Source Citations in Reports - Full Reference vs. Short-Form Reference

[Peter Sherman]

Hello, all. I'm curious about how those who publish reports from Reunion handle full source references (for a first citation in a footnote or endnote) vs. short-form references (in subsequent citations to the same source). I've looked for any earlier threads on this topic, and was surprised it doesn't seem to have ever come up.

The "ibid." option in report settings is really only useful with consecutive citations to a single source. But, in Reunion, citations to a previously cited source that is not the last cited source still get the full reference. What I want is to use a short form of the citation for these subsequent references.

I use the free-form field to enter and format my sources, and would love to have a second similar field in which to type a short form of the source, along with a report setting (similar to the "ibid." setting) to use the short form in subsequent citations to the same source.

Short of this being possible within Reunion, I'm curious if there are any separate tools that can automate the process of abbreviating a full reference to short-form. I've seen mention of Zotero for managing citations and bibliographic references, but its uses and options seem almost overwhelming. Has anyone used Zotero to automate converting repeated long-form citations to short-form? Or does anyone have another method that works for their reports and publications?

Thanks,
Peter Sherman

[Miss Myrtle]

I am very much interested in this subject as well. Hopefully there will be some feedback.

[CKP-70]

Me too, very much interested!

[A Ginn]

This may not be what you want, but it is a method that works for me and does relate somewhat to using a "short form" in that it uses abbreviations. It keeps things simple and entirely within Reunion.

I have settled on the citation style used in many of the earlier published genealogies. It puts meaningful citations immediately after the facts presented and then uses just a basic source list where each source used appears only once.

In Report Settings I opt for enclosing citation numbers in brackets and having the citation detail appear with the citations. The detail includes an abbreviation for the source along with volume, page, etc. Many sources have commonly used abbreviations that older genealogies used with a "Key" to link back to the complete source description. Since Reunion can keep the same number throughout (i.e., disable renumbering) the cross referencing is easy.

An example is below. The citations take up more room than a superscripted number in the report body, but for me the information is more productive there than in a long list of repeating source descriptions and ibids.

Citations.jpg

[Donald W. Moore]

This example is very much like a cite key provided by various citation managers like EndNote, Zotero, etc.

[Peter Sherman]

This may not be what you want, but it is a method that works for me and does relate somewhat to using a "short form" in that it uses abbreviations. It keeps things simple and entirely within Reunion.

You're right that this wasn't what I (at least) was thinking of when I originally posted on this subject, but I want to thank you for sharing your method. I've tested using it with a couple of people I'm focusing on in my research right now, with sources including vital records, censuses, newspapers, and city directories—and I've come to like it! Essentially, the "source" holds the bibliographic entry and the "citation" holds what I think of as the "subsequent" source reference. I've added a note field to hold the "first" (or complete) source references, so that I have easy access to those as well.

I still wish improvements to Reunion's source features kept pace with many of its other wonderful capabilities, but this gives me a good way to keep all my source data—all three levels of citation—within Reunion in a logical, easy to use way.

Thanks again!
Peter Sherman