Citation style no longer works after upgrading from Zotero 7 to Zotero 9

valentyna_konetzna · 2026-09-01T14:47:37+00:00

Hello,

I am currently finishing my bachelor's thesis and I have encountered a problem with Zotero and the citation style required by my university.

I was previously using Zotero 7 together with a custom citation style called “Katedra biologie a ekologie OU” (Department of Biology and Ecology, University of Ostrava). The citation style worked correctly in Zotero 7.

However, Zotero was recently updated to a newer version, and the citation style no longer works correctly. I am currently using Zotero 9, and I need to continue working on my thesis using the required citation style.

I can provide the original CSL file if needed.

Could you please advise me on how I can use this citation style with the current version of Zotero? If the style is not compatible with the newer version, would it be possible to download and install a previous version of Zotero 7?

I have already started writing my thesis and I need to finish it using this citation style, so I would greatly appreciate any advice on how to resolve this issue without having to recreate all of my citations manually.

Thank you very much for your help.

dstillman · 2026-09-01T14:48:15+00:00

What do you mean by "no longer works"?

We'd want to see a Report ID and the style in question.

valentyna_konetzna · 2026-09-01T16:45:41+00:00

Thank you for asking. By “no longer works”, I mean that when I try to update the citations in my Word document, Zotero gives me the following errors:

1.“The citation style http://www.zotero.org/styles/DeptBiolOUcz could not be found.”
2. Then I selected the style “Katedra biologie a ekologie OU” in Zotero.
3. Zotero then gives me the error: “Zotero encountered an error while updating your document.”

I am using Zotero 9.0.6 on macOS.

Report ID: 821220359

I would also like to provide the CSL file, but the forum does not allow me to attach either the .csl or .txt file. Is there another way I can provide you with the style?

Thank you.

damnation · 2026-09-01T17:35:28+00:00

You can upload it to pastebin.com (or similar) and share the link here.
I don't think anything changed in Zotero regarding styles in versions 7 and up though.

dstillman · 2026-09-01T17:39:47+00:00

(I believe this is an old CSL 0.8 style that hasn't been updated to CSL 1.0. We'll fix the bug that prevents it from working, but the style itself should be updated.)

valentyna_konetzna · 2026-09-01T17:54:39+00:00

@damnation

https://pastebin.com/1bUpUDM7
can you open it?

valentyna_konetzna · 2026-09-01T17:59:29+00:00

@dstillman

Thank you. How can I update the style? Is there a recommended way to do this?

damnation · 2026-09-01T18:06:53+00:00

Can you tell me where you got this style from?
Some intranet or is it from a public university website?
Also, are there public guidelines?
Then I can get the style in shape and uploaded to the repository.

valentyna_konetzna · 2026-09-01T18:22:29+00:00

@damnation

I received the style from someone via email. Unfortunately, I cannot find the style or the guidelines on the university website :(

adamsmith · 2026-09-01T19:52:29+00:00

This is the updated version of the style -- no fixes, just update:
https://gist.github.com/adam3smith/bdf6be8f169c540faf85ee45646711ac

anything else you'd have to work on with damnation

damnation · 2026-09-01T19:56:16+00:00

The following style is updated from ver 0.8 to 1.0.1:
https://gist.githubusercontent.com/POBrien333/c258ce6e9354cfb5355b0b4dca968ca0/raw/280fede88c2ab618f1195395c207332bbbde9dd0/DeptBiolOUcz.csl

valentyna_konetzna · 2026-09-01T20:07:16+00:00

OMG thank you so so much. It's already working.