Sonny Software

Hello, I seem to have a problem; my citations are not coming out in the right format.

I followed the included tutorial step-by-step, and I do understand all the basic features of how the software works
the issue is with "Copy Citation".

It dosnt mater how many times I change the format using the Biblio Formats Manager - the citation style will not change. I can select different references but the style it is posted in will not change.
E.g.
1. I select "Learn" style and then "copy Citation" and it will print
{Chu, EB MV Hobbs CB Wilson CG Romball PS Linsley & WO Weigle. “Intervention of Cd4+ Cell Subset Shifts and Autoimmunity in the Bxsb Mouse By Murine Ctla4ig.” J Immunol 156, no. 3 (1996): 1262–68.}

2. I change the citation style to APA 7 (or anything else) and it prints
{Chu, EB MV Hobbs CB Wilson CG Romball PS Linsley & WO Weigle. “Intervention of Cd4+ Cell Subset Shifts and Autoimmunity in the Bxsb Mouse By Murine Ctla4ig.” J Immunol 156, no. 3 (1996): 1262–68.}

The citation preview updates, but will not update the citation that actually gets copied...


Maybe it has something to do with an AppleScript? The very first time I tried to copy a citation I was prompted to give access to Bookends IIRC (I declined) - it has not asked me again, even after restarting the software.

Hi,

First, if you decline to give Bookends permission to use AppleEvents with another app you are denying permission for Bookends to work. macOS won't ask you twice -- once you've denied permission it's remembered in System Preferences. So expect things to fail. In other words, don't do that. You need to go to System Preferences -> Privacy-> Automation and make sure Bookends is allowed to communicate with the apps you use (e.g. Word). You can google for Appleevents and Privacy if you need more information.

Second, you don't understand Copy Citation. It is NOT for copying a finished, formatted, reference to another app. That's what Copy Formatted is for. Copy Citation is for copying a temporary citation, usually in curly brackets, to your word processor. A temp citation is a placeholder -- t is processed to the final citation when you scan the document. It is then that the format you use makes a difference.

Third, you have changed Settings so the Copy Citation uses a format to create the contents. This is almost always the wrong choice, and should only be done by experienced users who know how to design a format that works for this purpose. Please change the Copy Citation setting back to Author, Date, Unique. As it is now, it will not work for you.

You can refer to the User Guide (Help menu) for how Copy Citation works and how scanning works. There's a lot of information there, more than a beginner needs. But you can get what you need out of it now and refer to it again later if/when you need more in-depth information.

This video tutorial is dated, but covers the basics (mostly in Word 2011), and the concepts still apply:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W-mmbq6C80c

Jon
Sonny Software

Thank you Jon, this cleared it up right away. My citations are now updating to the formats I select. Thanks for your fast reply!