Upgrade StorageCustom field for my own bespoke titles for items
For attached files, I use "short title" (`shortTitle`) in the file naming template. This usually allows me to avoid having the title be truncated and makes file names more readable (most of the time). However, not all items have a short title. In that case, the template is set up to use the title, which might be too long or include characters I'd rather not have included in a file name.
Is there a way that I can set up a custom field, called "my title" (`myTitle`), which I can use to give items my own bespoke titles that the file naming template would then utilise instead of using `shortTitle` (if present) or `title`?
Is there a way that I can set up a custom field, called "my title" (`myTitle`), which I can use to give items my own bespoke titles that the file naming template would then utilise instead of using `shortTitle` (if present) or `title`?
For instance, there are occasionally papers that have ridiculous titles, and either no short title or a title that shortens to something just as ridiculous. In those instances, I'd rather just use my own made-up title for the paper. Obviously, when referencing, I wouldn't use the title I just made-up. But, for the purposes of file naming, I think it's fine to just use a bespoke title for the paper. For that to work though, I'd need to be able to set up a custom field (`myTitle`) that the file naming template can call on when applied to a file.
I could maybe use one of the existing fields within Zotero (e.g., `extra`) for this purpose. However, I'd rather leave these fields available for other uses. For instance, the `extra` field used to be used to insert DOIs for works that had a DOI but for which the DOI field was not visible for the item type (e.g., books)(https://forums.zotero.org/discussion/comment/355892/#Comment_355892). So, for some items, I've already used the `extra` field for this purpose. And I'd rather avoid the confusion that could result from using one field, like `extra`, for multiple purposes.
This would be resolved by custom fields or even a dedicated Zotero-native field that allows users to set their own title or shorthand for an item, which the file naming template could then use to name corresponding attachment files.
https://docs.citationstyles.org/en/stable/specification.html#appendix-iv-variables
1. This seems like a fairly rare occurrence: since all this is for is the filename, you could just set the filename manually?
2. Works do not 'have' short titles. The Chicago Manual, e.g., gives you significant latitude on how to shorten titles (see https://www.chicagomanualofstyle.org/book/ed18/part3/ch13/psec036.html if you have access), so if you think the short (do you mean the main title or the one automatically generated by Zotero?) is bad, just edit the short title field (within reason).