Entire Journals
I would like to be able to enter an entire journal as an entry. So far only individual journal articles can be documented. In doing an historical review I have found it useful to document the publication period of older journals, but there is no document category for Journal. This would also be useful for special issues.
I've searched the discussion forums, but couldn't find any discussion of this.
I've searched the discussion forums, but couldn't find any discussion of this.
What exactly would you need an entire journal to include? And does it need to be citable?
i.e. if you just create it as a Book entry - what fields are you missing?
Also, once hierarchical item type arrive - which, imo, seems to be rather distant future, this could be taken up again.
https://www.zotero.org/trac/ticket/661
I had used the search engine at the top of the page, but everything it found seemed concerned with citation styles for specific journals. (I never realized there was so many specific variations requiring entirely new styles.)
I will use the Book item type for now as it does have the requisite fields.
I wouldn't use my Zotero entry concerning a journal series for a citation, but I would use an entry on a Special Issue (as opposed to individual contributions to that issue) for a citation.
I'm still learning all that Zotero can do. I only recently realized the ability to change the field for author to editor as I started entering my ridiculously large thesis bibliography. I wish I'd started with Zotero 4 years ago...
Like mdfurney, I would like to quote an issue of a journal or a magazine (e.g. for the above mentioned special issues, or to state which issues of a journal were included in an analysis) or sometimes just to have it in my database (e.g. add note “nothing relevant for me in this issue” – after all, Zotero is not a bibliographical program but a “research tool”). For the latter it is probably sufficient to use the item type “book”, still it’s not very neat. But for the former the fields are not right, which would show up in a bibliography. With an item type “journal/magazine/newspaper issue” it would be possible to define the right output in CSL.
We have very specific plans to include entire periodicals as item types:
https://github.com/avram/zotero-bits/issues/23
And a general awareness of the need to cite special issues:
https://github.com/avram/zotero-bits/issues/36
though nothing very concrete on how to procede on that.
The first of the two is hopefully going to happen this year, though no promises. The 2nd one I don't know. Could be at the same time, could also take longer.
If I do as Adamsmith suggests and choose Book type, I'm missing, the "issue" field so I can write the number or the issue, right now I have to write it in the Title field.
If I add a "series editor", there appears a "series number" field which I'm unsure what it means..
Also I would reeeaaaally appreciate hierarchical item types.. Makes little sense having 30 articles from a same magazine listed as different items!! Even if I use the "related" field, it makes it very difficult to manage.
Any help is welcome!
However, as a workaround, and since this comes up so rarely, pretending it's an article actually seems to be close to the right formatting, just omitting page numbers and including the names as editors rather than authors. The only obvious problem is for styles that want some special term like "special issue" in the citation.
Since it comes up so rarely for me, it's not a major priority for me personally, but I wanted to add in my voice that this seems "wrong" based on any current options, as a technicality, and may require manual revision if we need to cite these in a work, depending on the style.
This is a now a request with an 8 (8!) year history—there is clearly a reasonable and consistent demand for this feature. I would really hope that Zotero could accommodate this need in the immediate future.
When hierarchical items come (and pigs fly), I would like the hierarchy:
--> Journal (name, publisher etc.)
--> Volume (i.e. usually a year's worth; that which is bound as a book in a library).
--> Issue (the physical journal that one receives in the post or buys at the 20C newsagent. This is associated with the date [which, BTW can sometimes have multiple months or a season, like "spring"]
--> Journal Article
This would match the hierarchy usually found on a journal's web-site or in a library index. The same would apply to magazines.
Newspapers are a bit different as Volume does not apply and an Issue is generally identified (in archives etc.) just by the date.
In the present Zotero, Journal is like a book series, Volume and Issue are both like Books and Journal article is like a Book Section. Note that some Journals vary their name from year to year.
(Started October 23, 2006)
“Books and Book Sections: Avoiding Input of Duplicate Info”
https://forums.zotero.org/discussion/78/
(Started February 5, 2007)
“Hierarchical Item Relationships”
https://forums.zotero.org/discussion/391/2/hierarchical-item-relationships/
(Started July 6, 2015)
“Sub-items”
https://forums.zotero.org/discussion/comment/228300
(Started August 24, 2015)
“Hierarchical item types”
https://forums.zotero.org/discussion/51349/hierarchical-item-types/
(Started December 1, 2020 by me)
“Feature Request: Link Book Sections to Book”
https://forums.zotero.org/discussion/86468/feature-request-link-book-sections-to-book/
From what I understand, this is still an unresolved issue... and I need it too.
You mentioned that "periodical" would probably be in Zotero 5.1
Do you have any idea WHEN that new version of Zotero is due to be released?
Any plans in the near future?
In the meantime, I am trying to use the "book" item.
The problem is that, when I enter "2020-06" in the date field, for example, and cite in MLA, it does not indicate the month.
Is there a workaround for this?
If we are only entering one article from a journal, then we can use the article type or the in book approach?
I came here because I have a PDF of the whole journal issue and I was hoping to have a simpler way than to create each article entirely.
In addition to managing citations, I am attempting to catalog my library, both physical books, journals & pamphlets as well as e-copies. You can to a point where you cannot find whether you have something or where it is.
Many thanks for your consideration.
As print media history and periodical studies continue to become larger and exert their influence across the humanities and social sciences more generally, there is only going to be more of a need for an ability to cite entire issues. The current workarounds are insufficient and too time consuming—especially when it comes to those of us for whom periodicals are not just secondary but primary to our research and need to cite a vast amount of periodicals in full.
Thank you for your continued work on this.
Any news about plans of adding periodical item type?
Type: periodical
That will be cited as a periodical for styles that support it. A dedicated periodical type will likely be added to Zotero at some point in the future.
Merci à vous
and for adding something to the discussion:
Book is not a useful type for periodicals (magazines) as they have Issue numbers. And there is no field for this in the book type.
Best regards,
Aljoscha