bibtex_duplicate_manager

Checks multiple .bib files for near-duplicate entries, and updates citekeys in \cite{} statements of specified .tex file(s). Useful when combining multiple .bib files and .tex files into a larger document (e.g. thesis writing).

Usage

Install bibtexparser using pip install or your favorite package manager beforehand.

> python bibtex_duplicate_manager.py
> Welcome to the BibTeX duplicate cleaner!
> Enter the paths to the .bib files, separated by commas: chap2/references.bib,chap3/references.bib,chap4/references.bib # comma separated list of reference .bib files
> Enter the paths to the .tex files, separated by commas: chap2/chap2.tex,chap2/supp.tex,chap3/chap3.tex,chap3/supp.tex,chap4/chap4.tex,chap4/supp.tex # comma separated list of reference .tex files
>
Potential duplicates for '{Strongly Correlated Chern Insulators in Magic-Angle Twisted Bilayer Graphene}':
# title, citekey, and the number of times the citekey occurs accross `.tex` files.
1: {Strongly Correlated Chern Insulators in Magic-Angle Twisted Bilayer Graphene} (key: YazdaniChern) (occur: 1)
2: {Strongly Correlated Chern Insulators in Magic-Angle Twisted Bilayer Graphene} (key: Yazdani2022) (occur: 1)
3: {Chern Insulators and Topological Flat-bands in Magic-angle Twisted Bilayer Graphene} (key: AndreiChern) (occur: 0)
4: Chern Insulators, van {{Hove}} Singularities and Topological Flat Bands in Magic-Angle Twisted Bilayer Graphene (key: wu2021Chern) (occur: 2)
Treat these as duplicates? (yes/no) no # answer if the listed entries correspond to the same file

# if you answer no, uses more stringent comparison criterion to narrow down possible duplicate entries.
Potential duplicates for '{Strongly Correlated Chern Insulators in Magic-Angle Twisted Bilayer Graphene}':
# title, citekey, and the number of times the citekey occurs accross `.tex` files.
1: {Strongly Correlated Chern Insulators in Magic-Angle Twisted Bilayer Graphene} (key: YazdaniChern) (occur: 1)
2: {Strongly Correlated Chern Insulators in Magic-Angle Twisted Bilayer Graphene} (key: Yazdani2022) (occur: 1)
Treat these as duplicates? (yes/no) yes
# enter which citekey you want to use in `.tex` files.
Enter the number of the key to keep: 2

# updates `.tex` files.
All occurrences of 'YazdaniChern' in chap2/chap2.tex have been replaced with 'Yazdani2022'.

...
# repeat this many times
...

Done cleaning duplicates!

Note

• Backup your data before using this file, preferably using a version control software, so that it is easy to fix mistakes!
• You might want to try out other solutions as well:
  • For renaming cietkey in .tex files, you might try this.
  • For tidying .bib files, this looks useful.
• I also implemented a helper function check_arXiv for listing .bib entries that only have arXiv reference. Might be useful if you want to update your file.