TS 2781

TS 2781 is a withdrawn Turkish standard aligned with ISO 690:1975, covering the essential and supplementary elements of bibliographical references. It addresses the order in which the parts of a reference are presented and the general arrangement used when bibliographical entries are formatted.

How a bibliographical reference is structured

A bibliographical reference is the set of identifying details that lets a reader recognize and locate a source, typically through elements such as author, title, publication data and date. This standard focuses on the structure of those elements: what components make up a reference and the general sequence in which they are shown. In general technical context, such conventions support cataloguing, library records, academic writing and information retrieval by giving sources a consistent descriptive form.

Essential versus supplementary elements

Essential elements provide the minimum identification needed to distinguish a source, while supplementary elements add precision or help complete the record. That distinction is important because bibliographical formatting must remain consistent across different document types. The scope of TS 2781 also includes detailed recommendations for the presentation of individual elements and bibliographical references, but the standard should be understood here as defining a general reference framework rather than a source-by-source instruction manual.

This document reflects an early bibliographic reference convention associated with the ISO 690 family. Its practical value lies in the conceptual framework it gives for writing references that are readable, comparable and systematically organized.