bibliography items in wrong order in Chicago style

When I have items from the same source and the same year, they are appearing in the wrong order. For example, the items below should appear in the opposite order, i.e. 2007a should be 2007b since "Resist..." should come before "U.S...." After looking at other similar examples, I think zotero is ordering them by date, rather than title. For example, in this case, January 18 comes before November 18.

CBC. 2007a. “U.S. Urges ‘Fivefold Expansion’ in Alberta Oilsands Production.” CBC News, January 18. http://www.cbc.ca/canada/story/2007/01/17/oil-sands.html.

———. 2007b. “Resist Temptation to Spend on ‘Buy Nothing Day,’ May Says.” CBC News, November 23. http://www.cbc.ca/canada/british-columbia/story/2007/11/22/bc-buynothing.html.

One other problem evident above is that the date accessed is not appearing for online items.

Any ideas on how to fix this?
  • In the reference list according to Chicago author-date, as opposed to the bibliography used for Chicago full note, items should indeed be sorted chronologically (cf. CMoS 15.17).
    Since the 16th edition the manual also discourages date accessed:
    Chicago does not therefore require access dates in its published citations of electronic sources unless no date of publication or revision can be determined from the source (see 14.8).
    (CMoS 14.7)
  • Thanks for the reply.

    Is there any relatively simple way to change it so the date accessed appears? My publisher has asked for the dates to be included and adding them manually will be time consuming given the amount of sources I'm dealing with.
  • edited December 9, 2013
    how should they appear? (as in: how should one of the citations above look like?)
  • For example:
    CBC. 2007a. “U.S. Urges ‘Fivefold Expansion’ in Alberta Oilsands Production.” CBC News, January 18. Accessed January 19, 2007. http://www.cbc.ca/canada/story/2007/01/17/oil-sands.html.
  • find
    <choose>
    <if variable="DOI issued" match="none">
    <choose>
    <if variable="URL accessed" match="all">
    <group delimiter=" ">
    <text term="accessed" text-case="capitalize-first"/>
    <date variable="accessed" delimiter=" ">
    <date-part name="month"/>
    <date-part name="day"/>
    </date>
    </group>
    </if>
    </choose>

    replace with

    <choose>
    <if variable="DOI" match="none">
    <choose>
    <if variable="URL accessed" match="all">
    <group delimiter=" ">
    <text term="accessed" text-case="capitalize-first"/>
    <date variable="accessed" form="text"/>
    </group>
    </if>
    </choose>

    general instructions here - make sure to remember to change the style ID, else your edits will get overwritten:
    http://www.zotero.org/support/dev/citation_styles/style_editing_step-by-step
  • Thanks - much appreciated. I'll give that a try.

    In the meantime, I've discovered another apparent problem with the order of items in the bibliography. On the basis of the titles, these three items are in the wrong order. But there are no dates for any of the items, unlike the examples above. Any idea why it appears in this order?

    Defra. 2008a. “Wellbeing: Government Departments and Other Organisations: Sustainable Development Commission”. London: Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. http://www.defra.gov.uk/sustainable/government/what/priority/wellbeing/ogds.htm#sdc.

    ———. 2008b. “A Framework for Pro-Environmental Behaviours”. London: Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. http://www.defra.gov.uk/publications/files/pb13574-behaviours-report-080110.pdf.

    ———. 2008c. “Synthesis Report on the Findings from Defra’s Pre-Feasibility Study into Personal Carbon Trading”. London: Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. http://www.defra.gov.uk/environment/climatechange/uk/individual/carbontrading/pdf/pct-synthesis- report.pd
  • yeah, that's currently arbitrary (probably in the order you cited them).
    find
    <sort>
    <key macro="contributors"/>
    <key variable="issued"/>
    </sort>
    and change to

    <sort>
    <key macro="contributors"/>
    <key variable="issued"/>
    <key macro="title"/>
    </sort>
    If you generally want to sort by title before date, move the added line one line up.
  • Thanks. I tried sorting by title before date. That solved one problem. When all the items are from the same year, they now appear as I'd like them in alphabetical order by title. But when they aren't from the same year, a new problem arises. For example, the two items from 2007 below now have an item from 2008 in between them.

    CBI. 2007a. “Climate Change: Everyone’s Business”. London: Confederation of British Industries.

    ———. 2008. “Don’t Give up on Climate Change during Recession, Urges CBI.” London: Confederation of British Industry.”

    ———. 2007b. “Top Business Leaders Join CBI Climate Change Task Force.” London: Confederation of British Industries.”

    What I'm looking for is an ordering by Author/Source > Year (ignoring month and day) > Title. When I use ASA style rather than Chicago, it comes out as I'd like it, in this order:

    CBI. 2007a. Climate change: everyone’s business. London: Confederation of British Industries.

    CBI. 2007b. ‘Top Business Leaders Join CBI Climate Change Task Force.’ London: Confederation of British Industries.

    CBI. 2008. ‘Don’t give up on climate change during recession, urges CBI.’ London: Confederation of British Industry.

    Any suggestions for how to make that happen with Chicago style?
  • <sort>
    <key macro="contributors"/>
    <key macro="date"/>
    <key macro="title"/>
    </sort>
    should do it then
  • edited December 9, 2013
    *where <key macro="date"/> is actually <key macro="issued"/> (?)
  • no, date is correct - that's what the year macro is called for Chicago author-date.
  • My apologies. Looked in the wrong style.
  • That eliminates some major headaches. Thanks!!!!
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