Reviving "BibTeX: how to force et al. for long author lists?"

[tjulou]

Hi,

Following this post, I would like to limit the number of author
displayed in bibliography with abbrvnat. For instance to 12… But
rather than having First Author, at al. I would like to print all
twelve first authors followed by et al.
http://groups.google.com/group/comp.text.tex/browse_frm/thread/b9a3c452b71eaaf5?tvc=1

Has anybody already written something similar?
Thank you in advance for your help,

Thomas

[Michael Shell]

On Tue, 29 Mar 2011 01:49:44 -0700 (PDT)
tjulou <thomas...@gmail.com> wrote:

> I would like to limit the number of author displayed in bibliography

> with abbrvnat. For instance to 12, but rather than having First Author,
> et al. I would like to print all twelve first authors followed by et al.

Thomas,

Make a copy of abbrvnat.bst, say to abbrvnatlongetal.bst.

Around line 220, delete the code for the FUNCTION {format.names}
and replace it with (watch out that your newsreader does not
introduce line breaks in the INTEGERS line that is longer than
80 columns):

INTEGERS { max.num.names.before.forced.et.al num.names.shown.with.forced.et.al }

FUNCTION {format.names}
{ 's :=
#1 'nameptr :=
#12 'max.num.names.before.forced.et.al :=
#12 'num.names.shown.with.forced.et.al :=
s num.names$ 'numnames :=
numnames 'namesleft :=
{ namesleft #0 > }
{ s nameptr "{f.~}{vv~}{ll}{, jj}" format.name$ 't :=
nameptr #1 >
{ nameptr num.names.shown.with.forced.et.al #1 + =
numnames max.num.names.before.forced.et.al >
and
{ "others" 't :=
#1 'namesleft :=
}
{ skip$ }
if$
namesleft #1 >
{ ", " * t * }
{ t "others" =
{ " " * "et~al." emphasize * }
{ numnames #2 >
{ "," * }
{ skip$ }
if$
" and " * t *
}
if$
}
if$
}
't
if$
nameptr #1 + 'nameptr :=
namesleft #1 - 'namesleft :=
}
while$
}

The line

#12 'max.num.names.before.forced.et.al :=

determines the maximum number of names before an et al. is
forced.

The line

#12 'num.names.shown.with.forced.et.al :=

determines how many names are actually shown with the et al.
and should not be greater than max.num.names.before.forced.et.al.

Alter the number constants #12 as desired.

The above code also changes the et al. to be italics
and also not to be preceded by a comma.

To go back to the old way with comma and no italic et al.,
change the line:

{ " " * "et~al." emphasize * }

to

{ ", " * "et~al." * }

Enjoy,

Mike Shell

[tjulou]

This works great!
Thanks :)

Thomas

P.S.: btw do you have any reason to promote italicized et al. ? I
seems to me that most people consider it to be better not…

[Michael Shell]

On Wed, 30 Mar 2011 02:02:50 -0700 (PDT)
tjulou <thomas...@gmail.com> wrote:

> P.S.: btw do you have any reason to promote italicized et al. ?

> It seems to me that most people consider it to be better not

The code base for what you needed came from my IEEEtran.bst where it
is done that way as the IEEE (www.ieee.org) requires for all their
many publications, so I just retained it as-is.

The Chicago Manual of Style states that et al. should not be italicized,
but I don't consider the CMS to be the style bible many do. In fact,
I think requiring blind allegiance to it has been a disservice to many
a thesis writer.

I also see in the computer science department of a school in the UK
wants et al. italicized:

http://www.cs.bham.ac.uk/~pxc/refs/index.html

as does a science magazine:

http://www.sciencemag.org/site/feature/contribinfo/prep/res/refs.xhtml

and a style guide in the EU:

http://publications.europa.eu/code/en/en-4100600en.htm

and the Reviews in Modern Physics Style guide (page 8):

http://rmp.aps.org/files/rmpguide.pdf

So, it seems to me that in the hard sciences and engineering that
they generally want it in italics, but in other fields they generally
don't.

My own view on such matters is that there really is no official
standard in English for such things and that, as a result, the
choice will be the result of some uncomfortable tradeoffs and
even contradictions.

For example, I would not want to put every "e.g." and "i.e." in
italics in a main text as that would be distracting.

However, sometimes we want the distraction. Putting et al. in
italics in references clearly shows that it is not part of the
previous author's name as well as flags the "sin" of not crediting
every author. Given that there are so many strange constructs with
respect to names such as von, D', and our own pdfTeX's "Han The Thanh"
(not to even touch on complex accents and suffixes), that it may not
immediately be clear to a quick scan of the eye that the et al. isn't
part of a name.

Cheers,

Mike

[gajen...@gmail.com]

Thanks a lot for the code.

[Will]

Many thanks!

[Michael Shell]

On Sat, 22 Feb 2014 12:38:18 -0800 (PST)
Will <will...@gmail.com> wrote:

> Many thanks!


I had a feeling that one might be for me. LOL!

Coming from March 29, 2011, you're welcome. ;)


Mike Shell