Upgrade StorageDealing with "Extra" field disrupting workflow
I currently have a workflow that I use to easily cite journal articles in LaTeX using Overleaf and Zotero:
1. Navigate to the webpage of the article I would like to cite.
2. Use Zotero connector for Chrome to save the article to my library, including the relevant metadata.
3. Add a citation to the LaTeX project in Overleaf, which is linked to my Zotero account and so automatically includes a (refreshable) .bib file that includes all entries from my Zotero library.
So far, this has been very convenient and has allowed me to avoid manually entering citation information or repeatedly exporting bibliography entries from Zotero.
The only issue with this otherwise painless process is the "Extra" field which, as far as I can tell, is automatically populated with any metadata that could not be assigned to another field such as Title, Author, etc. Most often, for reasons that are not entirely clear to me, this field simply contains redundant information such as the publisher, DOI, or URL, which are already stored elsewhere. In fact, in my experience, I have never found any useful or original information stored in this field.
When formatting the bibliography in LaTeX, this field is printed by most bibliography styles causing every entry to contain annoying and undesired extra text at the end of an otherwise normal citation. It seems like this problem is not new, since I found a forum post from 2010 mentioning this exact issue, which is linked below.
Previously, I was able to delete this field before printing the bibliography using BibLaTeX. Unfortunately, I am now creating a document that cannot make use of BibLaTeX and must use BibTeX with a predefined style, so this workaround is no longer possible.
The only solutions I have been able to find so far are:
1. Manually clear the "Extra" field from every entry I would like to cite
2. Use SQL (or similar) to clear the "Extra" fields in bulk
3. Create a custom .bib file for use in Overleaf, distinct from the one that is automatically generated, which does not include the undesired sections
I wouldn't mind going through this manual process for a few citations but for projects with dozens or more citations, it seems unreasonably time-consuming. Also, any of these solutions would still require me to manually clear the extra data from every new item that I want to add to my Zotero library and cite in this way going forward, adding an extra step to my workflow.
I'm curious if anyone has any suggestions to remedy this problem permanently without adding an extra step to my workflow. Perhaps there is a way to alter whether the Zotero connector writes any data to the "Extra" field when adding an item to my library so that this is simply left blank from the beginning? Or perhaps some way to programmatically (SQL or otherwise) check my Zotero library periodically and clear out all of the "Extra" fields?
I don't mind doing a little initial legwork (coding, etc.) if it means that I can set up a permanent solution that doesn't alter the workflow I outlined above.
Link to 2010 Forum Post:https://forums.zotero.org/discussion/12992/a-way-to-delete-all-info-from-all-extra-fields#:~:text=The problem is that Zotero's 'extra' gets exported by the BibTeX translator.
1. Navigate to the webpage of the article I would like to cite.
2. Use Zotero connector for Chrome to save the article to my library, including the relevant metadata.
3. Add a citation to the LaTeX project in Overleaf, which is linked to my Zotero account and so automatically includes a (refreshable) .bib file that includes all entries from my Zotero library.
So far, this has been very convenient and has allowed me to avoid manually entering citation information or repeatedly exporting bibliography entries from Zotero.
The only issue with this otherwise painless process is the "Extra" field which, as far as I can tell, is automatically populated with any metadata that could not be assigned to another field such as Title, Author, etc. Most often, for reasons that are not entirely clear to me, this field simply contains redundant information such as the publisher, DOI, or URL, which are already stored elsewhere. In fact, in my experience, I have never found any useful or original information stored in this field.
When formatting the bibliography in LaTeX, this field is printed by most bibliography styles causing every entry to contain annoying and undesired extra text at the end of an otherwise normal citation. It seems like this problem is not new, since I found a forum post from 2010 mentioning this exact issue, which is linked below.
Previously, I was able to delete this field before printing the bibliography using BibLaTeX. Unfortunately, I am now creating a document that cannot make use of BibLaTeX and must use BibTeX with a predefined style, so this workaround is no longer possible.
The only solutions I have been able to find so far are:
1. Manually clear the "Extra" field from every entry I would like to cite
2. Use SQL (or similar) to clear the "Extra" fields in bulk
3. Create a custom .bib file for use in Overleaf, distinct from the one that is automatically generated, which does not include the undesired sections
I wouldn't mind going through this manual process for a few citations but for projects with dozens or more citations, it seems unreasonably time-consuming. Also, any of these solutions would still require me to manually clear the extra data from every new item that I want to add to my Zotero library and cite in this way going forward, adding an extra step to my workflow.
I'm curious if anyone has any suggestions to remedy this problem permanently without adding an extra step to my workflow. Perhaps there is a way to alter whether the Zotero connector writes any data to the "Extra" field when adding an item to my library so that this is simply left blank from the beginning? Or perhaps some way to programmatically (SQL or otherwise) check my Zotero library periodically and clear out all of the "Extra" fields?
I don't mind doing a little initial legwork (coding, etc.) if it means that I can set up a permanent solution that doesn't alter the workflow I outlined above.
Link to 2010 Forum Post:https://forums.zotero.org/discussion/12992/a-way-to-delete-all-info-from-all-extra-fields#:~:text=The problem is that Zotero's 'extra' gets exported by the BibTeX translator.
extrato not show up, the BBT plugin can remove any field you like with a javascript snippet (aka "postscript"), which will execute any time you export.This does mean that you'll have to use dropbox or git to transport your bib file to overleaf. It will not work for the standard zotero-overleaf connection.
Another option is a javascript snippet to run in the zotero dev console which will just clear out all
extrafields. The results of that will show up in overleaf. You would have to occasionally re-run it, but it be paste-click-done.