Grayed out fields?

[michaelAF]

Hi All,

I'm wondering if anyone can help me understand why my reference fields are sometimes grey and other times black. More importantly, how to I make them always appear in black?

I have included a screenshot for reference.

Thanks,

Michael

[Jon]

What version of Bookends?

It looks like the gray "hint" text style was mistakenly applied to real data. You should be able to select the text, Edit -> Show Colors or use the Command-T font panel and change the color to black.

If this happens repeatedly and you know what steps preceded it, please contact tech support so we can reproduce it. And if the diagnosis is correct, you can stop it by turning off "hint" text in Settings -> Refs tab.

Jon
Sonny Software

[michaelAF]

Hi Jon,

Thanks for the reply. I am using Bookends 14.2.2.

I was able to use the "show colors" panel to change my text to black. I also turned off hints, as you suggested. I will keep you informed if the issue persists.

I have one additional issue that is really perplexing me today.

While in the format manager, I have changed the default field order to reflect the bibliography style I need. This has been no problem, and I do see the appropriate changes in the "example bibliography" at the bottom of the formats manager. Unfortunately, the changes I make to the field order revert to the previous set as soon as I navigate away from the format manager. Is this expected? If so, how do I save my changes to the field order?

Thanks so much for your time,

Michael

[Jon]

I've had reports where Bookends wasn't being permitted to save the changes to the format file. Permissions in macOS are, as you perhaps know, flaky. You can try relaunching Bookends. If that doesn't work you might try going to the format in the Finder (right click on it in Bookends), duplicating it in the Finder, trashing the one you can't save, then renaming the copy to the original. Perhaps that will satisfy the OS. If not, please contact tech support an we can try something else.

Jon
Sonny Software

[michaelAF]

Hi Jon,

Unfortunately, the issue with custom field order formatting reverting to the default persists. I'm hoping someone will be able to help me resolve this quickly as it's a solid barrier to Bookend's usefulness as a research tool. Do you have any suggestions for how I can connect with the proper person to help resolve this issue?

Thanks,

Michael

[vinschger]

Dear Michael

Indeed, Jon is the correct person to help you resolve this issue. he is the founder and developer of bookends and really helpful. follow his advices and you will probably be able to solve this issue.

sometimes re-starting the computer, completely deleting and re-installing bookends already helped to solve issues in my case. please also check that bookends has full disk access rights etc.

all the best