antilibrary

Manage a BibTeX file from the terminal.

Install

pip install antilibrary
# or
uv tool install antilibrary

Usage

Antilibrary manages one or more libraries — each a .bib file with an optional folder for associated files (PDFs, EPUBs, …). Libraries live in ~/.config/antilibrary/config.toml (override with $ANTILIBRARY_CONFIG).

# Register a library (the first one becomes the default)
antilibrary library add main --bib ~/refs/main.bib --files ~/refs/files
antilibrary library add movies --bib ~/media/movies.bib   # no files folder

antilibrary library list                 # show configured libraries
antilibrary library set-default movies   # change the default
antilibrary library remove movies        # forget a library (add --purge to delete its files)

Once a default is set, the entry commands operate on it. Use -l/--library NAME to target another:

antilibrary add                          # interactively add an entry
antilibrary add -l movies                # add to the movies library
antilibrary get smith2024                # print citation for a key
antilibrary browse                       # list entries
antilibrary browse -q "attention"        # fuzzy search
antilibrary browse -t "nlp,transformers" # filter by tags
antilibrary remove smith2024             # delete an entry (+ its managed file)

The library is resolved in this order: -l/--library NAME, then -f/--file FILE (ad-hoc, no files folder), then $ANTILIBRARY_BIB, then the configured default.

Associated files

If a library has a files folder, attaching a file copies it there and renames it to the entry's key (e.g. smith2024.pdf); the entry's file field stores the relative name. If the library has no files folder, the file is left in place and file stores its absolute path. Removing an entry deletes its managed file (pass --keep-file to keep it).

antilibrary add --attach ~/Downloads/paper.pdf   # attach during interactive add

Citation styles

antilibrary get KEY --style {bibtex|bibtex-full|latex|org-cite|pandoc} prints a citation in the requested format:

Adding entries

antilibrary add is interactive — it prompts for type, title, author, year, key, and any extra fields. Adding an entry that matches an existing one (by DOI, arXiv ID, ISBN, or normalized title+author) silently fills any empty fields on the existing entry rather than creating a duplicate. Pass --no-merge to skip on duplicate, or --force to append anyway with an auto-suffixed key.

Bulk add from files or online search

Antilibrary integrates with its two companion tools:

• antifile — extract BibTeX from PDFs, EPUBs, URLs, DOIs, arXiv IDs, or ISBNs.
• antifind — online search (movies, TV, music, papers, books) → BibTeX.

Install them as extras:

pip install 'antilibrary[files]'    # antifile
pip install 'antilibrary[search]'   # antifind
pip install 'antilibrary[all]'      # both

Then add entries in bulk. Files that resolve to a real path are attached using the library's files-folder rules:

antilibrary add --add-from-files paper.pdf book.epub 10.1145/3292500
antilibrary add --add-from-search "attention is all you need" --kind papers --limit 3

For PDFs, antifile resolves metadata by identifier (DOI / arXiv / ISBN) or a CrossRef title match. When none of those work it falls back to an LLM: set ANTHROPIC_API_KEY (or OPENAI_API_KEY / GEMINI_API_KEY) and that key is passed through. With no key set, it still tries the claude CLI if it's on your PATH.

License

MIT