APA citations output from Scrivener

JennK
edited November 8, 2017
Hi all,
I am using Scrivener for my writing and using the scannable cite format from Zotero. The problem is the APA in-text citations are not properly formatted inside parentheses in the resulting output. Example: (author, year). Rather, the output is the author and year, but not enclosed in parentheses.

Here is the process I am using:
Compile document in Scrivener to .odt format.
Run RTF scan in Zotero with ODF to citations format.
Resulting ODT file correctly converts the in-text citation markers to the author, year format, but without the citation information contained in parentheses.

Does anyone have any ideas how to fix this? Thanks!
  • adamsmith
    It sounds like you're missing the last step: Opening the ODT document in LibreOffice and setting a citation style (APA in your case). What you're describing are just the placeholder citations the scan inserts.
  • JennK
    I have the LibreOffice plugin installed in Zotero. Does this not do the proper formatting? I discovered if I manually put in the parentheses then of course this corrects the issue. But when I've done the in-text citations in the past in Scrivener, I don't recall having to do that.
  • bwiernik
    Can you give the full sequence of steps you are following?
  • JennK
    edited November 8, 2017
    Yes, @bwiernik . To input a citation into Scrivener, I use CTRL + SHIFT + C to copy the scannable cite in Zotero from the parent document. Then I paste the cite into Scrivener.
    To compile the document, I select "format as original" and compile for ODT.
    I save the ODT file.
    Then I go to Zotero and use the RTF scan to open the ODT file. File type selected is ODF to citations. Output is an ODT file.
    Then I open the output file with Word. The citations are converted from the citation markers to the author, year format, but with no parentheses.

    Another issue (which may or may not be related) is that when I open the ODT file with Word after doing the RTF scan, I get the following message: "The file cannot be opened because there are problems with the contents."
    If I click "okay," I get another message: "Word found unreadable content in test (citations).odt. Do you want to recover the contents of this document?"
    If I then click "yes" the file will open but with a small dialog box that lists a series of repairs that were performed. The errors are listed as "character properties."
  • adamsmith
    Then I open the output file with Word. The citations are converted from the citation markers to the author, year format, but with no parentheses.
    no, you can't do that. The moment you open the file in Word after the scan, you break the link to Zotero. You have to use LibreOffice to set the citation style (you can then set the citation format to bookmarks, save as .doc, and open in Word and continue there).

    You need to exactly follow the instructions under "Setting a citation style" here: http://zotero-odf-scan.github.io/zotero-odf-scan/
  • JennK
    @adamsmith - Okay, I opened the ODT file in Libre Office that I created using the Zotero RTF scan. The settings in Zotero for the LO plugin are for APA. The document in Libre Office has the citations formated correctly (author, year), however, it also appears that it does not automatically put the author, year citation inside parentheses.

    Also, I cannot seem to find the "insert bibliography" option in Libre Office (I can when I am using the Zotero plugin for Word). Can you tell me where to find it?
  • JennK
    I also noticed that the citations for works with three to five authors do not seem to have correct citations for APA. The first time a work with three to five authors is cited in-text, all of the names should be included (example: Smith, Jones, Rogers, & Alfred, 2010). For each subsequent citation of that work, the citation should be the first author followed by et al., then the year. Example: Smith et al., 2010. However, each citation with three to five authors shows up only as the Smith et al., 2010 format. In other words, the first citation of the work in the document is not formatted correctly with the names of all authors.

    In addition, there is oddly a comma placed in the citation when there are only two authors. For example: Smith, & Jones, 2010. There should be no comma between Smith and the ampersand. Is this just a code error in the RTF output from Zotero?
  • adamsmith
    It still doesn't sound like you have actually done this:
    "In the toolbar of the Zotero LibreOffice plugin, click the "Set Document Preferences" button and choose a citation style."
    (For one, because that wold set the citation style correct, but also because the insert citation button is right next to that one)
  • JennK
    In Zotero (standalone version), I went to the Libreoffice plugin and set the document preferences to APA 6th. So yes, I did do that, yet the output does not seem to insert the parentheses around the author and the year automatically.

    Now I am looking at the ODT file in LibreOffice. The citations are in APA format, but I put the parentheses in manually in Scrivener. So in other words, if the citations were formatting properly from Zotero, then to the ODT file, then to LibreOffice, it seems like I should now see 2 sets of parentheses. One set being what I added manually in Scrivener, the second set that was added by converting the citation markers to the APA-style references.

    As for the bibliography question, I have the ODT file open in LibreOffice. Now I want to create a bibliography from the citations in the paper. Is there a button in LibreOffice to do this?
  • adamsmith
    In Zotero (standalone version), I went to the Libreoffice plugin and set the document preferences to APA 6th. So yes, I did do that, yet the output does not seem to insert the parentheses around the author and the year automatically.
    no, sorry, you almost certainly didn't. This all happens in LibreOffice, not in Zotero Standalone.(You can't set a citation style for the word processor in Zotero Standalone).

    You're looking for the "Set document preferences" button in the Zotero Toolbar in LibreOffice, which looks basically the same as the Word one. https://www.zotero.org/support/word_processor_plugin_usage
  • JennK
    As a test, in Scrivener, I removed the parentheses that I previously put in manually around the citation marker.
    What I had previously: ( { | English, 1998 | | |zu:2016386:GUYDJNDI}) (parentheses added manually).
    Now: { | English, 1998 | | |zu:2016386:GUYDJNDI}

    I then went through all the steps again (compiled to ODT in Scrivener, used RTF scan in Zotero to create the ODT output file, opened ODT output file in LibreOffice).

    The citation looks like this in the ODT output file: English, 1998

    No parentheses.
  • JennK
    In Zotero standalone, under "add-ins", I selected APA settings for the LibreOffice plugin.

    I'm not seeing any toolbar for Zotero in LibreOffice...??
  • adamsmith
    Maybe this is easier to follow: Check out step 10. here:
    http://thedigitalresearcher.com/how-to-use-zotero-with-scrivener-part-2/
    I'm pretty sure you haven't been doing that.
  • adamsmith
    If you don't see a Zotero toolbar in LibreOffice, you'd have to troubleshoot that separately, starting here: https://www.zotero.org/support/word_processor_plugin_troubleshooting#toolbar_is_missing
  • JennK
    Okay, I got it @adamsmith. I needed to add the Zotero add-in to LibreOffice. Now the citations are formatting correctly and I see where to add in the bibliography with the Zotero button.
    Thank you again for your help!!
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