeset button once to produce the bbl file and the correct output. The problem seems to lie in that a bbl file isn't produced when compiling from the MikTeX editor. – Alex Nov 27 '14 at 16:13
  • Perhaps you need to tell your editor to use Biber rather than BibTeX? Certainly I needed to tell my editor this. (Actually, I needed also to tell it what Biber was but many editors now are Biber-aware and you just need to switch the default.) I don't use MiKTeX and I don't know which editor you are using. @Bernard may be more help since I believe that he uses MiKTeX, at least, even if you are using a different editor. (But it would be helpful to know which editor you are using.) – cfr Nov 27 '14 at 17:05
  • @Alex: If you use MiKTeX's editor (TeXworks) the default compiler driver is texify which rune (pdf)LaTeX + MakeIndex + BibTeX. You can run biber and (pdf)LaTeX as independent applications, though, but I have no idea how to configure texify so that it uses biber instead of bibtex. It seems much easier with TeXmaker, for instance. – Bernard Nov 27 '14 at 18:37
  • @Bernard - got it, thanks. I used TeXworks since this is what came with the MikTeX installation. I'll put it in my words to make sure I got it clear - the TeXworks editor won't cooperate with biber. I will forward this to the MikTeX or TeXworks guys. – Alex Nov 28 '14 at 20:13
  • @Alex/ As far as I know, with TeXworks you can use biber but as a standalone application, not within the automated texify. – Bernard Nov 28 '14 at 20:24
  • Actually, the vast majority of editors works together with Biber rather nicely, there might be some work involved on your part, though; see Biblatex with Biber: Configuring my editor to avoid undefined citations, you will find detailed instructions for TeXworks as well. – moewe Dec 01 '14 at 05:07
  • This question appears to be off-topic because it is about problem arising because the editor wasn't set up to use Biber initially, the problem has since been resolved by the OP (see above). – moewe Dec 28 '14 at 08:57

0 Answers0