Texmaker and TeXstudio ⇒ bibtex can not start command error

[dogsipod]

running macbook pro with OSX 10.4.11
I installed mactex 2008 and i installed the current version of texmaker.

i wrote my thesis without doing the formal "\cite" thing...instead i just put notes to myself about what to cite. now i am going through and doing just that. in texmaker i run the latex command. and i get a message that says process exited normally. then i run bibtex and i only get "error: could not start the command" when i look at my paper i have [?] where there should be cites. if i open terminal and type "which bibtex" it returns the directory where texmaker says it is running the command from. is there any other way to get it to report more then "error could not start the command"...like why it couldn't start it.

my texmaker config looks like ""/usr/texbin/bibtex" %.aux

[Juanjo]

Add \nocite{*} anywhere in your tex file and try again (several LaTeX runs). Report the results and attach, if possible, a file having extension blg (the log file of BibTeX).

Edit: After a first and quick reading, I thought that your document contained no \cite command, so the advice of including at least \nocite{*}. But, after re-reading, it seems that \cite is alreay there, isn't it? Post the blg file, if any. Likewise, have you added the commands \bibliographystyle and \bibliography?

[dogsipod]

ok...i played around with the config file and changed the path from my first post to ""/usr/local/texlive/2008/bin/universal-darwin/bibtex" %.aux" now bibtex will run. so my questions are no longer related to getting it to run, but instead about style. below is my bib_refs.bib file truncated for convenience.

my question is that currently when i cite, i get a [1] which corresponds to an alphabetic list of my refs. I would like the style of the cite to be the first 3 letters of the authors last name plus the year. for example the book by krane would be [Kra88]. basically i guess what i am asking is how do i control what is listed in the [ ] ?

Code: Select all

% Books
@InBook{Kra88a,
author= {Krane, K.},
title = {Inroductory Nuclear Physics},
chapter = {5},
publisher = {"John Wiley and Sons"},
year = {1988},
edition={Second}
}

@InBook{Kra88b,
author= {Krane, K.},
title = {Inroductory Nuclear Physics},
publisher = {"John Wiley and Sons"},
year = {1988},
edition={Second},
pages={118}
}

@InBook{Kra88c,
author= {Krane, K.},
title = {Inroductory Nuclear Physics},
chapter = {19},
publisher = {"John Wiley and Sons"},
year = {1988},
edition={Second}
}

@InBook{Kra88d,
author= {Krane, K.},
title = {Inroductory Nuclear Physics},
chapter = {11},
publisher = {"John Wiley and Sons"},
year = {1988},
edition={Second}
}

@Book{Sat90,
author = {Satchler, G. R.},
title = {Introdution to Nuclear Reactions},
publisher = {"Oxford University Press"},
year = {1990},
edition = {Second}
}

@Book{Rol88,
author={Rolfs, C. E. and Rodney, W. S.},
title={Cauldrons in the Cosmos},
publisher = {"The University of Chicago Press"},
year = {1988}
}

@Book{Pre92,
author =  {Press, W.H. and Teukolsky, S. A. and Vetterling, W. T. and Flannery, B. P.},
title =  {NUMERICAL RECIPES in Fortran 77},
publisher = {Cambridge University Press},
year = {1992},
edition = {Second}
}