# Ho to express nicknames and unknown names

**URL:** <https://discourse.citationstyles.org/t/ho-to-express-nicknames-and-unknown-names/862>\
**Category:** CSL Development\
**Created:** [June 16, 2010, 10:44pm UTC](https://discourse.citationstyles.org/t/ho-to-express-nicknames-and-unknown-names/862 "2010-06-16T22:44:29Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 6\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Frank\_Bennett](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex029/user_avatar/discourse.citationstyles.org/frank_bennett/32/198_2.png) [@Frank\_Bennett](https://discourse.citationstyles.org/u/Frank_Bennett)\
**Post date:** [June 16, 2010, 10:44pm UTC](https://discourse.citationstyles.org/t/ho-to-express-nicknames-and-unknown-names/862/1 "2010-06-16T22:44:29Z")

</div>

The issuse Jakob raises below apply to CSL, forwarding from citeproc-  
js group.

Frank---------- Forwarded message ----------  
From: Jakob [jakob.v...@gbv.de](mailto:jakob.v...@gbv.de)  
Date: Jun 17, 7:06 am  
Subject: Ho to express nicknames and unknown names  
To: citeproc-js

Hi,

According the the CSL 1.0 spec ‘Personal names require a "family"  
name-  
part, and may also contain “given”, “suffix”, "non-dropping-particle"  
and “dropping-particle” name-parts’. Alternatively a name can be a  
literal name.

Although I do not want to expand this even more complex, I think there  
should be a “nick” name-part to specify a nickname. According to  
Wikipedia “the nickname is placed between the first and last names and  
surrounded by quotation marks (e.g. Catherine “Cate” Jones). The  
middle name is eliminated (if there is one).”

For instance:

{“given”:“Catherine”,“family”:“Jones”,“nick”:“Cate”}  
{“given”:“Georges Prosper”,“family”:“Remi”,“nick”:“Hergé”}

Most citation styles will silently drop the nick but others want to  
show it or even show the nick in favor of the given and surname - for  
instance it is common for artists like comic writers to cite them by  
their nickname. What do you think?

My second question is about unknown names. How do you express

1. a single unknown name (“anonymous”)
2. the fact that there are more names but you don’t know them (“et  
al.”)

A workaround would be to use a dummy literal name like this:

“author”:[{“literal”:“unknown”}]  
“author”:[…, {“literal”:“et al.”}]

But we could also define a third type of name (beside name-parts and  
literal) that can only ocurr once at the end of the list of names.

Please note that there is a difference between just omitting a name  
and explicitly stating that there are one or more names which are  
unknown.

Cheers  
Jakob

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**Author:** ![Rintze\_Zelle1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/258eb7/32.png) [@Rintze\_Zelle1](https://discourse.citationstyles.org/u/Rintze_Zelle1)\
**Post date:** [June 18, 2010, 7:47pm UTC](https://discourse.citationstyles.org/t/ho-to-express-nicknames-and-unknown-names/862/2 "2010-06-18T19:47:00Z")

</div>

> From: Jakob [jakob.v...@gbv.de](mailto:jakob.v...@gbv.de)  
> I think there should be a “nick” name-part to specify a nickname.

Do you know of any style guides that discuss the use of nicknames with  
regard to citations? I couldn’t find any mention in the Chicago Manual of  
Style.

> My second question is about unknown names. How do you express
> 
> 1. a single unknown name (“anonymous”)

Existing CSL styles typically test whether a name variable is empty. If it  
is, the “anonymous” term can be used. Would that suit your need?

> 1. the fact that there are more names but you don’t know them (“et  
> al.”)
> 
> A workaround would be to use a dummy literal name like this:
> 
> “author”:[{“literal”:“unknown”}]  
> “author”:[…, {“literal”:“et al.”}]
> 
> But we could also define a third type of name (beside name-parts and  
> literal) that can only ocurr once at the end of the list of names.

What is the use case here exactly? Reading this, this topic about  
thousand-author papers came to mind:

> **[Cap author count?](https://forums.zotero.org/discussion/10718/)**
>
> Hi, 
>  
> I recently made the mistake of importing this paper via DOI import: 
>  
> http://www.iop.org/EJ/abstract/1748-0221/3/08/S08004 
>  
> The import took a couple of minutes, and now every time Zotero tries to display this paper, it takes 160 seconds of...

Rintze\> ---------- Forwarded message ----------

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Bruce\_D\_Arcus1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/4bbf92/32.png) [@Bruce\_D\_Arcus1](https://discourse.citationstyles.org/u/Bruce_D_Arcus1)\
**Post date:** [June 18, 2010, 7:53pm UTC](https://discourse.citationstyles.org/t/ho-to-express-nicknames-and-unknown-names/862/3 "2010-06-18T19:53:26Z")

</div>

Yeah, I’d reiterate the question.

Bruce

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Jakob\_Voss](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex029/user_avatar/discourse.citationstyles.org/jakob_voss/32/169_2.png) [@Jakob\_Voss](https://discourse.citationstyles.org/u/Jakob_Voss)\
**Post date:** [June 21, 2010, 11:49am UTC](https://discourse.citationstyles.org/t/ho-to-express-nicknames-and-unknown-names/862/4 "2010-06-21T11:49:33Z")

</div>

Rintze wrote:

> > From: Jakob [jakob.v...@gbv.de](mailto:jakob.v...@gbv.de)  
> > I think there should be a “nick” name-part to specify a nickname.
> 
> Do you know of any style guides that discuss the use of nicknames with  
> regard to citations? I couldn’t find any mention in the Chicago  
> Manual of Style.

I found [http://www.beadsland.com/weapas/](http://www.beadsland.com/weapas/) and in RefMan you can add  
nicknames as author synonyms. However most styles I know recommend to  
use the full name or the nickname instead, so I could also just put the  
nickname in the “family” or “literal” field.

The broader question is which name to choose if a person is known under  
multiple names. Nicknames are only one case and they can act as  
given-name replacement or as mononyms:

Theodor Holm Nelson = Theodor “Ted” Nelson = Ted Nelson  
Jean Giraud = Jean “Moebius” Giraud = Moebius

I think it is still relevant, especially if you cite digital objects  
like an image at flickr or a commit in a source code repository - the  
workaround is to include the nick as part of one of the name fields, but  
it’s still a workaround. Maybe this can also be treated with  
transliterated names.

> > My second question is about unknown names. How do you express
> 
> > 1. a single unknown name (“anonymous”)

> Existing CSL styles typically test whether a name variable is empty.  
> If it is, the “anonymous” term can be used. Would that suit your need?

Yes, if this will explicitely be stated in the spec. Otherwise the empty  
name variable will get lost somewhere in the process of copying the data  
around because some implementations will silently remove it. However  
multiple empty name variables of the same role should be normalized to  
one, right?

> > 1. the fact that there are more names but you don’t know them (“et  
> > al.”)
> > 
> > A workaround would be to use a dummy literal name like this:
> > 
> > “author”:[{“literal”:“unknown”}]  
> > “author”:[…, {“literal”:“et al.”}]
> > 
> > But we could also define a third type of name (beside name-parts and  
> > literal) that can only ocurr once at the end of the list of names.
> 
> What is the use case here exactly? Reading this, this topic about  
> thousand-author papers came to mind:  
> [Cap author count? - Zotero Forums](http://forums.zotero.org/discussion/10718/)

Yes and also many other publications with only five, four or three  
authors: if you just copy the citation from another citation that does  
not list all authors, you must either ignore the remaining authors or  
add a dummy author named “et al.”. I think the latter is the most common  
workaround.

In summary there are the following cases to cover:

1 Alice and Bob.  
2 Alice, Bob et al.  
3 anonymous.  
4 anonymous et al.  
5 Alice, Bob, and anonymous  
6 Alice, Bob, anonymous et al. [\*]

I am not sure whether case 6 is really needed but you need case 4.

Jakob–  
Jakob Voß \<@Jakob\_Voss\>, skype: nichtich  
Verbundzentrale des GBV (VZG) / Common Library Network  
Platz der Goettinger Sieben 1, 37073 Göttingen, Germany  
+49 (0)551 39-10242, [http://www.gbv.de](http://www.gbv.de)

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Rintze\_Zelle1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/258eb7/32.png) [@Rintze\_Zelle1](https://discourse.citationstyles.org/u/Rintze_Zelle1)\
**Post date:** [June 23, 2010, 9:37am UTC](https://discourse.citationstyles.org/t/ho-to-express-nicknames-and-unknown-names/862/5 "2010-06-23T09:37:40Z")

</div>

> I found [http://www.beadsland.com/weapas/](http://www.beadsland.com/weapas/) and in RefMan you can add  
> nicknames as author synonyms. However most styles I know recommend to  
> use the full name or the nickname instead, so I could also just put the  
> nickname in the “family” or “literal” field.
> 
> The broader question is which name to choose if a person is known under  
> multiple names. Nicknames are only one case and they can act as  
> given-name replacement or as mononyms:

Just the other day I noticed a reference including a name like “T.R. (Sean)  
Doe” (not sure if it was from a style in use though). I’m getting convinced  
adding support for nicknames would be useful, but there are quite a few  
questions to answer with regard to disambiguation, sorting, etc. But I feel  
it might be handier to hold off on this until we have the input model  
completed for the current CSL 1.0 spec.

> > > My second question is about unknown names. How do you express
> > 
> > > 1. a single unknown name (“anonymous”)
> 
> > Existing CSL styles typically test whether a name variable is empty.  
> > If it is, the “anonymous” term can be used. Would that suit your need?
> 
> Yes, if this will explicitely be stated in the spec. Otherwise the empty  
> name variable will get lost somewhere in the process of copying the data  
> around because some implementations will silently remove it. However  
> multiple empty name variables of the same role should be normalized to  
> one, right?

Sorry, I don’t follow. In my understanding, CSL doesn’t distinguish between  
an empty variable and a non-existing one. Also, each role only has a single  
name variable (which can be an array of multiple names).

> > 1. the fact that there are more names but you don’t know them ("et
> > 
> > > al.")
> > > 
> > > A workaround would be to use a dummy literal name like this:
> > > 
> > > “author”:[{“literal”:“unknown”}]  
> > > “author”:[…, {“literal”:“et al.”}]
> > > 
> > > But we could also define a third type of name (beside name-parts and  
> > > literal) that can only ocurr once at the end of the list of names.
> > 
> > What is the use case here exactly? Reading this, this topic about  
> > thousand-author papers came to mind:  
> > [Cap author count? - Zotero Forums](http://forums.zotero.org/discussion/10718/)
> 
> Yes and also many other publications with only five, four or three  
> authors: if you just copy the citation from another citation that does  
> not list all authors, you must either ignore the remaining authors or  
> add a dummy author named “et al.”. I think the latter is the most common  
> workaround.
> 
> In summary there are the following cases to cover:
> 
> 1 Alice and Bob.  
> 2 Alice, Bob et al.  
> 3 anonymous.  
> 4 anonymous et al.  
> 5 Alice, Bob, and anonymous  
> 6 Alice, Bob, anonymous et al. [\*]
> 
> I am not sure whether case 6 is really needed but you need case 4.

Right. As with nicknames, I’d suggest we revisit this at a later point, as  
any solution will have quite a few implications. Feel free to create  
tickets, though.

Rintze

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Jakob\_Voss](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex029/user_avatar/discourse.citationstyles.org/jakob_voss/32/169_2.png) [@Jakob\_Voss](https://discourse.citationstyles.org/u/Jakob_Voss)\
**Post date:** [June 23, 2010, 12:04pm UTC](https://discourse.citationstyles.org/t/ho-to-express-nicknames-and-unknown-names/862/6 "2010-06-23T12:04:02Z")

</div>

> Just the other day I noticed a reference including a name like “T.R.  
> (Sean) Doe” (not sure if it was from a style in use though). I’m getting  
> convinced adding support for nicknames would be useful, but there are  
> quite a few questions to answer with regard to disambiguation, sorting,  
> etc. But I feel it might be handier to hold off on this until we have  
> the input model completed for the current CSL 1.0 spec.

Ok

> Sorry, I don’t follow. In my understanding, CSL doesn’t distinguish  
> between an empty variable and a non-existing one. Also, each role only  
> has a single name variable (which can be an array of multiple names).

We should clearly define whether there is a difference between an empty  
variable and a non-existing one and what means “empty variable”. In JSON  
it _could_ be one or some of:

no author variable given  
“author”: { }  
“author”: “”  
“author”: false  
“author”: true  
“author”: 1  
“author”:

> Right. As with nicknames, I’d suggest we revisit this at a later point,  
> as any solution will have quite a few implications. Feel free to create  
> tickets, though.

[http://bitbucket.org/bdarcus/csl-schema/issue/23/define-how-to-express-anonymous-and-et-al-as](http://bitbucket.org/bdarcus/csl-schema/issue/23/define-how-to-express-anonymous-and-et-al-as)

Jakob