Changing letter template in Chicago Manual of Style

kientzla · January 30, 2009

I'm sorry, but I have never worked with html before, so I don't understand the other forums about how to fix citation styles.

I need the "letter" template to not put the to/from (title) in quotes, include the location in archive, and the repository in the note. I would absolutely love it if a citation manager would have a special form for a letter (with to/from instead of author/title). I used Endnote before I found Zotero (and still do to an extent since I understand how to manipulate it better). I had to force Endnote into citing archival materials, but I feel like it does it with one hand tied behind its back. I was so excited when I saw that Zotero included entry blanks for archival info.

adamsmith · January 30, 2009

This looks like it should be feasible, but please provide a sample citation (i.e. what Zotero does and what you want it to do).
The above is a bit hoard to follow.

kientzla · January 30, 2009

When I reread I thought the same.

Zotero does this: “Harris to Goetz, 6 Apr 1925.” (if I suppress the author) or this Harris, “Harris to Goetz, 6 Apr 1925.” (if I don't).

The title I entered was "Harris to Goetz, 6 Apr 1925". I also filled in the author, date, location in archive, and repository fields.

It should be this: Harris to Goetz, 6 Apr 1925, Box 7, Calverton Papers Columbia.

bdarcus · January 30, 2009

The title I entered was "Harris to Goetz, 6 Apr 1925". I also filled in the author, date, location in archive, and repository fields.

The first part seems wrong. Enter Harris and Goetz as separate author and recipient contributors, and leave the title empty. See what happens then.

Aside: this points to some recurring issues with typing in Zotero. This example is neither only a Letter, nor a Manuscript; it's both. It might be that the style needs to be tweaked to be a little more resilient, but am not sure.

kientzla · January 30, 2009

Ok--I see I was entering letters incorrectly. However, now it gives me:

Harris to Goetz, May 12, 1925.

I still need the archival information.

Thanks for the help!

bdarcus · January 30, 2009

Which Chicago style are you using? Can you post the link from the repo list?

kientzla · January 30, 2009

Do you know what the difference between (full note with bibliography) and (note with bibliography) are?

full note: http://www.zotero.org/styles/chicago-fullnote-bibliography
note: http://www.zotero.org/styles/chicago-note-bibliography

I'm using footnotes. I want the full form of the citation in the footnote the first time the source is used. All subsequent footnotes should be in the short form of the citation.

I've searched and searched through the physical copy of the Chicago Manual and it doesn't really have a guideline for manuscript sources other than to be "consistent."

bdarcus · January 30, 2009

Elena has been primarily responsible for these styles, so I'd like to see if she can chime in before I make any changes.

Here's what I see as the problem:

<macro name="access-note">
  <group delimiter=", ">
    <choose>
      <if type="graphic report" match="any">
        <text macro="archive-note"/>
      </if>
      <else-if type="book thesis chapter article-journal 
            article-newspaper article-magazine" match="none">
         <text macro="archive-note"/>
       </else-if>
     </choose>
     <text variable="DOI" prefix="doi:"/>
     <text variable="URL"/>
  </group>
</macro>

This macro (which is what is handling archive information) is pretty restrictive. Elena, why not just remove the conditional entirely and do the following?

<macro name="access-note">
  <group delimiter=", ">
     <text macro="archive-note"/>
     <text variable="DOI" prefix="doi:"/>
     <text variable="URL"/>
  </group>
</macro>

The only problem I can see with that change off-hand is that it might run into what I've called a bug where "archive" is understood rather too liberally by Zotero.

erazlogo · January 30, 2009

@kientzla:

Ok--I see I was entering letters incorrectly. However, now it gives me:

Harris to Goetz, May 12, 1925.

I still need the archival information.

You must be using "note with bibliography" style which gives you a short citation for every footnote. Switch to "full note with bibliography" and you will see the archival information in the footnote.

@Bruce:

This macro (which is what is handling archive information) is pretty restrictive. Elena, why not just remove the conditional entirely and do the following?

Your guess is correct--the conditional is there because currently Zotero puts the name of the library catalogue in the "Repository" field when downloading books and the name of the article database when downloading articles. This needs to be changed before removing the code. Here is the ticket with the relevant discussion: https://www.zotero.org/trac/ticket/853

Aside: this points to some recurring issues with typing in Zotero. This example is neither only a Letter, nor a Manuscript; it's both. It might be that the style needs to be tweaked to be a little more resilient, but am not sure.

What do you think should be changed? Some memoranda do include titles, so we should probably keep the title field for letters. Or were you thinking of something else?

bdarcus · January 30, 2009

The solution in that ticket sounds good.

But on looking at that macro again, I'm confused why it's not working correctly here. It seems to me the else-if condition should mean that a letter would call that macro.

As for what I was suggesting might be changed, it seems it already was (but I earlier missed it): to allow archival information for letters. Might also make sense to allow more contributors on Manuscript though (?).

kientzla · January 30, 2009

Is there somewhere that explains the difference between Note and Full note? It might be good to give users a little heads-up.

kientzla · January 30, 2009

Thanks!

kientzla · January 30, 2009

One more question. I have forty odd letters between the same two individuals. I probably don't need their full names in each citation. With the full note version (which includes archival information!), it shortens the citation for each letter after the first use, which is great. But I still end up with cluttered footnotes. For example:

4. Abram Harris to George Goetz, March 25, 1925, Box 7, Calverton Papers, NYPL.
5. Abram Harris to George Goetz, February 10, 1925, Box 7, Calverton Papers, NYPL.
6. Harris to Goetz, March 25, 1925.

Is there some way to make them all Harris to Goetz? Maybe I should leave out first names when I fill in the citation information?

adamsmith · January 31, 2009

hmm - this would be _possible_ by adapting the style, but not completely trivial, because for other bibliographic references you'd still want the first names - so it would be necessary to create an exception for letters.

I don't think the footnotes look cluttered as they are, though.

kientzla · January 31, 2009

It wouldn't be good to adapt the style b/c there are some letters where having both names is very important. Maybe there could be a button like "suppress author"--"suppress first names"

kientzla · February 1, 2009

One other question--some of my footnotes have periods at the end, and some don't (they all should). Example:

1. Harris to Goetz, April 6, 1925; Abram Harris to George Goetz, June 18, 1925.
2. Abram Harris to George Goetz, December 12, 1924, Box 7, Calverton Papers, NYPL
3. Abram Harris to George Goetz, May 12, 1925, Box 7, Calverton Papers, NYPL.
4 Harris to Goetz, June 18, 1925

fbennett · February 1, 2009

@kientzla, I've noticed that cites come out with no period when first entered, but acquire a period when citations are refreshed. Just to be sure, do you not get a period on those items after clicking the Zotero refresh icon in Word/OO?

adamsmith · February 1, 2009

hmm - hard to say. There should be a period after every citation - the style is explicit about that so no idea what's happening. Can you check if the citations behave the same way in the test pane?
chrome://zotero/content/tools/csledit.xul

erazlogo · February 1, 2009

@kientzla, I've noticed that cites come out with no period when first entered, but acquire a period when citations are refreshed.

Yes, this is a known bug--see this ticket: https://www.zotero.org/trac/ticket/884

kientzla · February 3, 2009

yep, thanks, worked.