Citation remains in document after removal from Zotero database

Yukusoona

Dear forum,

I am not sure what I am doing wrong:
There were some citations in my Zotero database which I decided to alter slightly. Now I have a word 2019 document containing plenty of citations from my database. I updated the citations within the word document. Curiously, those cited (and altered) sources appear two times in my word document: there is the original citation and there is the updated version. Within my word document there are positions linked to the original (not existing!) citation and there are some positions that are now linked to the slightly altered citation. Of course, I would like to have the old citation switched to the new one and all positions, linked to this citation, switched to the corrected version. When I started to manually correct the falsely linked positions, Zotero plugin would have suggested both citations to me (original [non existent] and corrected one). The original citation was suggested as long as there was still at least one position in the word document linked to this citation. After I had removed all links to the original citation, Zotero would have suggested the correct altered version only. What's the problem? How can I correct?

Anyway, what happens if a word document contains a citation and this citation is subsequently removed from the Zotero database? Does the citation (as happened in my above-mentioned case) remain in the word document as "stand-alone-citation" (without a corresponding source in the Zotero database)? Or should the Zotero plugin rather (on updating the citations) give a warning as to missing citation sources? Is there a way to ask Zotero to mark all citations with lost links to the Zotero database in order to easily replaced those by correct, i.e. active, citations?

I hope I managed to explain my problem properly and that someone may be of help to me.

Thank you very much!
Yukusoona

Windows 10
Zotero 5.0.96
Word 2019 with plugin

bwiernik

If you delete an item from your library, a citation to it will remain in the document and will be formatted using its embedded data. To remove the citation from the document, delete the citation text from the document.

Yukusoona

OK, I understand. And is there a way to extract those "orphaned" citations from my word document and re-create a corresponding item in my Zotero database? Apparently, the required citation data is still present within my word document so there should be a way to transfer it back to my Zotero database.

This option could be useful, by the way, if you have a word document from another person with citations I do not have in my own Zotero database. In that case, I could extract the citation information and create source items in my Zotero database. Is there a way?

I am just trying to figure out if there is an easy way to reassign some of my citations to other source items...

bwiernik

You can extract them using https://rintze.zelle.me/ref-extractor/

But the citations will not be linked to the new items in your database if you reimport your your library. The only way to change the item in your library a citation is linked to is to delete the citation and reinsert it.

Yukusoona

So, is there a way to ask Zotero to exchange one citation by another one? Let's assume I have 10 positions scattered all over one word document which are linked to one citation X:

My name is Batman [1,4,X,9]. I know because Superman told me [2,3,X]. It must have been Superman because I know his cousin Spiderman [X]. (...)

1. Citation1 (linked to Zotero data base)
2. Citation2 (linked to Zotero data base)
3. Citation3 (linked to Zotero data base)
X. CitationX (not linked to Zotero data base, because original data was removed)
...
9. Citation9 (linked to Zotero data base)
(...)

Is there a way to tell Zotero it shall assign all positions linked to X to re-link to another citation?
Or must I really search my word document manually for all "X", then edit each citation link, remove X, add new citation...?

Thank you very much!
Yukusoona

bwiernik

No, there isn't a way to do that. You need to delete the citations and re-insert them.