MHRA with/without bibliography

chmg32
Why are these two styles different? The style 'with bibliography' uses double quotation marks and places punctuation inside of quotation marks - both incorrect. The 'without bibliography' style does it correctly, but without the ability to generate a bibliography, it's pretty useless for me. Am I missing something here?
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  • adamsmith
    These are old styles from the early days of Zotero, so it's very well possible that they're not right. I'll have a look.
  • chmg32
    That would be fantastic - thanks.
  • adamsmith
    OK, for a start, go here
    http://gist.github.com/228849
    download the style by using the "Raw" Link on the top right of the page.
    Install by dragging to an open FF window.
    please report back if everything works alright.

    The styles were written by two different people, the "without note" style is much, much better code (go Rintze!), so it'd be a good idea to shift any MHRA style over to that code.

    I'm not quite sure how to proceed from here. There are several considerations:
    According to MHRA
    "Except when the author–date system (see 11.4) is used or when full details
    are given in a separate bibliography, the first reference to a book, article,or other publication should be given in full and later references in an easily
    identifiable abbreviated form"
    Which seems to imply that there are at least two more possible styles: An MHRA- author date as well as an MHRA-short note - along the lines of what already exists for Chicago style.

    For the sake of keeping things simple, I wonder if there is really a need for a "Full note without bibliography" as well as a "Full note with bibliography" style - if people don't want a bibliography, they can simply not insert it. Not sure where that leads, would be interested in some input.
  • chmg32
    It seems to work - thanks. The short form issue would be a problem; I hadn't yet thought of that, as I've just started playing with this. I don't know anyone who uses the MHRA author-date system, but I'm sure there are a couple of people out there.

    As for the short note, I was rather fantasizing that the plugin would somehow manage that for me - i.e. it would keep track of which reference was the first use of a source and then shorten the rest. Is such a thing pure fantasy at this moment?

    I've also noticed that in the new form you uploaded, it places the period at the end of the footnote, which is appropriate. But when I want to add to the footnote (a specific page reference in a journal article, for example, which must appear as '...: 210-260 (p. 253).'), I can do so, but if I refresh footnotes, it erases what I added. Trying to add the specific page reference via the dialogue box when you first insert the reference gets rid of the full page citation for the entire article, replacing it with the specific page.

    And as for your final question, I can't imagine when I would need a full note without bibliography - I'd be fine without having that style maintained.
  • adamsmith
    as for short form - doesn't the style already do that?
    Zotero (and the plugin) are certainly capable - try the Chicago Manual of Style for an example. If not, that will take some more time to implement - you have to redefine a lot of things.
    The appropriate way to add stuff to citations (including p. 253) is to use the suffix field in the plugin. My recollection is that the omission of the page range when a specific page is given is on purpose and as required by the style - but as I said, you can circumvent that by using the suffix field.
  • chmg32
    Sorry - have been away & didn't realise there was a response here. You're correct: the short form works perfectly well. I'm not sure what I was going on about before, then.

    And thank you for clarifying how to use the 'suffix' field - not sure either how I missed that. The cite style seems to be working perfectly for me now. Thanks again for your help and re-write!
  • chmg32
    edited November 22, 2009
    Could I ask you to take a look at something that seems - my guess - to be causing problems. When I try to cite old newspaper articles with no author, I get the error statement, "An error has occurred communicating with Zotero. Please ensure Firefox is open and try again". It only happens in this case - everything else works fine. Is there a way to allow no author for newspaper and magazine articles? This will be a common issue for those of us working on the 19th century (and probably earlier). Thanks.
  • adamsmith
    ok I can take a look
    but I doubt very much this is style-related.
    I have some "no author" items in the regular test-set that I run all styles through.
    So while I look at this, maybe you can see if this couldn't be a coincidence and something else is going on - the "communicating with Zotero" is a known error that can occur for a variety of reasons, including using FF in offline mode.
  • chmg32
    edited November 22, 2009
    I checked several other things suggested here on the forum. FF was definitely not in offline mode. I reinstalled the plugin for Word; I also copied the document's content into a new file to see if that helped (it didn't), and then I copied the file itself and tried again - still no luck (but only with the newspaper articles with no author). When I switched the style for the doc to Chicago, it worked fine.

    Can you recommend anything else I should check? (I'm using FF 3.5.5 with Zotero 1.0.10 and Office 2004 for Mac.)
  • dstillman
    Post a Report ID after getting the error, but it's probably a bug in 1.0.10 that's since been fixed in Zotero 2.0.
  • chmg32
    Just submitted the error report; the id is 1385921723.

    I haven't upgraded to 2.0 since it's still in beta. Is it rather stable?
  • adamsmith
    yes, quite stable. I think by now most people work with 2.0.
  • chmg32
    Just upgraded to 2.0. Didn't fix the problem - it still will not insert an author-less newspaper citation. Everything else is fine. If I switch to Chicago, it handles the author-less newspaper article fine.

    Also, it seems to remind me that I need to upgrade the document and I have to manually switch the window over to FF when I click add a citation, which is very annoying. Will search around to see if there's a solution to that problem.
  • dstillman
    CSL: style references undefined macro title
    Which style is this that you're using?
  • chmg32
    The Modern Research Humanities Association (with bibliography) - the second one on the list (there are two). Or at least, there are for me - I'm not sure how to remove the old, incorrect one.
  • dstillman
    In 2.0 you can delete styles from the Styles pane of the prefs. Delete both of them for good measure, and then go to the Advanced pane of the prefs and choose Reset Translators and Styles. Then try again.
  • adamsmith
    ooh that might actually be my fault - I posted the style above as a correction to the existing one - and chmg32 is using the custom verion.
    I'll recheck it tonight.
  • adamsmith
    I found the problem
    sorry about that - I didn't know this would crash entire Zotero - but that's why I ask people to test before uploading styles to the repository.

    You can install the corrected style from the location linked to above (same as the last time).
    Please report back again.
    I've also added the word "New" in the title for the time being, so that you can distinguish between this one and the pre-installed style.
  • chmg32
    Yes - whatever you did seems to have done it. It inserts the no-author article fine.

    Now I just need to figure out why FF and Word are forcing me to manually toggle back and forth between them to add citations.
  • chmg32
    Woops. Sorry: something new just caught my attention. In multi-volume works, MHRA insists on the total number of volumes in the citation, but that's not happening in the current style. For example, I get:
    Theodor Griesinger, Land und Leute in Amerika: Skizzen aus dem amerikanischen Leben (Stuttgart: Verlag von A. Kröner, 1863), I, 405.

    But it should be:
    Theodor Griesinger, Land und Leute in Amerika: Skizzen aus dem amerikanischen Leben, 2 vols (Stuttgart: Verlag von A. Kröner, 1863), I, 405.

    I double checked - I definitely have the number of volumes in the entry in Zotero.
    Is there a quick way to update this?

    Thanks again for all of your help with this citation style.
  • adamsmith
    I'll check - I thought it's in the style.
    Do a search on the forum for your other problem - the solution depends on your operating system, but it's definitely solvable.
  • adamsmith
    It looks right for me - just as you say it should, including 2 vols.
    what exactly does it say in your # of Volumes field in Zotero?
    It should be an actual number. If it says "three" or "mulitple" nothing will happen.
  • chmg32
    Yes, I just have the number. In "Volume" I've got "1" (without the quote marks, obviously), and in "# of Volumes", "2". But when I insert the citation, it doesn't include "2 vols".
  • adamsmith
    don't really know what to say - I can't fix a problem I can't replicate, of course.
    This is unlikely to matter, but is that still on 1.0 or did you upgrade to 2.0?

    Could you export the item in question to Zotero rdf (without file or notes), open the .rdf file with a text editor and post the content here (just copy&paste, but make sure you have "format comments as text" selected?
  • chmg32
    I've upgraded to 2.0 - 2.0b7.5 to be precise.

    <rdf:RDF
    xmlns:rdf="http://www.w3.org/1999/02/22-rdf-syntax-ns#"
    xmlns:prism="http://prismstandard.org/namespaces/1.2/basic/"
    xmlns:dc="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/"
    xmlns:vcard="http://nwalsh.com/rdf/vCard#"
    xmlns:foaf="http://xmlns.com/foaf/0.1/"
    xmlns:bib="http://purl.org/net/biblio#"
    xmlns:z="http://www.zotero.org/namespaces/export#">
    <bib:Book rdf:about="#item_16208">
    <prism:volume>1</prism:volume>
    <dc:date>1863</dc:date>
    <dc:publisher>
    <foaf:Organization>
    <vcard:adr>
    <vcard:Address>
    <vcard:locality>Stuttgart</vcard:locality>
    </vcard:Address>
    </vcard:adr>
    <foaf:name>Verlag von A. Kröner</foaf:name>
    </foaf:Organization>
    </dc:publisher>
    <dc:subject>read</dc:subject>
    <dc:title>Land und Leute in Amerika: Skizzen aus dem amerikanischen Leben</dc:title>
    <bib:authors>
    <rdf:Seq>
    <rdf:li>
    <foaf:Person>
    <foaf:givenname>Theodor</foaf:givenname>
    <foaf:surname>Griesinger</foaf:surname>
    </foaf:Person>
    </rdf:li>
    </rdf:Seq>
    </bib:authors>
    <z:itemType>book</z:itemType>
    <z:numberOfVolumes>2</z:numberOfVolumes>
    </bib:Book>
    </rdf:RDF>
  • adamsmith
    edited November 28, 2009
    Theodor Griesinger, Land und Leute in Amerika: Skizzen aus dem amerikanischen Leben, 2 vols (Stuttgart: Verlag von A. Kröner, 1863), i.

    is what I get (with title in italics and Roman number at the end). That's right (except for the Umlaut, which is already messed up in your export), isn't it?

    Could you try how it looks here? (
    chrome://zotero/content/tools/csledit.xul
    (select the item in Zotero and the style in the top right.)
    I'll doublecheck that the style I have posted is the one I'm using, but I'm pretty sure it is. I also definitely never took this out.
  • chmg32
    Yes, it worked fine when I followed your instructions above in the tester.

    I think I've realized the problem - I get the '2 vols' bit when I don't add a specific page reference. Since I've always been adding a page reference, that's when the '2 vols' bit disappears (I've just tested that now in my document). So it appears that for some reason it's suppressing the '# of volumes' element if there's a page reference.
  • adamsmith
    ah OK. I didn't write that part of the style so it didn't occur to me, but that makes perfect sense.
    You are pretty sure that isn't a desired feature of the style? The rest was so carefully done that I'm surprised something like that slipped in. Should be relatively easy to fix, though, sometime over the weekend.
  • chmg32
    Yep, in section 11.2.2. of the MHRA Style Guide, the total number of volumes also appears when page numbers are specified.

    That would be great if you can fix it when you get the chance - thanks.
  • adamsmith
    OK, the style is now in the repository, install from here:
    http://www.zotero.org/styles/mhra/dev?install=1
    you will still, unfortunately, have two MHRA styles with identical names (you may actually have three, because I've changed the ID of this one) - you can remove the superfluous using the style manager in the preferences.

    Please let me know if everything works and once that is the case I'll ask Dan to push the style to clients (i.e. replace the default style that comes with Zotero).
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