Re: st: how to cite others' code?

[Richard Williams <richardwilliams.ndu@gmail.com>]

Good question. Some thoughts:

* If you are using a program you downloaded from SSC, the authors 
sometime include a list of suggested citations.

* If the author has published an article using their own program, 
e.g. in The Stata Journal, they would probably appreciate a citation 
to that. I also appreciate it if people send me a note saying they 
used one of my programs in a published article, but I don't consider 
that essential.

* When reviewing, I always encourage people to tell what software 
they are using. I don't know if Stata wants a specific citation from 
you (perhaps to one of the reference manuals?) but I imagine it likes 
it if you at least say that you were using Stata.

* Some uses might be mentioned in the acknowledgments or in a 
footnote., e.g. thank Nick Cox for his helpful suggestions, without 
necessarily linking to the posts where he did that.



At 03:29 PM 2/25/2011, Rebecca Pope wrote:
> Hello Statalist-ers,
> Is there a standard format or set of guidelines for citing code
> written by others? I am _not_ asking whether one ought to cite pieces
> of code written by others, but what is required to be in that
> citation. If a standard does exist, does it differ depending on
> whether the code comes from Stata Corp, user-written ado files, or was
> posted as an example to the list? I did try to search for this before
> posting, but all I found were some posts relating to people not citing
> others' code. If guidelines are already codified & available, I'm
> afraid they have been obscured in my search results by this previous
> discussion.
>
> As a concrete example, Svend Juul posted a question a few days ago
> about generating new variables in a command when a -varlist- is also
> required. I do something similar in one of my programs, but Nick's
> response (http://www.stata.com/statalist/archive/2011-02/msg00861.html)
> is far more flexible than my solution to the problem. If I were to
> replace my code with what Nick posted, how would that be correctly
> cited?
>
> Regards,
> Rebecca
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Richard Williams, Notre Dame Dept of Sociology
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