Incorrect margins when dragging reference to Word 2007 from Zotero 1.0

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  • jpaulgoode
    Thanks for the suggestion, but setting that to "true" didn't make a difference.
  • Shannon2255
    edited September 15, 2014
    I'm having the same trouble: Zotero Bibliography overrides Word 2007 margins with Zotero resetting left margin at .5" All I need to do is the bibliography.

    If I click on Print Bibliography instead of Copy to Clipboard (my favorite way of moving digital files), I get 1" margins. There's something wrong with Zotero communicating with Word 2007. Yes, I've reset all margins, even after importing. The only 'work around' is manually adjusting each line.
  • aurimas
    edited September 15, 2014
    The issue here is really with Word. Zotero places the bibliography into clipboard as HTML-formatted text. It creates hanging indents using standard techniques with setting padding-left: 2em (which indents all text by 2em) and setting text-indent: -2em (which moves the _first_ line in each paragraph 2em to the left). Word ignores the padding-left value when pasting HTML, so you just get the -2em for the first line, which ends up going into the margin.

    I'm looking for a solution, but I don't see one currently. If you just need to print the bibliography, then select the items in Zotero, right-click them, select Create Bibliography From Items..., pick the style you want, save it as HTML, then open the file in your browser and print.
  • Shannon2255
    edited September 15, 2014
    I ended up exporting it as an RTF file, opening a new Word document, then clicked on the RTF file (I had to click on "All Files" so I could see it.) After it opened in the Word document, I "saved as" Word Document. Faster than manually resetting the margins.

    I also discovered that if I Print only the bibliography from Zotero, the default formatting, such as line spacing, is not 12 font double spaced.

    I'm just glad to find an easy work around. Thank you for your help.
  • aurimas
    I also discovered that if I Print only the bibliography from Zotero, the default formatting, such as line spacing, is not 12 font double spaced.
    From my testing, it seems that Word is at fault here again (though I guess it depends on what you define as double-spaced). Zotero's HTML export and Print function (same thing) use the literal definition of double-spacing: for 12pt font double-spaced is 24pt. It doesn't use 12pt for single spaced text, because that's not very nice on the eyes (it uses 1.35 x 12pt, which is in the optimal range [1]). Word makes up it's own values for single spacing and just doubles that for double-spacing [1], hence the difference between the two. Neither of them do a true single-spaced bibliography (no one probably wants to see that anyway), but at least Zotero gets the double-spacing right.

    [1] http://practicaltypography.com/line-spacing.html
  • jmhuculak
    I'm still getting this issues when copying APA style from clipboard and pasting into World 2016 (mac). Any news on this topic?
  • stanmeyer
    Still getting incorrect margins when i copy bibliography into word. Left margin is 1/2 inch left of page margin
    any suggestions how to fix it??
  • jpaulgoode
    I've had this problem for years. Every few months or so I check if there's been some fix. But it doesn't seem like anybody's interested in a fix and just blames Word.

    I copy individual references into Outlook and Word all the time and the left margins are always left of the page margin. It's very annoying.
  • clementr
    I have just started having this problem. Was never an issue in the past, then it started happening yesterday. For me it is not limited to Word, as it also happens in Google Docs. So blaming Word doesn't seem to be the solution.
  • adomasven
    edited November 3, 2016
    I am afraid this is a MS Office problem, even with the newest version, they seem to ignore certain CSS properties to make this work properly. For Word, you should just use a Word Processor Plugin, which will format the bibliography properly.

    A quick way to make it look right in Outlook is to highlight the inserted bibliography entry (or multiple entries) and press the [TAB] key, which should readjust the margin.

    A Google Docs fix will be included in Zotero 5.0, which is currently in Beta.
  • tomfjackson
    edited December 27, 2017
    I must say this problem is still driving me crazy. I drag and drop a lot into syllabi and constantly have to reformat just those citations. My left margin moves .33"

    So the word processor plug-in doesn't work for me as I drag and drop individual cites into weekly assignments. Anyone find a fix for this yet? Thanks, Tom ("Increase Indent" actually fixes the problem but who wants to do that for everything?)
  • bwiernik
    edited December 28, 2017
    Drag and drop is not using the word processor plugin. To add references using the Word plugin, you need to click the Add/Edit Citation button in the Zotero tab.

    As I believe this very old thread says, the indent change is an issue with Word’s handling of HTML drag and drop content that Zotero can’t control. Inserting citations using the word processor plugin doesn’t have this issue.

    If you have additional questions, please start a new thread.
  • tomfjackson
    I don't use the word plug-in at all in my course syllabi, as I have not figured out how to make it work as quickly as dragging and dropping or using "create bibliography from item" for multiple cites. Working from within Zotero Stand Alone is a fast way to insert bibliographic citations. Each week has numerous suggested readings and these are added to separate weeks as I become aware of them and select them from my library folders corresponding to the topic.
    Besides, in my plug in for Word 2013, "Add/Edit Bibliography" simply inserts the word {bibliography} in the document and no matter how many cites I add to that, nothing transfers. Sorry not to be clearer: this is why the "plug-in doesn't work for me."
  • bwiernik
    You need to first add citations to the items, then add the Bibliogrpahy after you’ve added the individual citations. See here for how to use the Word plugin:
    https://www.zotero.org/support/word_processor_plugin_usage

    But agree that that’s not the best way for making a syllabus. As I wrote above, dragging is a bug in Word that Zotero doesn’t have control over. You can instead use the keyboard shortcut (Ctrl/Cmd-Shift-C) to copy the references then paste into your document. Or you can select the items in Zotero, right-click, and choose “Create Bibliogrpahy” to Copy the items to the clipboard or export directly to an RTF document.
  • tomfjackson
    edited December 28, 2017
    Thanks! Inserting citations and generating bibliographies is indeed too cumbersome. In the process, I came upon two work-arounds to the Word glitch: 1. Drag and drop and then click on the "increase indent" button in "Paragraph" in the Word 2013 Ribbon OR 2. "create bibliography from items" in Zotero, then PASTE using the "merge formatting" rather than "keep source formatting" option in Word 2013. Hope this helps. No need to open a new thread if MS Office can't be fixed. Dear kovboi: found another fix?

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