BibTeX · @misc entries with stable cite keys
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Required fields
Example output
@article{yeh2018_journal,
title = {Parachute use to prevent death and major trauma when jumping from aircraft: randomized controlled trial},
author = {Robert W. Yeh and Linda R. Valsdottir and Michael W. Yeh and Changyu Shen and Daniel B. Kramer and Jordan B. Strom and Eric A. Secemsky and Joanne L. Healy and Robert M. Domeier and Dhruv S. Kazi and Brahmajee K. Nallamothu},
journal = {BMJ},
year = {2018},
volume = {363},
pages = {k5094},
doi = {10.1136/bmj.k5094}
}Edition guide
BibTeX is the bibliography database format that ships with LaTeX, originally written by Oren Patashnik in 1985. Each reference is an entry of a specific type — article, book, inproceedings, misc, online — with a unique cite key that you reference in your manuscript via \cite{key}.
Quick rules
Pick the entry type that matches the source. Use @article for journal articles, @book for books, @inproceedings for conference papers, @online (BibLaTeX) or @misc (legacy BibTeX) for websites. CitePlain picks the type automatically based on the source-type tab you selected.
The cite key must be unique inside your .bib file and stable across edits — renaming it later will break every \cite reference. CitePlain generates keys as the lead author's surname plus year plus source type, lowercase and stripped of punctuation. Override the key freely; just keep it unique.
Each entry type has its own required fields. @article requires author, title, journal, year. @book requires author or editor, title, publisher, year. @misc has no required fields, which is why it is the safe fallback for anything that does not fit the other types cleanly.
Names containing accented letters work in modern TeX engines, but classic BibTeX with pdfLaTeX still benefits from explicit escaping. Curly braces around capitalised acronyms preserve the case — write {NASA} not NASA — because BibTeX will otherwise lowercase non-initial letters in some styles.
Prefer the doi field over the url field when a DOI exists; many .bst styles render the DOI as a link automatically. For websites without DOIs, use the howpublished field with a \url{} wrapper, which is what CitePlain emits for tweets, YouTube videos, and podcasts.