Release 2.0.40

Dear BibSonomy users,

today, we released version 2.0.40 of BibSonomy. This release includes the following features:

• OpenID users can now have a password sent to them. This converts the OpenID account to a normal account and you can now log in with your username and a password. The OpenID login for this user is then disabled.
• You can now upload SVG (Scalable Vector Graphics) documents.
• We added a new custom tag to the CV page: You can now include your homepage separately.
• Many internal changes like issues with the visibility of the profile picture of a user

Happy tagging!

Thomas

Excluding tags with wildcards

Hello our dear BibSonomy fans,

in our post about the last Release, we mentioned better capabilities of  excluding tags in your searches with wildcard support. Here is an example of what that means and how you can use it:

Let's say you use tags like 'news_2013_09', 'news_2013_10', etc. for tagging news articles of certain months. Furthermore you add tags for the news content like for example 'insurance'. That topic might have occurred frequently in the news.
Furthermore you searched for a certain insurance, so you tagged websites and articles about insurances also with the tag 'insurance'.
Now, if you liked to search for your insurance inquiry, you would also get all the results in the news.

For a longer time, BibSonomy already supports excluding a single tag like 'news' by writing 'sys:not:news' your search query. However, that would be of no help for you in this case, because the tags include the month suffix.

With BibSonomy's new wildcard exclusion feature you can now write 'sys:not:news*' to exclude all the news related posts from your search.


Enjoy the new feature and happy tagging,
Jens

Customize your CV page!

Hello, dear users of BibSonomy,

in release 2.0.39, we changed the way BibSonomy's CV page (see http://www.bibsonomy.org/cv/user/<your username>) works. Before this release, we offered a static web page with information taken from your user profile. The look and feel was predefined and could not be changed (see figure 1).

Figure 1: The old CV look and feel

With the advent of BibSonomy 2.0.39, it is now possible to customize the design of your CV page. We offer a set of exemplary layouts from which you can choose one to instantly prep up the way you're presenting yourself on BibSonomy. If you are a more advanced user, you can also lay a hand on the design itself by creating your own CV page. In the following, we will give you a short overview about the two ways to adapt your CV page to your personal needs.

Choosing a predefined layout

If you are fine with one of our standard layouts, you can easily choose and save one to have it presented on your CV page.

Figure 2: The settings page for your BibSonomy CV. The gray part contains all the tools to edit your CV. You can preview your changes directly below.

For this, direct your browser to the CV settings in BibSonomy. As depicted in figure 2, you see a short help notice at the top and the editing area as a gray part below with a dropdown menu, where you can choose a design template (see figure 3). Below the gray window, you see a preview of your CV, i.e. what it would look like to the public if you saved your changes. Changing the layout will automatically render a new preview.

Figure 3: Choose a standard template according to your likes.

If you found a template you like, you can save it as your default CV layout by clicking on the save-button on the top right.

Creating your own layout

If you're keen on changing a bit more than only tiny bits of your CV, you can choose the option to edit the current layout or maybe even create a new, customized one by clicking on the "edit layout" button (see figure 4 for this).

Figure 4: The open layout editor

In this layout editor, you may change every bit you like about your CV. The only thing you'd need some experience with is the Wiki Markup Language (all the things on http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Help:Cheatsheet work fine). We also offer a range of custom XHTML tags. You can find the list of supported tags in the BibSonomy help. These tags make it easier for you to reuse often needed information you already defined in your user settings page on http://www.bibsonomy.org/help_en/CVWiki.
After you entered your changes, you can either preview your CV by clicking on the corresponding buttons in the bottom right corner or you can save it directly by using the "save" button in the top right corner of the editing area.

If everything is OK, you can then view your shiny new CV on http://www.bibsonomy.org/cv/user/<your username here>. We also offer the same functions for group accounts.

We hope you can make good use of that feature. Over time, we plan to add some treats like extra tags or some help buttons to easily insert frequently used code parts to make the use of the editor more comfortable. New layouts are also on our wishlist.

Happy editing (and tagging) :)
Thomas

PUMA in use in Frankfurt

Since the beginning of October a new PUMA instance is in use at the library of the University of Frankfurt.
PUMA is a clone of BibSonomy meant for local installations of universities, libraries or research institutes. Like BibSonomy, it allows to collect and share bookmarks and publications but has additional features like a guided export to an institutional repository (read more about PUMA).
As part of the introduction of the HeBIS Discovery Service (HDS) for Hessian university libraries, a customized version of VuFind Discovery System was developed which includes an interface to PUMA. A few months before, Kassel's version of the HDS has been coupled with PUMA.

The original favorites list by VuFind was replaced by a PUMA managed list. This offers many additional features for VuFind users, like new export and citation formats, as well as tagging. Now it’s possible to export literature research in a large variety of formats (BibTeX, EndNote, Harvard, Chicago, etc.) In addition, the entries do not have to be grouped as several favorite lists, but can be organized more clearly by the free assignment of tags. With the appendant tag cloud, entries can be filtered by topic. PUMA users also have the huge advantage that publications stored in VuFind are immediately available in PUMA and can thus be directly accessed and exported from PUMA.

With the new PUMA instance, HDS users in Frankfurt also take advantage of these features. As part of the launch of the HeBIS Discovery Service, more PUMA installations will follow for the universities of Mainz, Marburg, Gießen and Darmstadt.