EndNote Plus
Marc Bizer
University of Texas-Austin
Many of you are probably aware that Niles & Associates recently released EndNote Plus 2.0 and EndLink 2.0 for the Mac. My reaction to EndNote Plus 2.0 is similar to what I thought after trying EndNote Plus for the first time: the newer program does not represent a radical change, yet it incorporates enough truly important new functions so as insure that you will not want to go back to the earlier version. Sophisticated EndNote users have already expressed their disappointment that EndNote Plus 2.0 implements so few of the features that they had been requesting; here is what EndNote Plus 2.0 offers:
- Global Editing. Users can edit text in all or just some references automatically. The first thing I did when I copied EndNote Plus 2.0 to my hard drive was to use this feature.
- Term Lists. These are known as "authority lists" in similar products. Users can create term lists holding thousands of names or terms which allow the standardization of entries and avoid typographical errors; they can furthermore be independent or linked to specific fields. One feature I really appreciate is that term lists can be automatically built from pre-existing field entries.
- Searching has been greatly improved (just as it was in EndNote Plus with respect to EndNote): dates are now understood as numbers, comparative operators and ranges can be used, and search results can be combined and restricted to only the references showing in the library window.
- There is complete control over which references are displayed in the library window through the "show selected" and "hide selected" commands. Global Editing and searching apply only to the references actually displayed in the window.
- The display font in both the library window and the text typed into records can be changed. The library window is still not configurable (i.e. it only shows author, date, and title).
- A collection of over 200 styles is included in the package. Be prepared to edit, though.
The EndNote Plus 2.0 upgrade includes the EndNote Plus 2.0 plug-in module for Microsoft Word 5.x. This module is NOT compatible with Microsoft Word 6 (is anyone using the monster?), but registered users of EndNote Plus 2.0 will be entitled to a free upgrade to EndNote Plus 2.1, which will have this capability, when it is available (probably in the Spring of 1995). The other word processors supported by EndNote Plus 2.0 (although EndNote Plus 2.0 can only scan footnotes in Word) are WriteNow, Nisus, WordPerfect (I don't know about version 3.1), and FrameMaker.
Although I haven't yet had time to evaluate EndLink 2.0, it seems like a huge advance over its predecessor. EndLink 2.0 comes with more than 100 import filters, but most importantly, these filters can be customized to suit particular databases. Nisus claims that EndLink 2.0 can rcognize any tags of any length, in addition to the numeric MARC format. EndLink can import any refrence type, not just journals as in the past. However, it goes without saying that EndLink 2.0 will only work on consistently organized text files.
EndLink 2.0 requires EndNote Plus 2.0 which runs in 750K of RAM and requires System 6.0.2 or later.
Niles & Associates can be reached by voice at (510) 559-8592, by fax at (510) 559-8683, or on the internet at nilesinc@well.sf.ca.us.
jmfarmer@students.wisc.edu
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Last Update: 9 April 95