Editing & citations¶
Editing an entry¶
Press e on the selected entry to edit it. bibtui offers two modes, and you switch between them with v:
- Field form — the same dynamic form as creating a new
entry: inputs are labelled with the real
BibTeX field names for the entry's type (required fields marked
*), and you can change the type, edit any field, or add custom ones. Best for quick corrections. - Raw BibTeX — edit the entry's BibTeX source directly. Best for power users.
Save with Ctrl+S, cancel with Esc. Remember that edits live in memory until you write the file with w. The field form runs the same validation as adding a new entry — auto-fixing small issues, flagging others, and blocking on required fields you clear — except that a field which was already empty (or a year that was already non-numeric) when you opened the entry is only flagged, so you can never be trapped editing a messy entry.
Keywords, rating and read state aren't in the form
Keywords are managed separately in the keywords picker (k), and the rating, read state and priority have their own shortcuts — so the edit form leaves them out and never disturbs them.
Deleting an entry¶
Press Delete (or Backspace) and confirm. Deletion only takes effect in your file when you save.
Citation previews¶
The detail pane renders a formatted citation for the selected entry using a
CSL style. bibtui loads styles from
~/.config/bibtui/csl/ and seeds common ones on first run — Copernicus, APA,
IEEE, Vancouver, Chicago author-date, and Harvard. See
configuration for adding more.
Copying¶
bibtui has a copy shortcut for every common need:
| Shortcut | Copies |
|---|---|
| Ctrl+C | selected text, or the cite key if nothing is focused |
| Shift+C | the formatted citation in your current CSL style |
| Ctrl+Shift+C | the full BibTeX entry |
| Ctrl+Y | the full BibTeX entry (terminal-safe fallback) |
Clipboard over SSH
bibtui copies via the OSC 52 terminal escape sequence, so copying works even over SSH — provided your terminal supports it (most modern ones do). If a copy doesn't land, Ctrl+Y is the most compatible fallback.