CitationCore is a framework designed to generate a citation string given a URL to a code source like a GitHub or Bitbucket repository. It is part of a larger effort, lead by Mozilla Science Lab, to develop a suite of tools that aim to implement a standard for citing software and making it easier to cite software correctly. To learn more about this project you can visit the Software Citation Tools repository.
CitationCore is distributed through npm. To install:
npm install citation-core
If you are interested in contributing to citation-core please follow these install instructions. They will add a pre-commit hook that will run our linter and reject commits that do not meet the project's coding standards. We are adhering to the AirBnb style guide.
git clone https://github.com/mozillascience/CitationCore.git
cd CitationCore
cp dev/pre-commit .git/hooks/
To generate a citation you must provide at least a url.
const CitationCore = require('citation-core');
let formatOptions = new CitationCore.FormatOptions();
formatOptions.url = 'http://github.com/apple/swift';
CitationCore.generate(formatOptions, (citationStr, errors) => {
// Handle completion of citation generation
});Citation Output:
Lattner, C., Gregor, D. & Gribenko, D. (2017). "swift". Version: Swift 3.0.1 Preview 3. Retrieved From: https://swift.org/
The generate function requires an instance of the FormatOptions class. This class allows for customization of the output citation. The FormatOptions object has the following customizable properties:
The url of the code source. Currently the framework supports GitHub.
formatOptions.url = 'http://github.com/scipy/scipy';The style template of the output citation. The framework currently supports the following formats:
- apa
- chicago
- bibtexMisc
- biblatexSoftware
formatOptions.style = CitationCore.styles.apa;A token field for GitHub OAuth. Required for GitHub URL's.
The callback for the generate function second parameters is an array of errors. Not all errors are created equal. Some errors are critical and will halt generation, however some will be a warning. In this case the citation generation will complete. If the citationStr parameter is null a critical error has occurred.
API Documentation is viewable on github pages or locally in the docs directory.