JabRef
v4
v6v5v4
v4
v6v5v4
  • JabRef Bibliography Management
  • General information about JabRef
    • Entry Editor
    • Best Practices
    • Command line use and options
    • Automatic Backup (.sav and .bak) and Autosave
    • Remote operation
    • Installation
  • About BibTeX and its fields
    • URL and DOI links in JabRef
    • File links in JabRef
    • Links to other entries
    • The 'owner' field
    • Time stamped fileds
    • Journal abbreviations
    • Special Fields
    • Set/clear/rename fields
    • Field content selector
    • Strings
  • Finding, Sorting, and Cleaning Entries
    • Searching within the library
    • Searching externally using Online Services
      • ACM Portal
      • arXiv
      • CiteSeerX
      • DBLP
      • DOAJ
      • Google Scholar
      • GVK
      • IEEEXplore
      • INSPIRE-HEP
      • MathSciNet
      • MEDLINE
      • SAO/NASA Astrophysics Data System
      • Springer
      • Unpaywall
      • zbMATH
    • Searching externally using Publication Identifiers
      • DiVA
      • DOI -- Digital Object Identifier
      • IACR eprint IDs
      • ISBN number
      • Medline
      • RFC document
      • SAO/NASA Astrophysics Data System
      • Title of the paper
    • Add unlinked PDFs including BibTeX data into the database
    • Synchronize file links
    • Cleanup entries
    • Save actions
    • Check integrity
    • Get BibTeX data from DOI
    • Find duplicates
    • Merge entries
    • Groups
    • Replace string
  • Import and Export
    • Import
      • JabRef Browser Extension
      • Custom import filters
      • Import from Microsoft Word -- MS Office Bibliography XML format
      • Import inspection window
      • New subdatabase based on AUX file
      • New entry from plain text
    • Export
      • Custom export filters
      • EndNote Export Filter
      • Export to an External SQL Database
      • Export to Microsoft Word -- MS Office Bibliography XML format
    • Other integrations
      • LaTeX Citations Tab
      • OpenOffice/LibreOffice integration
      • Pushing to external editor application
      • XMP metadata support in JabRef
    • Knowledge
      • Comparison of the Medline (txt), Medline (XML), and RIS format
  • Collaborative Work
    • Sharing a Bib(La)TeX Database
    • Shared SQL Database
    • Migration of pre-3.6 SQL databases into a shared SQL database
  • Configuration of JabRef
    • Customize the BibTeX key generator
    • Customize entry types
    • Customize general fields
    • Customize key bindings
    • Database properties window
    • Entry preview setup
    • Manage external file types
    • Manage protected terms
    • The string editor
  • Frequently Asked Questions and Howtos
    • General FAQs
    • Contributing
    • Sharing
    • How Tos
      • How to expand first names of a BibTeX entry
      • How to Improve the Help Page
      • How to translate the JabRef User Interface
    • FAQs on Operating Systems
      • Linux
      • Mac OS X
      • Windows
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On this page
  • Is there any way to include JabRef in the start menu of Ubuntu?
  • JabRef does not start under Linux! What can I do?
  • JabRef 5.x
  • JabRef 4.x
  • I am on Debian/Ubuntu and clicking on the JabRef icon works, but I cannot start JabRef from the command line. What is wrong?
  • Does JabRef run under free Java (Classpath, Kaffee, GCJ, etc.)?
  • Everything looks too big or too small. How can I change it to to a more reasonable size?

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  1. Frequently Asked Questions and Howtos
  2. FAQs on Operating Systems

Linux

Is there any way to include JabRef in the start menu of Ubuntu?

Yes, there is. See http://askubuntu.com/a/721387/196423 for details.

JabRef does not start under Linux! What can I do?

JabRef 5.x

JabRef 5.x requires Java 13 (It is included in the native builds)

JabRef 4.x

JabRef requires Java 8

Please follow the steps provided on our installation page. JabRef 4.x does not run under Java 9 or newer. See https://github.com/JabRef/jabref/issues/2594

You might see the error message Error: Could not find or load main class org.jabref.JabRefMain. This means, you do not have JavaFX support activated in your Java runtime environment. This typically happens if you use OpenJDK, where one needs to setup OpenJFX separately.

I am on Debian/Ubuntu and clicking on the JabRef icon works, but I cannot start JabRef from the command line. What is wrong?

You have several Java Virtual Machines installed, and under the command line the wrong one is chosen. Have a look at the previous question that tells you how to change the virtual machine used.

For Ubuntu you may also have a look at the Ubuntu page on Java.

Does JabRef run under free Java (Classpath, Kaffee, GCJ, etc.)?

As far as we know, JabRef is not yet running on these free JVMs, due of our dependencies. However, JabRef is reported to run nicely on the IcedTea runtime, which is based on the OpenJDK built with GNU Classpath to fill in missing classes. Some issues have been encountered with the look and feel (see issues #393 and #2003). Please let us know if newer versions give different results. If you have an idea or the expertise to make JabRef work under Classpath, let us know.

Everything looks too big or too small. How can I change it to to a more reasonable size?

In the background, JabRef uses JavaFX. Applications using JavaFX can be scaled via java -Dglass.gtk.uiScale=1.5 -jar <application>.jar. If you have installed JabRef via a package manager, you probably don't have a .jar file but a binary file. In this case, you need to find your JabRef.cfg in your installation folder (possibly located at /opt/JabRef/lib/app/JabRef.cfg) and add in the section [JavaOptions] the line -Dglass.gtk.uiScale=1.5. Then, restart JabRef. Try finding a value that is suitable for you. On high resolution displays, values around 1.5 seem to be reasonable.

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Last updated 3 years ago

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