unable to make IEEE bibliography work!

Question

In the RefPerSys project, we are submitting a paper to ICCAIT 2021 conference. Deadline is within a few hours.

Our paper draft in on gitlab, repository https://gitlab.com/bstarynk/refpersys under directory doc/iccait-2021/ in the FLTK branch. We are using Linux/Debian/Buster. The README.md contains dependencies, and the ./build.sh shell script is building the PDF.

For a reason I don't understand, I fail to get the bibliography right.

The error message I am getting is:

! Package biblatex Error: '\bibliographystyle' invalid.
See the biblatex package documentation for explanation.
Type  H <return>  for immediate help.
 ...

The last PDF I was able to produce is on refpersys.org/iccait2021-refpersys-6f6c8f8d.pdf. As you can see, bibliographical references do not appear. It was produced by git commit 6f6c8f8d

I did read several times the LaTeX guidelines on https://mirrors.chevalier.io/CTAN/macros/latex/contrib/IEEEtran/IEEEtran_HOWTO.pdf and BibTeX guidelines on https://ctan.tetaneutral.net/macros/latex/contrib/IEEEtran/bibtex/IEEEtran_bst_HOWTO.pdf

For example, when I run

 ./build.sh >& /tmp/build-iccai2021-61953b55ba0.out

I am obtaining an output file uploaded to refpersys.org/build-iccai2021-61953b55ba0.out

What am I doing wrong ?

I tried many things, and nothing works.

Another way of asking the same question would be: what are the source files (*.tex with *.bib and perhaps *.svg) of a IEEE submission using Linux?

The paradox being that the authors of IEEE LaTeX packages probably are using Linux too....

PS. we gave up the idea of submitting.

you have 11 links in your text. Do you really expect people to follow them up to understand your problem? Put a small, complete example along with relevant log-files or error messages here. — Ulrike Fischer, Aug 31 '20 at 12:58
Is there an error message when you compile the bibliography? — pluton, Aug 31 '20 at 13:01
well the error message says that your document is using biblatex. So \bibliographystyle is simply wrong. — Ulrike Fischer, Aug 31 '20 at 13:04
@UlrikeFischer: please give more information as an answer. Either detailed Linux commands, or a full github repository containing source files of a working example. — Basile Starynkevitch, Aug 31 '20 at 13:14
No. If you show a small, complete document demonstrating your problem here, then I will (if I have time) correct it and post an answer here. But I won't hunt down the internet for infos or setup github repos as answer. — Ulrike Fischer, Aug 31 '20 at 13:20
Another way of asking the question is a complete (even fictional) example of LaTeX source code. Do you know any? — Basile Starynkevitch, Aug 31 '20 at 13:34
Did you indeed read those guidelines? Your .sh script alternates between pdflatex and bibtex several times, where you should do pdflatex->bibtex->pdflatex->pdflatex. One time pdflatex, one time biblatex, two times STRAIGHT pdflatex. That said. God knows what other problems you might or might not have with your project. I fail to see the relevance to Linux and to graphics files. — Elad Den, Aug 31 '20 at 15:25
Also, I think next time you should consider referring a question like that to a help forum or a chat. This board is designed to answer specific questions that may be applied to a big audience. Asking "Why my project does not work" is not what is usually done here. https://tex.meta.stackexchange.com/questions/1436/welcome-to-tex-sx — Elad Den, Aug 31 '20 at 15:32
Linux is still irrelevant. You may be using it, but the problem very apparently lies with TeX, independent of the OS you use. And Ulrike Fischer gave you a perfectly valid answer: You are apparently using BibLaTeX, but at the same time you use the setup (i.e. `bibliographystyle{}`-command) for BibTeX. The solution is simple: Decide for either BibTeX or BibLaTeX, modify your files accordingly, and make sure to then call the correct program (bibtex or biblatex/biber) in your bash, as explained by Elad Den. — Manuel Weinkauf, Aug 31 '20 at 18:01
Not related to the question posted here, but I have to say this aloud, WASET is a PREDATORY publisher! — Nirmal, Apr 30 '22 at 16:16

score 5 · Answer 1 · answered Aug 31 '20 at 18:08

biblatex is rarely the right choice if you want to submit to a publisher. I recommend to assume that biblatex is not accepted by publishers unless they explicitly say otherwise.

Let's examine this conference's LaTeX template.

The Paper Submission Guidelines at https://panel.waset.org/conference/2021/05/paris/ICCAIT/guideline link to a LaTeX template at http://waset.org/downloads/latex.zip. That .zip file contains two files: The not very creatively named journal.cls and journal.tex. journal.cls is clearly the document class file and should probably not be modified or even read by authors, but journal.tex contains many comments. Given the state of the comments, it is however not at all clear to me how much of the comments are verbatim copy of the original template (clearly based on Michael Shell's IEEEtran class) and what is from the conference publishers.

Anyway, towards the end of journal.tex we find

% references section
% can use a bibliography generated by BibTeX as a .bbl file
% BibTeX documentation can be easily obtained at:
% http://www.ctan.org/tex-archive/biblio/bibtex/contrib/doc/
% The IEEEtran BibTeX style support page is at:
% http://www.michaelshell.org/tex/ieeetran/bibtex/
%\bibliographystyle{IEEEtran}
% argument is your BibTeX string definitions and bibliography database(s)
%\bibliography{IEEEabrv,../bib/paper}
%
% <OR> manually copy in the resultant .bbl file
% set second argument of \begin to the number of references
% (used to reserve space for the reference number labels box)
\begin{thebibliography}{1}
\bibitem{IEEEhowto:kopka}
H.~Kopka and P.~W. Daly, \emph{A Guide to \LaTeX}, 3rd~ed.\hskip 1em plus
  0.5em minus 0.4em\relax Harlow, England: Addison-Wesley, 1999.
\end{thebibliography}

This suggests to me that the best course of action would be to use BibTeX and \bibliographystyle{IEEEtran} and to copy the .bbl file into your paper before submission. There is no mention of biblatex and the recommended methods are completely incompatible with biblatex, so I recommend you do not use it.

Here's how things might look

\documentclass[journal]{journal}
\begin{document}
\cite{sigfridsson}
\bibliographystyle{IEEEtran}
\bibliography{IEEEabrv,biblatex-examples}
\end{document}

Compile this with LaTeX, BibTeX, LaTeX, LaTeX (use BibTeX and not Biber as you might do with biblatex). More background about BibTeX is at Question mark or bold citation key instead of citation number. When you finish your paper, take your .bbl file, which may look a bit like

% Generated by IEEEtran.bst, version: 1.14 (2015/08/26)
\begin{thebibliography}{1}
\providecommand{\url}[1]{#1}
\csname url@samestyle\endcsname
\providecommand{\newblock}{\relax}
\providecommand{\bibinfo}[2]{#2}
\providecommand{\BIBentrySTDinterwordspacing}{\spaceskip=0pt\relax}
\providecommand{\BIBentryALTinterwordstretchfactor}{4}
\providecommand{\BIBentryALTinterwordspacing}{\spaceskip=\fontdimen2\font plus
\BIBentryALTinterwordstretchfactor\fontdimen3\font minus
  \fontdimen4\font\relax}
\providecommand{\BIBforeignlanguage}[2]{{%
\expandafter\ifx\csname l@#1\endcsname\relax
\typeout{** WARNING: IEEEtran.bst: No hyphenation pattern has been}%
\typeout{** loaded for the language `#1'. Using the pattern for}%
\typeout{** the default language instead.}%
\else
\language=\csname l@#1\endcsname
\fi
#2}}
\providecommand{\BIBdecl}{\relax}
\BIBdecl
\bibitem{sigfridsson}
E.~Sigfridsson and U.~Ryde, ``Comparison of methods for deriving atomic charges
  from the electrostatic potential and moments,'' \emph{Journal of
  Computational Chemistry}, vol.~19, no.~4, pp. 377--395, 1998.
\end{thebibliography}

and copy it into your .tex file replacing the two lines

\bibliographystyle{IEEEtran}
\bibliography{IEEEabrv,biblatex-examples}

resulting in

\documentclass[journal]{journal}
\begin{document}
\cite{sigfridsson}
% Generated by IEEEtran.bst, version: 1.14 (2015/08/26)
\begin{thebibliography}{1}
\providecommand{\url}[1]{#1}
\csname url@samestyle\endcsname
\providecommand{\newblock}{\relax}
\providecommand{\bibinfo}[2]{#2}
\providecommand{\BIBentrySTDinterwordspacing}{\spaceskip=0pt\relax}
\providecommand{\BIBentryALTinterwordstretchfactor}{4}
\providecommand{\BIBentryALTinterwordspacing}{\spaceskip=\fontdimen2\font plus
\BIBentryALTinterwordstretchfactor\fontdimen3\font minus
  \fontdimen4\font\relax}
\providecommand{\BIBforeignlanguage}[2]{{%
\expandafter\ifx\csname l@#1\endcsname\relax
\typeout{** WARNING: IEEEtran.bst: No hyphenation pattern has been}%
\typeout{** loaded for the language `#1'. Using the pattern for}%
\typeout{** the default language instead.}%
\else
\language=\csname l@#1\endcsname
\fi
#2}}
\providecommand{\BIBdecl}{\relax}
\BIBdecl
\bibitem{sigfridsson}
E.~Sigfridsson and U.~Ryde, ``Comparison of methods for deriving atomic charges
  from the electrostatic potential and moments,'' \emph{Journal of
  Computational Chemistry}, vol.~19, no.~4, pp. 377--395, 1998.
\end{thebibliography}
\end{document}

Thanks. I could try. – Basile Starynkevitch Aug 31 '20 at 20:01 — Basile Starynkevitch, Aug 31 '20 at 20:01

unable to make IEEE bibliography work!

1 Answers1