Converting an EndNote Database to BibTeX

During a recent L^aT_eX introductory workshop, many participants said that they’re very much looking forward to using L^aT_eX for their future writings, but mentioned that there didn’nt seem to be an obvious way of porting their existing EndNote bibliography libarary into BibT_eX format.

EndNote does have an “Export BibTeX” filter, but it doesn’t seem to generate satisfactory BibT_eX files. After some googling, I found Bevan Weir’s customised export filter, which does a much better job than EndNote’s default. I modified his filter file a little bit more, and was able to convert an EndNote bibliography library to BibT_eX with the following steps.

I tested this with EndNote X5 on the Mac, with JabRef 2.7, but they should also work with Windows versions. %ENDNOTE% refers to the path where EndNote is installed on your system.

1. Put BibTeX_Export_LLT.ens (download) in %ENDNOTE%/Styles/ .
2. Start EndNotes, and load your library.
3. Make sure the new style is listed:
   Edit > Output Styles > Open Style Manager
   Make sure BibTeX_Export_LLT is checked.
4. File > Export
   Make sure Save File as Type is set to Text Only, and Output Style is set to BibTeX_Export_LLT.
5. Save your file and check that it has a .bib extension.
6. Open the exported .bib in JabRef. There will be a whole bunch of errors about corrupted or empty BibT_eX keys; don’t worry. Just click OK.
7. Ctrl+A to select all the BibT_eX entreis, Tools > Autogenerate BibTeX keys.
8. Check through the BibT_eX entries, especially those highlighted red, to check and correct any crucial information loss.

And hopefully the converted bibliography file is now usable enough.