restoring styles (and the first initial issue)

JD123

Hi. I have a compound problem.
I was having the "unnecessary first initial" issue described here: http://forums.zotero.org/discussion/3464/citations-putting-in-authors-initialsnames/

I tried editing the Chicago style to remove ""disambiguate-add-givenname"

The extra initial is gone but now my bibliography is a complete garbled mess.

My questions are: does anyone have a version of Chicago style (author date) that does not add the first initial in citations?
Or does anyone know how I can restore the original version of chicago style? I tried downloading from the styles page but my document is still a mess.
Thanks.

adamsmith

re-downloading the style is typically all you need to do - you need to change to a different style and back for the update to take effect.
If that fails you can reset your styles from the advanced tab of the Zotero preferences.

Generally, Chicago only disambiguates when it's strictly necessary, i.e. with a citation by two authors with the same last name and in the same year. It is a bad idea to turn this off - if you're getting this because you have one author in your database in multiple ways, you should fix this in the database, otherwise you'll get other problems like inconsistent sorting of the bibliography.

JD123

By re-downloading the style, do you mean I go to the list of styles and hit install? Is that all I have to do?

Like the people in that other forum, my program is disambiguating two authors with same last names but different first names; in citations, it gives their first initial. I've had this problem with two different styles.

JD123

OK. The bibliography is fixed. I had to delete 200 pages of garbled bibliography but it generated a new one. Should I have switched to another style and then switched back to the style I'm using?

It is still putting initials for some citations. Sometimes when I hit refresh, it will take the initials out of some of them, and then later, it puts them back. It can't seem to decide if they go there or not.

JD123

Thank you, btw.

adamsmith

The initial is supposed to be there - cf. CMoS, 16th ed., 15.21:

Where two or more works by different authors with the same last name are listed in a reference list, the text citation must include an initial (or two initials or a given name if necessary).

Text citations:

(C. Doershuk 2010)
(J. Doershuk 2009)

References:
Doershuk, Carl. 2010. . . .
Doershuk, John. 2009. . . .

http://www.chicagomanualofstyle.org/16/ch15/ch15_sec021.html
if you have online access.

Should I have switched to another style and then switched back to the style I'm using?

yes. That's the only way for changes in a citation style to take effect.

JD123

Thank you for the clarification!

JD123

It's just strange now how whenever it updates, it takes the initials out of some of the citations. It will put them back later and vice versa.

fbennett

it takes the initials out of some of the citations. It will put them back later and vice versa.

I assume that this correct behavior (if initially disconcerting). If you mean that initials appear where they are logically not supposed to do, we'll need to know how to reproduce the behaviour.