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At 1:38 PM -0500 14/2/08, G.Wood[[email protected]] wrote:
>On 2/12/08 1:23 PM,
>"[email protected][[email protected]]"
>wrote:
(snip)
> > In EndNote the order of execution is fixed so you have to rearrange
>> your search. For the above you would need to put the (B Or C) first.
>> As I refine searches this can lead to a lot of rearranging.
>
>Ah, precisely my point. (And I know we're not debating a point, just
>continuing a conversation about our "dream search features".)
No, what I want is a decent set of views so I can avoid searches as far
as possible.
>Many searches -- that is, search queries -- are searches that will
>likely be repeated. Search queries, in any search interface, are a
>"mini language".
>Search queries are little "coded instructions" that have a very
>different syntax across search tools (EndNote vs. Google vs. etc.)
>
>So...what more efficient thing that to provide the ability to store
>those queries, for future reference?
A decent set of views is much more efficient than any search language.
>Either as 'saved queries', that you can 'execute' again later, or as
>constantly on patrol search queries, always looking for new items that
>match the query (that is: a smart search, a smart group, a smart
>folder, a smart list, whatever.)
>
>
>> That being said, the search facilities are about equal BUT in
>> ProCite I can avoid many searches. In EndNote can you look at the
>> term lists (author, keyword, journals, titles, reference types) and
>> click on any term to see the references for that term?
>
>I know. Better search in EndNote -- including interfaces to that
>search engine -- are much needed.
If EndNote had a decent set of views the search facilities would be
perfectly adequate.
>Currently, the best alternative I've found is the use of AppleScript,
>which opens up a new "interface" for writing searches in EndNote.
Aaaarrgh! No no no I don't want to program searches. I want to get on
with my work.
I had 30 years in the computer industry and learned multiple programming
languages, from direct machine coding to high level languages. Now I
want to do something else.
>An AppleScript, running in the background, can keep just such a "smart
>list"
>of pre-programmed (i.e., "remembered" or "stored") search queries.
>
>As the AppleScript implementation gets better in EndNote [1] there
>should be any number of new tools to integrate EndNote. Some may even
>be as successful as CWYW, the best integration there is right now.
>
>(And as MS backs off of VBScript, I don't know what will be the
'bridge'
>between EndNote and Word now. Perhaps that will have to be AppleScript
>on the Mac and something else on Windows.)
MS has "backed off" VBA for Excel, something I depend on for my work,
but it was useful precisely because I could record the code to do what I
wanted. If I have to start programming the tool becomes useless. I
cannot go into software development to get my work done.
>[1] EndNote has a very severe deficit in its present AppleScript
>implementation. That deficit is the absence of a "record" class of
>object
>in the AppleScript vocabulary of EndNote.
>
>There is a "document" class, and that is all (there is, of course, an
>"application" class, but this is not the point). This makes it
>impossible to say things like:
>
> record 2 of document "somedocument"
>
> or
>
> every record whose author contains "Smith"
>
>
>AppleScript, like other languages of a similar kind, has "nouns"
>(classes of
>objects) and "verbs" (commands you can perform on those nouns).
>
>So, it is typical in AppleScript, as in English (its model), to want to
>address things like:
>
> set the author of this record to "Ehrenreich, Barbara"
> set the year of this record to "2003"
>
> get notes of this record
>
>Imagine how difficult it would be AppleScript-able email clients did
>not have a class of object called "message". That is the essential
>kernelized bundle of data but it is cumbersome to refer to an object of
>that class.
>
>The introduction of a 'record' class will be a big step forward, even
>more so that the pretty good range of verbs (tasks) that EndNote
>exposes.
>
>(Some of the examples I've created above are purely hypothetical and
>are not valid AppleScript for EndNote.)
Your last piece says it all really. Most of us just want to use a
bibliographic database.
--
David Harvey
60 Gipps Street
Drummoyne NSW 2047
Australia
Tel: 61-2-9719-9170