Bolding Author Names

alg1223
My institution keeps track of all publications by an associated author. Part of the way we do this is to bold those specific author names within each citation (currently we use EndNote). Is it possible to do this in Zotero, or would it be a possible feature in the future?

Thanks!
  • fbennett
    edited August 2, 2019
    The only way to accomplish that would be to set boldface markup on the name in each Zotero item (i.e. <b>Smith</b>). For a large set of items, it's possible to do that programmatically with a little effort, but since it means altering the item content, you would want to use a separate group library for that purpose.
  • bwiernik
    I keep a separate group library with the author names in bold brackets like fbennett says for just this purpose. I also include various annotations, like asterisks for author order arrangements, on these items
  • alg1223
    If I put the boldface markup in, does that show it has bold when you are just looking at the Zotero entry or only in the output?

    Is it possible for Zotero to be updated to allow for author names to be bolded like you would in the notes (with just ctrl+b for example). Is there somewhere to request that as an update?
  • bwiernik
    It will show the markup in the Zotero app interface and as bold text in any rendered citations and bibliographies. More integrated support for entering and displaying text markup in the Zotero app itself is planned, but requires a move to a new development framework that is currently underway to be finished first.
  • alg1223
    Thanks! Is there a timeline for the move?
  • internationaled
    Just wanted to mention that this would be helpful for me, as well. The application here again would be boldfacing my own name in my curriculum vitae references per university standards.
  • bwiernik
    Just to reiterate comments above—you can already do this for applications like CVs by putting the author last name in <b> </b> tags
  • johnmy
    edited July 24, 2022
    For batch operation, the plugin https://github.com/redleafnew/zotero-updateifsE could be used, it just find the author name you input and replace it with <b> author name </b> in batch.
  • internationaled
    @bwiernik, the drawback to including the boldface tag in the author name is that I use some of my own references in my writing, which breaks the citations in APA. For APA, you would need to put <b>Lastname, FI. MI.</b> in the last name field and then delete anything that appears in the first name field. But then that breaks the citations, which subsequently appear as "(Lastname, FI. MI., 2018)" instead of "(Lastname, 2018)".

    Maybe at some point an Extras option could be added indicate the name that should be boldfaced when using the Curriculum Vitae citation styles, but I'm sure everyone has bigger issues to address than this. In Word, I did a search and replace for my name and initials and replaced it with boldface. That seems to be the best solution for me given what I mention above.

    @johnmy, I appreciate the suggestion. I did translate the read.me into English for that plugin, but it wasn't immediately clear to me how this tool would facilitate this. Maybe something was lost in translation, or maybe I just didn't get it (most likely the latter). Also, I saw Chinese scattered throughout the code and didn't have the time to translate all of that. I feel it's always a good idea to look to see what an unknown plugin is doing, especially one that isn't listed in the Zotero plugin directory.
  • internationaled
    edited July 24, 2022
    (Accidentally posted twice.)
  • johnmy
    Sorry for the incomplete readme, I will show you in a vedio.
    https://www.dropbox.com/s/2rxby9gfi5yzqjc/author-bold-star.mp4?dl=0
  • internationaled
    Oh, wow! You have included some great time-saving features here. Very nice work indeed! And thank you very much for the video explanation.
Sign In or Register to comment.