This sometimes happens to me when I'm editing and adding names. I cannot reliably reproduce the behavior. I've become convinced that I'm not _precisely_ clicking on the + and am actually clicking in the abstract field. Shift-Enter will add a new author line.
1) Add item using an ISBN (e.g., 978-3-447-06657-0 - not sure if this is necessary), 2) manually add another author/editor by clicking on the "+" - do not choose one from the list of suggestions, 3) manually add a third author/editor by clicking on the "+".
I retract what I said above. The video makes it clear that there is more to this than a misplaced click. This still happens to me too frequently and I have to click elsewhere and then the "+" again or click in the first author field and shift-enter. It appears that @mschwarze may be using a Mac with a non-Apple mouse. That is my situation. Never happens with Zotero but with other software sometimes the cursor doesn't become an arrow-pointer but remains a hand (as though I am about to click on a link). The hand click works. When I've talked with AppleCare they acknowledge that my issue can happen with Logitech pointing tools. I don't like the MagicMouse so I've learned to live with the pointer. I understand that much of Zotero is developed on a Mac so I wonder if anyone can replicate the problem.
I use the stacked view. If it is possible to add a small additional spacing between the end of the list of authors and the abstract field this might go away. If it is possible to add a small amount of space to separate the authors from the abstract, might it be possible to add a similar small space above the item Title after the Item Type? I all too frequently click in the title field and my machine reads the click as though it is in the Item Type field.
@dstillman I had convinced myself that this problem was user error on my part until I viewed the @mschwarze video.
I also have this issue quite regularly. I am on Windows with a Logitech mouse (but it also happens with the touchpad of the laptop), so I'm assuming we can exclude the possibility that it is simply the combination of a Mac & a non-Apple mouse.
I just reproduced the issue by adding a new entry, copying in a title, and a first author, adding a second one, and when I tried to add a third one, it jumped into the abstract field.
I generated a Report ID: 1364149336, in case this might be helpful
I feel that I need to express my disappointment that this isn't as simple as my using a Logitec mouse with a Mac. I felt an emotional let-down when I read that this also was occurring with a Windows OS. As I understand that the Zotero development team uses Macs, I was going to ask what pointer software hardware was being used. This is such an obvious and frequent problem among those of us who encounter it; I believe that the developers systems are such that they do not encounter the glitch.
I'm going to borrow a friend's fancy gamer's mouse when they are on vacation to learn if a more precision pointing tool might make a difference. (I do have other point-click-select issues outside of Zotero. These issues increased after the update to Big Sur. I try to insert the cursor but instead select a word ahead of or behind the point where I want to insert the cursor.) I'll post here if I notice an improvement with the gamer-mouse.
Shift-Enter from the firstname field is great for adding another author. However, when I need to edit the author list (when journal article metadata includes author institutions as a discrete listed author that must be removed from the list) it seems that the active "hot point" of the Zotero UI and the tip of my mouse arrow are misaligned.
edit: The authors' affiliations are in the header meta tags as separate authors and are in the DOI record as separate authors. Some authors have more than one affiliation (and as an additional author listed). When more than one author is from a single institution the institution is listed again as a duplicate author name.There isn't a pattern that could be identified by a translator to determine automatically which "non-author authors" to remove. Especially a problem because sometimes the author list includes an actual institutional author, "Committee for the Investigation of ...". Yes, I've written to the publisher and the journal editors but without success.
edit2: I did not have this problem (several years ago) when I used an old ThinkPad with a Logitec mouse with Windows.
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https://www.zotero.org/support/reporting_problems
I captured the undesired behaviour in this video: https://1drv.ms/v/s!At2iVKW7O0Q9qhvMqJSiHh4Tql1I
Debug ID: D1681149918
Steps to reproduce:
1) Add item using an ISBN (e.g., 978-3-447-06657-0 - not sure if this is necessary),
2) manually add another author/editor by clicking on the "+" - do not choose one from the list of suggestions,
3) manually add a third author/editor by clicking on the "+".
I use the stacked view. If it is possible to add a small additional spacing between the end of the list of authors and the abstract field this might go away. If it is possible to add a small amount of space to separate the authors from the abstract, might it be possible to add a similar small space above the item Title after the Item Type? I all too frequently click in the title field and my machine reads the click as though it is in the Item Type field.
@dstillman I had convinced myself that this problem was user error on my part until I viewed the @mschwarze video.
I just reproduced the issue by adding a new entry, copying in a title, and a first author, adding a second one, and when I tried to add a third one, it jumped into the abstract field.
I generated a Report ID: 1364149336, in case this might be helpful
Apparently it is hard to fix...
I'm going to borrow a friend's fancy gamer's mouse when they are on vacation to learn if a more precision pointing tool might make a difference. (I do have other point-click-select issues outside of Zotero. These issues increased after the update to Big Sur. I try to insert the cursor but instead select a word ahead of or behind the point where I want to insert the cursor.) I'll post here if I notice an improvement with the gamer-mouse.
Shift-Enter from the firstname field is great for adding another author. However, when I need to edit the author list (when journal article metadata includes author institutions as a discrete listed author that must be removed from the list) it seems that the active "hot point" of the Zotero UI and the tip of my mouse arrow are misaligned.
edit: The authors' affiliations are in the header meta tags as separate authors and are in the DOI record as separate authors. Some authors have more than one affiliation (and as an additional author listed). When more than one author is from a single institution the institution is listed again as a duplicate author name.There isn't a pattern that could be identified by a translator to determine automatically which "non-author authors" to remove. Especially a problem because sometimes the author list includes an actual institutional author, "Committee for the Investigation of ...". Yes, I've written to the publisher and the journal editors but without success.
edit2: I did not have this problem (several years ago) when I used an old ThinkPad with a Logitec mouse with Windows.