It would be great if you could add a button in the toolbar that offers a Copy Citation(s) functionality. I think it would be easiest to just take the nice button that is available in the reference view and make it so that it will do the same as hitting Command-Y.
The question pertains to the naming of this function: Copy Citation. The recent convert looked at the buttons and menus in Bookends for a long time, searching for one function: putting the selected entry in the database into the document. To no avail. There was no such function to be found. A longish discussion ensued when I explained that Copy Citation is the thing to do. I agree that copy citation really is not a very lucid term when one is looking to insert or add a citation – as a matter of fact, the same Bookends command in Word is called “Insert Citation”. My only explanation to our confused convert was that there must be some kind of historical reasons for the copy citation wording – especially since if I hit copy citation, the citation is not being copied to the pasteboard - so it does not seem to be the same as a standard copy procedure (this behavior is different in one case though: if one does select “Copy Selected Formatted” the formatted citation is put into the clipboard).
So the question is: is there a specific reason or advantage to calling this function “Copy CItation” instead of “Insert Citation”, as it is called in Word?
In addition, it was surprising to our recent convert that this function is part of the Edit menu, because the effect of the copy citation operation is not related to the editing of content in Bookends, it is targeting another application.
Now, I am already excited about Jon’s response to this question, which is as much academic as it is concerned with the everyday use of our favorite bibliography app
