Multiple Authors

Many of you have constructively suggested that I make it easier to cite resources with multiple authors. I figured out a way about 3:00 yesterday morning, got up, and added a feature that provides, for MLA folks, templates for 1, 2, 3, 4, & 5 authors. For the time being, this is only available for books. This morning, I got up at 4:00 and added templates for 1, 2, 3, & 4 authors in APA.

I'm on the road this week, speaking at conferences across four states. So early in the morning, is the only time I have to work on this.

Please stay tuned for more happenings with Citation Machine.

Welcome to Son of Citation Machine

First, I want to welcome you to Son of Citation Machine (SOCM). It's been exciting to finally get this baby out, and, as is often the case, it's birth has been rocky. At the same time, it happened at exactly the right time. It's the end of the semester, and Citation Machine is serving more than a half-million page views a day.

So what's different about SOCM that helps with all this traffic. Mostly the software is much simpler. I reprogrammed most of the site so that the information involved in a citation comes from a database, so that Citation Machine just simply gets the format, plugs in the information, and then displays it for you to copy and paste.

Even with these economizing efforts, Citation Machine is threatening to bring down many of the other sites served by my hosting company. So I have been further economizing, at the same time that the technical folks at Dreamhost (my hosting company) have also enacted (heroic) measures to keep the service going.

I'm going to close now, by saying that I appreciate all of your suggestions. You have given me new ideas for further enhancing SOCM. More about that later.