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I've come across to a very explanatory video on youtube regarding a specific topic very related to my master thesis. Am I allowed to cite a youtube video in a master thesis and if so, how is it being done with BibTeX reference? Thank you.

theroglu
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    You should ask your supervisor about whether or not it is allowed. – albert Apr 08 '19 at 12:02
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    It is probably allowed. You can use the @misc entry type (miscellaneous) for such references, or use one of the suggestions on https://tex.stackexchange.com/questions/3587/how-can-i-use-bibtex-to-cite-a-web-page. – Marijn Apr 08 '19 at 12:13
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    Which bibliography style do you employ? – Mico Apr 08 '19 at 12:16
  • I do use BibTex – theroglu Apr 08 '19 at 12:17
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    The question whether or not you are allowed to cite a youtube video in your thesis can only be answered by those who are going to read (and grade) it. The question of whether or not it is in general a good idea/accepted to do so is off-topic here and might be appropriate for https://academia.stackexchange.com/. The question of how it can be done in TeX depends on the bibliography package and style you use (the argument to \bibliographystyle). With biblatex @online might work. – moewe Apr 08 '19 at 12:18

1 Answers1

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Concerning your first question: please ask your supervisor. Users here can only guess what is suitable for references in your field of studies and your masters thesis.

The second question:

@misc{Author.year,
 author = {Name, Given-Name},
 year = {2019},
 title = {A tutorial video},
 url = {http://www.youtube.com/xyz},
 urldate = {2019-04-08} %date of last access
}

The @misc entry for bibtex allows several fields that are relevant for online references (ie: URL and access date). The notation here is for bibtex. This is to be seperated from the actual package you use in your document to create reference from bibtex files (ie: biblatex, natbib or jurabib) and their respective bibliography stlyes. As moeve mentions in his*her comment, biblatex can also make use of @online.

Cf also How can I use BibTeX to cite a web page?

HATEthePLOT
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    Note that url and urldate are not supported by all BibTeX styles (.bst), but they should be supported by all biblatex styles. (The distinction might be important here, the question is tagged with both tags, but so far the OP has only mentioned BibTeX) – moewe Apr 08 '19 at 12:25
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    Thanks for the update. I must admit that I find the explanation still slightly confusing or misleading. It is not really "BibTeX" that decides which fields are valid (and with 'valid' I actually mean: are accepted and shown in the output). That decision is down to the bibliography style (.bst file) that is used (not the package, but of course some packages are associated with a certain set of .bst files). While there is a common core that most (all?) .bst files support, fields like url and urldate are only supported by some styles. ... – moewe Apr 08 '19 at 19:19
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    ... So it is slightly misleading to say that "BibTeX allows" the fields or that the notation is for BibTeX as a whole. (Technically, of course this is valid .bib syntax, but the real question is about the output in the document, which is not governed by .bib file syntax rules but by the .bst files.) – moewe Apr 08 '19 at 19:25