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title: AUX module – handling .aux files
SPDX-FileCopyrightText: 2024 Norman Gray <https://nxg.me.uk>
SPDX-License-Identifier: BSD-2-Clause


LaTeX generates `.aux` files which tie together the collection of
bibliographic citations obtained from the source file, the
bibliographic data base(s) which are to be used (the `.bib` files) and
the citation style.

The `.aux` file is in TeX syntax, with only the `\citation`,
`\bibdata` and `\bibstyle` commands recognised:

If `beastie` is asked to process a `.aux` file as input, then it will
assume that the citation style is a standard `.bst` file, and handle
it on that basis.  To use a separate `.scm` file, the extension must
be included explicitly.

You can either parse the aux file directly, with
[`parse-aux-file`](#fn-parse-aux-file), or use
[`call-with-aux-file`](#fn-call-with-aux-file) to parse it and invoke
a processor in one step.