citation problem biber/xelatex

Question

I'm using MikteX with TexStudio (3.1.1). I Cannot get my references with Biber. Here's what I have in preamble

    \documentclass[12pt,a4paper]{article}

    \usepackage{fontspec}

    \usepackage{xltxtra}

    \usepackage{xunicode}

    \usepackage{polyglossia}

    \setdefaultlanguage{french}

    \bibliography{testa}

    \usepackage[maxlevel=3]{csquotes}

    \usepackage[backend=biber,citestyle=verbose-trad2,bibstyle=verbose-trad2]{biblatex}

The message I get from Biber is

INFO - This is Biber 2.16 INFO - Logfile is 'calme.blg' INFO - Reading 'calme.bcf' WARN - No data sources defined! Processus terminé normalement

I have a new computer and my problem is that I have no problem with the documents made on my former computer, but only with the new documents, even with the same bib file. I read Biblatex with Biber: Configuring... but I had already typeset my editor to work with biber.

Any idea about where my problem comes from ?

Answer 1

You need to issue \bibliography{<bibfile>} or \addbibresource{<bibfile>.bib} after you have loaded biblatex.

\bibliography{testa}
\usepackage[maxlevel=3]{csquotes}
\usepackage[backend=biber,citestyle=verbose-trad2,bibstyle=verbose-trad2]{biblatex}

will not work, but

\usepackage[maxlevel=3]{csquotes}
\usepackage[backend=biber, style=verbose-trad2]{biblatex}
\addbibresource{testa.bib}

will (the latter also works with \bibliography{testa} instead of \addbibresource{testa.bib}, but \addbibresource is recommended).

Unfortunately, you do not get an error for this misuse of \bibliography, because the command is also defined by standard LaTeX. But when you call it, it has the wrong definition for biblatex. One more reason to use \addbibresource: It would have thrown an error in the wrong position.