Bug 83613

Summary:	Allow grouping of bibliographic citations
Product:	LibreOffice	Reporter:	ericdthrift
Component:	Writer	Assignee:	Not Assigned <libreoffice-bugs>
Status:	NEW ---
Severity:	enhancement	CC:	jbfaure, robinson.libreoffice
Priority:	medium
Version:	4.0 all versions
Hardware:	Other
OS:	All
Whiteboard:
Crash report or crash signature:		Regression By:
Bug Depends on:
Bug Blocks:	101258

Description ericdthrift 2014-09-08 13:11:35 UTC

Text in bibliographic citation fields, if set to use the "short names" rather than numbered entries, is automatically taken from the "identifier" attribute of the <text:bibliography-mark> element. Although this element can and does take character data content, the text content is ignored by LibreOffice, and is in fact updated on saving the document to match the reference identifier attribute (which is set in the user interface as "short name"). 

This behaviour is a problem if we want to display content other than the reference key, notably in cases where we need to suppress the author's name in an author-date citation. For example, if we have the keys [Smith 2012] and [Smith 2013], we may need to create citations such as "Smith (2012, 2013) ..." in addition to the basic citation "(Smith 2012)". Such formatting is not currently possible. 

This problem may be resolved if (1) the bibliography-mark element content is displayed in the citation field, and (2) this content is user-editable.

Comment 1 Jean-Baptiste Faure 2014-09-13 20:58:07 UTC

Hmm, editing a field is contradictory because a field is intended to be automatically updated. If it is manually modified, it is not a field anymore.

That said, I agree that citation engine in LibreOffice should be able to group citations like "see [Smith 2012] and [Smith 2013]" in "see [Smith 2012, 2013]" or something like that.

Well, now, bibliography module is not really maintained since several years. Already in the OOo time it was intended to remove this feature and use Zotero instead (Firefox extension + LibreOffice extension). Zotero (LibreOffice extension) has powerful options to make citations, you should give it a try.

Best regards. JBF

Comment 2 Robinson Tryon (qubit) 2014-12-15 00:21:46 UTC

(In reply to ericdthrift from comment #0)
> For example, if we have the keys [Smith 2012]
> and [Smith 2013], we may need to create citations such as "Smith (2012,
> 2013) ..." in addition to the basic citation "(Smith 2012)". Such formatting
> is not currently possible. 

(In reply to Jean-Baptiste Faure from comment #1)
> That said, I agree that citation engine in LibreOffice should be able to
> group citations

I agree as well. Seems like a reasonable enhancement.

> Well, now, bibliography module is not really maintained since several years.
> Already in the OOo time it was intended to remove this feature and use
> Zotero instead (Firefox extension + LibreOffice extension). Zotero
> (LibreOffice extension) has powerful options to make citations, you should
> give it a try.

So, two pieces here:
1) There's a reasonable enhancement request here, so 
Severity -> enhancement
Status -> NEW

2) If the bibliography module is heading towards removal, then pointing people at Zotero seems like a fine policy. That being said, the module isn't gone yet, so it seems reasonable to keep this bug report open.