APA formatting

[timofcanberra]

I use the APA format almost exclusively. It is one of the most idiosyncratic styles there is. For example if you write "research has shown task type makes a difference" then the correct citation is (Smith & Jones, 1992). However, if you write "It was stated by Smith and Jones ((1992) that task type makes a difference" the style requirements are that the & becomes and. I cannot find a way to make this happen in Bookends. I either have to cite the date only or manually correct the & to and. As endnote does this correctly as one of its few redeeming features is this possible in Bookends or do I have to ask for it as a feature request?

By the way Bookends is the best reference manager I have used bar none - especially with Mellel.

[Jon]

I use the APA format almost exclusively. It is one of the most idiosyncratic styles there is. For example if you write "research has shown task type makes a difference" then the correct citation is (Smith & Jones, 1992). However, if you write "It was stated by Smith and Jones ((1992) that task type makes a difference" the style requirements are that the & becomes and. I cannot find a way to make this happen in Bookends. I either have to cite the date only or manually correct the & to and. As endnote does this correctly as one of its few redeeming features is this possible in Bookends or do I have to ask for it as a feature request?

I assume you're using the ^ to tell Bookends to put the authors in front of the citation -- you're right, Bookends doesn't know about any alternative punctuation. In the example you give, I'd enter the author's names manually (in the text), and in the temp citation use the % so that Bookends replaces it with just the year:

"It was stated by Smith and Jones {%temp cite} that task type makes a difference" will give you want you want.



Jon
Sonny Software

[timofcanberra]

Hi Jon

is there a possibility that the & could be changed to and using the ^ operator for APA style in a future release?

[Jon]

It's something to think about. It would require additional, rather specialized, options in the format of course. And it would probably only be useful for the APA style.

Jon
Sonny Software

[nicka]

Having this feature would be a considerable benefit to me too. In my part of linguistics, APA is ubiquitous. The (newish) feature to put the author(s) in front of the brackets is great, but as it stands, can only be used for sole authors and groups that are long enough to be 'Author et al.'.

[Jon]

It wouldn't be hard to hardwire this into formats that have the letters APA at the beginning of their name, for example. But making it a general feature is more problematic (and adds to the complexity for everyone, whether they use APA or not).

BTW, the OP mentioned that EndNote handled this. I wanted to see what they did and took a look at the APA 5th EN style. I don't see such a setting. Can someone point me to this?

Jon
Sonny Software

[nicka]

Yes, I can see there must be costs to implementing this. I just wanted to indicate that there would be a sizeable benefit for at least some users. (Those of us who live in APA-world...)
I know that the cost-benefit analysis and decision one way or another is up to you, of course.

[timofcanberra]

Hi Jon

I have just installed Endnote 6 for Mac to check what is does with APA 5 and 6.

This is what {Levine, 1990 #366@@author-year} looks like in endnote as a temp cite.

This is what the code produces AuthorYear="1"><Author>Levine</Author><Year>1990</Year><RecNum>366</RecNum><DisplayText>Levine and Moreland (1990)....

This is what Levine and Moreland (1990) looks like when formatted.

It looks like they have a defined style Author = 1 that makes the citation behave as it should.

Cheers

Tim

[Jon]

It's not how the temp cite looks, how does the EN Style determine whether to use the & or the and? I didn't see that in the style.

Jon
Sonny Software

[Jon]

But I have had an idea. Instead of adding a lot of overhead to formats, perhaps I could define another metacharacter that would put the author in front and force an "and" between two authors. It would be very APA-centric, but really add nothing to the Bookends UI that would complicate its use by others. Let's give that some thought. Once the noise has died down from the transition to Bookends 12 it's something to discuss again.

Jon
Sonny Software

[timofcanberra]

Looks like a sensible solution

[Jon]

Here's a thought. What if, in the format Name Punctuation section for citations, one had the option of indicating options for what goes between the names if there are two authors and the names are in, or in front of, the rest of the citation. Something like this:

Custom Citation -> Between last names -> and [ & ]^, and

Meaning, if there are two names use the info before the ^. If the name is in the citation, use " and ". If the name is placed in front of the citation, use " & "?

Too geeky? Esoteric? Klunky? Or useful?

The nice thing about it is that if you don't need to use this feature (and only APA users will) you can ignore it. You'd just use the current mechanism to tell Bookends what goes between last names:

Custom Citation -> Between last names -> and ^, and

Jon
Sonny Software

[nicka]

Useful and not too klunky, in my opinion.

[ozean]

Sounds very good to me!

[Jon]

OK, after actually working on this I've decided to simply hardcode it in. This is a feature that is unique to APA, so there's no point in cluttering up the UI and documentation with more features.

The way I have it working is that you are using a custom citation in a format whose name begins with "APA", you are putting the authors in front, and there are two authors, the "&" between them will be replaced with an "and".

Speak now or forever hold your peace.

Jon
Sonny Software