On Sep 15, 2006, at 2:34 PM, Sanjoy Mahajan wrote:
At first I was sure that (2006a) and (2006b) are the right answer for the list. Othewise how else could the user know which entry to look up when they see, say, Hoekwater (2006b) in the text? But I just figured out the answer to that question: Users count 'a', 'b', ... starting with the first 2006 entry. However, I still don't think it's a good idea to make them do that. Let's not ask users to do what computers do very well (counting)!
Let me know whether I'm understanding it correctly. If you have a numbered reference list, then the year can still end up with a letter tag, e.g.
1. Taco Hoekwater. JournalA. 2006a 2. Taco Hoekwater. JournalB. 2006b
Ah, I hadn't thought of that problem. You're right, there shouldn't be a maybeyear in this case since the list number disambiguates the reference completely.
Sanjoy, yes, I agree completely: let the computer do the counting and bookkeeping! And you've hit the nail on the head: what I meant was, in cases where the form of the list makes the reference completely unambiguous (because it is numbered or because keys/authoryear tags are prefixed), adding another number in the bibliographic entry is superfluous and somewhat ugly. So question to Taco: maybe we need three options for maybeyear? 1. off [always] 2. on [always] 3. on for tags and authoryear etc., off for the date entry in the list itself. Am I making sense? Are we working you to the bones? ;-) Best Thomas