Reference list, bugs ?

halldisr

Thank you so much for Zotero ! I've used it a lot, and are very pleased.

However, a few irritating bugs (?) occured in my text and reference list lately (of the manuscript):
1) I have two publications by the same author from the same year, but Zotero spells the last name of the author differently in the actual Ref. list in the manuscript (one letter is lacking in the last name in one of them, even if their spelled correctly, and in the same way, in Zotero).
2) These same two references also show up a bit weired in the text - as e.g.
"A. Smith, 2014; A. B. Smith, 2014"
(even if it's not supposed to be any letters of the first name in there). I would expect a 2014a and 2014 b here...?

Can you please help me with this?
Kind regards, HR

adamsmith

Two reasons this happens:
1) The items are actually different in Zotero, i.e. the name is input differently (which you say they aren't)
2) One of them is cited from a different library and Zotero uses the data stored in the document rather than in it's library. If you edit them and click on the blue-ish bubble, you would see an "Open in Library" button for items connected to Zotero and wouldn't see it for items that aren't. You'd have to delete and re-insert citations for the latter.

halldisr

Thank's a lot - now it worked !
I deleted them both, and added them again from somewhat similar sources.

A lot of somewhat similar references are now stored in my zotero library, so a little struggle in finding the new once added, but I managed. Is it possible to delete old references in Zotero (so I don't confuse them with newer once)?

adamsmith

Don't delete! Look in the duplicate folder, select identical references and the click "Merge" on the right (make sure you have the right/best info).
Details here: https://www.zotero.org/support/duplicate_detection#duplicate_detection

halldisr

Thank's a lot for all your help !