Access data for a web page shows up in style preview but it is missing in exported bib file

Hi,

Zotero is very useful to me but I am having a problem: The access date for websites is missing from the bibliography. I suspect that this is because it is missing from the .bib file exported from Zotero. This is what I have done so far:

I have used Zotero Connector in Firefox to add a website to Zotero. In Zotero desktop I see the URL and the date in the "access" field, like this: 2021-06-09 10:50:28. All of this has been added automatically, so far so good.

In Zotero preferences, Cite tab, I select "Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute", a style I added after downloading from Zotero Style Repository. If I press "Style Preview" I can see the following for the website I want to cite, with the access date.
________________________________
Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute
[1]
1.
ENTSO-E Mission Statement Available online: https://www.entsoe.eu/about/inside-entsoe/objectives/ (accessed on 9 June 2021).
_______________________________________________

The above seems right to me. Then, I export with MDPI style and the following format: "Better Bibtex", Translator options: Export notes. However, the bib file doesn't include the access date. It looks like this:
________________________________________________
@misc{ENTSOEMissionStatement,
title = {{{ENTSO}}-{{E Mission Statement}}},
file = {/home/MYUSERNAME/Zotero/storage/KLE4JQRX/objectives.html},
howpublished = {\url{https://www.entsoe.eu/about/inside-entsoe/objectives/}},
language = {en-us}
}
_______________________________________________

Thanks in advance for any help.

  • This seems to be a misunderstanding. Citation styles and export formats are unrelated — you don't export to both. It's one or the other.

    For BibTeX, Zotero's stock exporter includes the access date with the urldate tag. For Better BibTeX, you'd have to ask the BBT developer.
  • Thank you, I see now.

    For the record, I have now url and urldate tags with Better BibTeX. Solved via Zotero Preferences, Better BibTeX, Export tab: Add URLs to BibTeX export in the 'url' field.

    @misc{ENTSOEMissionStatement,
    title = {{{ENTSO}}-{{E Mission Statement}}},
    url = {https://www.entsoe.eu/about/inside-entsoe/objectives/},
    urldate = {2021-06-09},
    file = {/home/MYUSERNAME/Zotero/storage/KLE4JQRX/objectives.html},
    language = {en-us}
    }
  • In BBT, urldate only shows up if the entry has a url field.
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