Barcode-to-Bibliography App Makes College Ridiculously Easy

[Swede]

Sometimes a technology comes along that is so great it seems almost unjust to former generations. Aviation. The personal computer. The polio vaccine.

One gets the same feeling today when considering a new app out for iPhone and Android. Quick Cite, a 99-cent app, automates the task of putting together a bibliography--that arduous list of books, articles, and other sources consulted that goes at the end of a master's thesis of PhD dissertation. The first thought you have is, "How much time scholars will henceforth save!" The next thought you have is, "Anyone who got a PhD before the year 2011 was a poor sucker."

http://www.fastcompany.com/1727803/barcode-to-bibliography-app-makes-college-ridiculously-easy

[enlightenment]

1. "End Note" has done that for years -

and formats it in a wide variety of styles. You still need to double-check/fix/modify almost everything, though. Of course, you can't scan a barcode, but you are doing the internet equivalent when it fetches the volume you request.

The glitches aren't too bad (assuming the student takes the time to fix them) if the format is correct - I suspect it only works for single author monographs, however. How does a barcode know that you need to cite a chapter in an edited volume? Or the title and page numbers of an article in a scholarly journal? What if you're dealing with a volume that was written in another language and then translated - that requires specific citation - or anything other than a simple citation?

I give them credit for giving it a shot and hope they learned a lot about citation styles while they were at it!

[AlabamaLibrul]

2. If any particular source can be found online, Zotero (free) has always done pretty well

http://www.zotero.org/