This page describes the RIS response format in detail.
The RIS (Research Information Systems) format is selected by ending a URL path with the suffix .ris. This format was defined originally by Research Information Systems, Inc., and has since become one of the most widely used formats for handling bibliographic references.
This format is not very flexible. There is no way to include comments, file attributes, or any information other than reference entries. As a result, if you generate this file with the parameters showsource and/or count, it will contain one or more dummy entries at the top that convey this requested information.
The first few lines of the file are defined by the file format, and provide some general information:
Provider:
The Paleobiology Database
Content:
text/plain; charset="utf-8"
If you have specified the parameter showsource, then the following two dummy entries will appear at the beginning of the file. See the file format for details of how these entries are encoded.
TY
GEN
TI
Data Source
UR
The exact URL that was used to generate the contents of this file
Y2
The date and time at which this file was generated
KW
The parameter value(s) that were used to generate the contents of this file. One of these lines will be present for each separate parameter.
The following entry will also be included if you specify showsource. A second entry is necessary because the RIS specification allows only one UR tag per entry.
TY
GEN
TI
Documentation
UR
The documentation page for the URL path that was used to generate the contents of this file. This page will describe the parameters accepted, and how they are used to determine the result set. It will also describe the fields that make up the result.
If you specify the parameter count, the following dummy entry is also added at the beginning of the file. It specifies the number of records in the result set, along with the number actually returned. This may be smaller depending on the value of the limit and offset parameters.
TY
GEN
TI
Record Counts
KW
Records Found = the total number of records in the result set
KW
Records Returned = the number of records actually returned
Following these dummy header entries, the remainder of the entries in the file make up the result set. Each of these entries will contain lines with some or all of the following tags, depending upon what information is stored in the database about each reference.
TY
The publication type, i.e. JOUR for a journal or BOOK for a book
ID
A unique identifier for this reference
TI
The title of the work
T2
The secondary title, i.e. the title of the journal or monograph series in which the work appears
AU
The author(s) of the work. One of these lines will be present for each listed author
A2
The editor(s) of the work. One of these lines will be present for each listed editor
PY
The year of publication
VL
The volume number, if any
IS
The issue number, if any
SP
The first page
EP
The last page
LA
The languge of the work
This service is provided by the Paleobiology Database, hosted by the Department of Geoscience at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
If you have questions about this data service, or wish to report a bug, please contact the database administrator at admin@paleobiodb.org