[Tex/LaTex] How to code ß (German “sharp S”) in BibTeX

bibtexcharactersgerman

I have an author called Jörg Geißler, whom I want to include in my BibTeX database.

I tried to use

Gei\ssler, J\"{o}rg

but this doesn't work correctly. I can't generate the PDF anymore. How do I type in the name correctly?

Best Answer

You need to enclose the \ss macro in braces: (it's also a good idea to enclose the \" within the braces of the 'o'.)

Gei{\ss}ler, J{\"o}rg

Otherwise, TeX can't tell whether the macro is \ss or \ssler. Usually macros can also be delimited by spaces in LaTeX, but this won't work in your bib file because the space is used by BibTeX to delimit parts of names.

So within your document

Gei\ss ler, J{\"o}rg

would render correctly as:

Geißler, Jörg,

but used within your bib file the same input would be rendered by BibTeX as:

Geiß ler, Jörg

assuming you were using a lastname-firstname bibliography format.

Furthermore, if you used the form

J{\"o}rg Gei\ss ler

in your bib file, it would be rendered as:

ler, Jörg Geiß

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