No duplicates in database, but getting "a", "b", etc after citation

I'm running into a problem where I have no duplicates in the database, but when I add a citation or bibliography it Zotero is adding a letter after the date.


For example, the biblioography cites this as 2 different articles, but there is only one in the database. I'm not seeing any differences between the two versions, except for the "a" and "b" after the year.

Havel, J. E., and Medley, K. A. (2006a). Biological invasions across spatial scales: Intercontinental, regional, and local dispersal of cladoceran zooplankton. Biological Invasions, 8(3), 459–473. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10530-005-6410-4

- cites inline as Havel and Medley, 2006a

Havel, J. E., and Medley, K. A. (2006b). Biological invasions across spatial scales: Intercontinental, regional, and local dispersal of cladoceran zooplankton. Biological Invasions, 8(3), 459–473. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10530-005-6410-4

- cites inline as Havel and Medley, 2006b

I have removed and re-added the bibliography, removed and re-added the citation, but it still shows the same result.

However, when I open a new document, it brings the citations across correctly with no letter showing up after the date in the citation (Havel and Medley, 2006) and no letter after the date in the bibliography

Havel, J. E., and Medley, K. A. (2006). Biological invasions across spatial scales: Intercontinental, regional, and local dispersal of cladoceran zooplankton. Biological Invasions, 8(3), 459–473. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10530-005-6410-4

As this document is currently in excess of 100 pages and 50+ different citations, It's not something I want to go back and remove every citation and reenter them. It's obviously something that is saved in the document itself, but I have no idea where to look or what to remove. This is similar to a question asked earlier (https://forums.zotero.org/discussion/63882/why-alphabetic-letters-a-b-or-c-appearing-after-year-for-some-references-and-how-to-avoid-this), but I see no answer for it. I also do not see the the button/box/checkmark/whatever for the answer given by adamsmith, so I can't try that (`So the easiest way to fix this would be to replace every instance of that citation, making sure to always use the item listed under "My Library" in the word processor add-on, not the one listed under "Cited" "`)

Currently running Microsoft Word 2016 for Mac, Version 15.40, and running Mac on OSX High Sierra.

  • For my answer (which is indeed the best/only solution), as you insert citations using the word processor add-on as per https://www.zotero.org/support/word_processor_plugin_usage, when you search for "Havel" in the red box, you'll first get search results under "cited" then under "My Library" make sure to check the ones under "My Library".

    See https://imgur.com/a/wIdwI

    And just to be clear, you don't have to change _every_ citation, just the Havel and Medley one.
  • Thanks, however, I'm not getting the same dialog box that you are. Here's what I'm doing and seeing.

    Original page: https://imgur.com/fl3Ugdx
    Dialog box that comes up: https://imgur.com/E8uC22r
    Choose a reference: https://imgur.com/cUE8Hcr
    Result: https://imgur.com/Nn2KVyK

    I'm not given any option for "Cited" or "My Library".
  • You'd have to have that view ("classic view") enabled specifically and you can switch in the Cite tab of the Zotero preferences, but if you select a new reference from the classic view it's automatically from your library. That'd likely also tell you which of the two (2006a or 2006b) you need to replace.
  • Ok, thanks, that helps. Didn't tell me which to replace so I'm just looking at the db and choosing the only one that is there.

    I have about 50 instances to replace of various sources to replace, so it will take a while. Any idea of how this occurs?

    Also, went in and looked at the html of the document (Word is actually a series of html files, to see them, unzip a document) and found all of the references, but wasn't sure if I could just update them there or not, but it was interesting to see what they looked like.
  • I think replacing the URI of the "old" one with the "new" one in the xml (looks like html, but docx is technically XML) using search&replace might actually work, as would doing so in the Word fields without using xml. Easy to break things that way, so obviously do this in a copy of the document for security.
  • Yeah, sorry, xml, not html, been years since I have actually done any programming. I may try to do that, if I do, I'll report the results here.
  • Problem solved!! Okay... I had an "a," "b," and a "c." I deleted the source from Zotero, made sure I didn't have copies in different folders in Zotero, then went to my document. The trick is to NOT EDIT a citation until you have cited all. Right click on the citation, click add edit citation button, then when you get the red popup bar with the Z at the front, click the Z. That will give you the option to click classic view. Click it. If any of your citations have page numbers this is where you will note that. After you have them all in the document, make the edits right there in Word.
  • You don’t have to use the classic view. You can just click on the blue bubble for the item to add page numbers, prefixes, suffixes, and to Suppress the authors.
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