Duplicated Authors

mblack154
When I add a citation to a paper, save the document and come back later an add the same citation again, zotero is modifying the citation as if the author had two papers in the same year. For example, if I add Smith, J. (2010) and try to add it again after the document has been saved, instead of just adding Smith, J. (2010) again, it changes the first one to Smith, A. (2010a) and adds the second on as Smith, J. (2010b).

Thanks
  • adamsmith
    For one reason or the other, you're inserting two different version, potentially of the same item.
    To start to figure out why, rather than a hypothetical example, could you copy&paste the exact citations as they appear?
    Which citation style?
    Can you replicate this consistently, e.g. in a new document?
  • mblack154
    Here are entries. When I do a search for the authors, there is only one entry. Also, when I sort by Author, I only see the entry once. It is APA 6th

    Bell, G. B., & Boddington, R. (2010a). Solid state drives: The beginning of the end for current practice in digital forensic recovery? The Journal of Digital Forensics, Security and Law, 5(3), 5–32.

    Bell, G. B., & Boddington, R. (2010b). Solid state drives: The beginning of the end for current practice in digital forensic recovery? The Journal of Digital Forensics, Security and Law, 5(3), 5–32.
    Carlton, G. H., & Worthley, R. (2010a). Identifying a computer forensics expert: A study to measure the characteristics of forensic computer examiners. The Journal of Digital Forensics, Security and Law, 5(1), 5–19.

    Carlton, G. H., & Worthley, R. (2010b). Identifying a computer forensics expert: A study to measure the characteristics of forensic computer examiners. The Journal of Digital Forensics, Security and Law, 5(1), 5–1

    Boddington, R., Hobbs, V., & Mann, G. (2008a). Validating digital evidence for legal argument. Paper presented at the SECAU Security Conferences: The 6th Australian Digital Forensics Conference, Perth, WA.

    Boddington, R., Hobbs, V., & Mann, G. (2008b). Validating digital evidence for legal argument. Paper presented at the SECAU Security Conferences: The 6th Australian Digital Forensics Conference, Perth, WA
  • adamsmith
    What's the history of that document?
    The most likely way this can happen is if the document gets disconnected from Zotero at some point - e.g. if you used export/import to transfer your library, if you used references from a group or something along the lines.
    Than one of these references is the "old" version, which is stored in the document, and the other one is the new version inserted from your library.

    If you can replicate your problem in a fresh document, that theory is a lot less likely, but you didn't answer my question on that.
  • mblack154
    I am storing the references in the document and word did crash while this document was open.

    Is there a way to fix it?
  • mblack154
    Seems to be only on this document.
  • adamsmith
    a Word crash shouldn't matter.

    How to best fix this depends on how many cases of this you have.
    It's likely the easiest to just replace all old citations with wrong ones (i.e. if, when you currently insert Bell & Boddington you get Bell & Boddington 2010b, reinsert all instances of Bell & Boddington 2010a.


    If you're curious to get to the bottom of why this happened, show field codes in Word by pressing alt+F9 and then copy and paste two of the full fields for items that should be the same but are 2010a and 2010b here.
  • mblack154
    My question is how are the citations different? I have tried to delete the A one and replace it and the B one and replace.
  • mblack154
    Would it make a difference if the same reference is in more than one collection?
  • adamsmith
    Would it make a difference if the same reference is in more than one collection?
    no. The same item can be in multiple collections, it's still only one item.
    My question is how are the citations different? I have tried to delete the A one and replace it and the B one and replace.
    and that didn't work? The way they differ from each other is the internal identifier that Zotero uses - you can see that when you show field codes as per my post above.

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