Unable to cite references from Zotero.

attilo2003
My Zotero suddenly stopped citing references from my source.

My Report ID is 1683093379.

Can anybody please help URGENTLY as I need the references for the submission of my work.

Thank You.

Attilo2003.
  • dstillman
    It's not clear what you mean here. Can you describe the problem in more details?

    https://www.zotero.org/support/reporting_problems#provide_steps_to_reproduce
  • attilo2003
    When I am typing in Word, I am unable to use my source documents saved in zotera as references.
    Please can you help with this?
  • adamsmith
    We need actual steps to reproduce, along these lines
    I'm using Word 20.....
    I see the buttons of the Zotero Word-addon
    When I click the add/edit citation button, XYZ happens
    etc.
  • attilo2003
    I am using both Word 2007 and Word 365.
    I see the button of Zotero Word-addon.
    When I click the add/edit citation button, the citation bar appears on Word.
    When I type in my reference materials, nothing happens.
    The reference materials do not appear, and hence, no reference.
  • adamsmith
    Cool, that's much clearer.

    When you click on the little arrow at the left of the insert citation bar and select "Classic view" -- do you see your full library?
  • attilo2003
    I can't see the arrow you refer to on both Word 2007 and 365?
  • adamsmith
    It's almost certainly there:
    https://www.zotero.org/support/word_processor_plugin_usage#citations_with_multiple_cited_items
  • attilo2003
    Yes. I didn't know you were referring to the citation box on zotero - I was looking at the one on Word. I can see the 'Classic view'' with a view of my full library.

    What else do I need to do please?
  • dstillman
    Anything you see in the classic dialog should also appear when you search in the main dialog. If you think that's not happening, take some screenshots that show exactly what you're describing — from both dialogs — and provide a link here.

    Also note that Word 2007 is no longer supported, and hasn't been since 2018. While that shouldn't affect this, you should upgrade to a more recent version of Word.
  • attilo2003
    It does work when I click the classic dialog box. It never used to be like that though. I wonder why it changed. Any ideas?
    And please note I sue Word 365.
  • adamsmith
    We'd really want to see a Screenshot as dstillman requests above
  • gyellen
    I have what I think is this same problem. When I enter the PMID of a reference in the search bar popup from Word (for a reference that is in my library, with the PMID in the Extra field), nothing appears. If I switch to Classic view and enter the same PMID, then I get a search result, but nothing is selected. I have to select the (only) entry manually and then press Enter. MANY extra steps for a simple citation (and I have many to do; I've been unable to find keyboard shortcuts to speed this up).

    I have screenshots, but I don't know how to upload them here.

    Word 365 on Mac (16.40, 20081000); Zotero 5.0.90
  • adamsmith
    That bar has only ever worked for title/creator/year searches, so that's a different issue.
    Where does the PMID come from? Presumably you're copying that from somwhere -- why not use the title?
  • attilo2003
    I haven't been able to send the screenshots because there are no links to upload them.
    Gyllen has just described the issue exactly.
    You do need to select the classic view before the required citation is selected.
    It never used to be like that?
  • dstillman
    You can upload to Dropbox or similar and post a link here.

    As adamsmith says, a PMID has never worked in the citation dialog. But it's not clear why you would have a PMID and not the title or author.
  • attilo2003
    I do not know what a PMID is.
    The document I am trying to reference has both an author an title. You can't reference it unless you click classic view and then select the document.
    It was never like this?
  • dstillman
    edited September 21, 2020
    PMID means PubMed ID and was mentioned by gyellen. You should be able to search by title and creator in the main citation dialog. If that's not working, we need you to provide the screenshots I requested above or else we can't help you. Again, you can upload them to Dropbox, imgur, or a similar file-sharing site and provide a link here.
  • attilo2003
    When I search by title and creator, nothing appears. Until you click the classic view That's what I have saying from the start.
    Really, I am not able to do Dropbox now. I would have thought my explanations were enough.
    If not, do not bother.
    Tanx anyway.
  • dstillman
    Screenshots would really be helpful — there's a very good chance this is a misunderstanding, and a screenshot would be the best way for us to tell — but a Debug ID for a search that's not working might also tell us something.
  • gyellen
    A PMID is the shortest unique identifier for an article in the biomedical literature. I routinely use PMIDs when mentioning an article to a friend or someone in my lab. When we write drafts of papers or grants (or snippets of them) based on a literature search, we use PMIDs. So that's where I get them. Anything else would be either much longer or ambiguous.

    It would be great if you can add these to the main search bar.
  • gyellen
    (and I'm not the only person who does this - many others use PMIDs routinely)
  • adamsmith
    @dstillman -- DOIs have been requested along these lines, too, I think. Would it make sense to allow PIDs like that in the searchbar? I'd guess PMID once it has got its own field in Zotero to avoid searching through and parsing Extra?
  • gyellen
    If you are planning to add a field for PMID (seems sensible!), it would be great to provide a transition tool that would either copy the PMID from Extra or resolve it by searching Pubmed.

    Thanks for considering this!
  • adamsmith
    PMIDs (and other data from Extra) will be automatically moved (not copied) to new fields once they exist, yes. I'd guess the idea for a PMID field would be to resolve to Pubmed the same way the URL and DOI fields resolve when you click on their labels, but I don't know the exact plans for this.
  • gyellen
    Ah, that's not quite what I meant by "resolve". I was thinking of a utility that would take an entry with no PMID (or ideally all such entries in the library) and search Pubmed for the correct ID (based on the title/year/authors). If it is an unambiguous match (as most would be), it is just entered into the PMID field.
  • adamsmith
    There's currently a plugin that does that as long as you have a DOI: https://github.com/retorquere/zotero-pmcid-fetcher

    Not sure if that'll get folded into regular Zotero, there are pros and cons there.
  • dstillman
    DOIs have been requested along these lines, too, I think. Would it make sense to allow PIDs like that in the searchbar?
    Yes, the open issue is for identifiers in general, not just DOIs.
Sign In or Register to comment.