Article Database

Article Database (Articledb) is a searchable citation and article (PDF) database application for MacOS. Articledb turns web-based adb into a standalone MacOS application. It does this by being both a web browser and a web-server. The web server capabilities are provided by embedding civetweb. Articledb is written using Objective-C.

There is tight integration with the NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS) through their web API (free token needed). This allows easy importing of citations and papers (PDF) into Articledb. In addition, citations can be imported using DOIs, which relies on the services provided by Crossref. Existing BibTeX bibliographies can be directly imported into Articledb as well.

Citations can be exported as BibTeX, MSWord, and text. PDFjs is included to view article PDFs directly from within Articledb.

Optionally, Articledb translates BibTeX journal abbreviations from a bibliography database file that provides mnemonics, e.g., those used by the ADS.

There are a number of tools for organizing and maintaining Articledb. These include a duplicates record finder, re-indexing, and a DOI finder for records missing one (via crossref). Furthermore, one can list all keywords and authors in present in Articledb.

The look of Articledb is theme-able, with a number of themes pre-installed. See adb for more details.

Usage

Building Articledb has the following dependencies:

1. Xcode
2. cmake
3. GNU C++ compiler
4. jemalloc
5. openssl
6. rapidjson
7. pkg-config

The application can be build using Xcode or from the command line with:

xcodebuild build

For the latter, the Articledb application is found in the build/Release folder as Articledb.app.

Notes

1. The web server port number is set to 7878 by default, but can be changed under →Preferences, which will sync it with adb. However, changing the port number from within adb at Config→General→Base URL will not sync with the web server.
2. The PEM certificate file used by Articledb defaults to /private/etc/ssl/cert.pem, change if needed under Config→DOI CrossRef→PEM.
3. The GNU C++ compiler is hardcoded to g++-12 in adb/CMakeLists.txt, change if needed.
4. The OPENSSL_ROOT_DIR is hardcoded to /usr/local/Cellar/openssl@3/3.0.7/ in adb/CMakeLists.txt, change if needed.

BSD-3 License

Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions are met:

1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer.

2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution.

3. Neither the name of the copyright holder nor the names of its contributors may be used to endorse or promote products derived from this software without specific prior written permission.

THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE COPYRIGHT HOLDERS AND CONTRIBUTORS "AS IS" AND ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE COPYRIGHT HOLDER OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGE.