Script for opening corresponding pdfs for bibtex keys in Vim

Question

Context

I currently write research articles in LaTeX using Vim. I have bibtex keys in my articles like \cite{smith2000sometopic} and I have corresponding pdf versions of most articles in a subfolder of ~/lib e.g., ~/lib/topica/smith2000sometopic.pdf.

Aim

I'd like to be able to press a key in Vim when my cursor is over a bibtex key that:

1. extracts the bibtex-key under the cursor
2. performs a search for bibtex-key.pdf
3. if the file is found, opens the file in a pdf viewer
4. If the file is not found, indicate that this is the case

Question

• Has anyone already done something like this?
• Are there any examples that would be useful to study?

Initial thoughts

I thought I could use something like:

 gnome-open `find ~/lib/ -iname "smith2000sometopic.pdf" | head -1`

and then experiment with some Vimscript to fine tune the interaction; but if anyone has any examples or suggestions, that would be most appreciated.

Answer 1

Perhaps, I should have persisted a little longer before posting, but any suggestions for improvement are still more than welcome.

In the end I found this documentation useful from vimtips.

This was the Vim function I wrote:

function! OpenBibtexPDF()
    let s:word = expand("<cword>")
    let s:cmd = "!gnome-open `find ~/lib/ -iname '" . s:word . ".pdf' | head -1`"
    execute s:cmd
endfunction 
map <silent> <leader>bb :call OpenBibtexPDF()<cr>