[Tex/LaTex] Package glossaries print acronyms instead of description

acronymsglossaries

I am writing an article for MDPI journal and I would like to use my list of glossaries instead of typing them by hand (which is what is done in the template).

I have tried the solution provided here: List of Acronyms but nothing seems to work. I think that I am mixing glossary terms and acronyms and this is why it doesn't work, but I think this is a legitimate thing to do as a lot of glossary terms have acronyms.

My MWE is:

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage[utf8]{inputenc}

\usepackage{import}


\usepackage[nopostdot,style=super,nonumberlist,toc]{glossaries}

% Tell glossaries package that glossaries start here
\makeglossaries
% Import the glossaries package
\subimport*{./}{glossary.tex}

\begin{document}


This is an acronym: \gls{dht}.\par

\section{This is how it should look like}

\noindent 
\begin{tabular}{@{}ll}
MDPI & Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute\\
DOAJ & Directory of open access journals\\
TLA & Three letter acronym\\
LD & linear dichroism
\end{tabular}

\section{This is how it looks like}

\printglossary[type=\acronymtype]

\end{document}

and glossary.tex contains:

\newglossaryentry{dht}
{
    type=\acronymtype,
    name={DHT},
    first={Distributed Hash Table (DHT)},
    long={Distributed Hash Table},
    firstplural={Distributed Hash Tables (DHTs)},
    plural={DHTs},
    description={I want the long here, not the description}
}

I have two separate questions, one regarding style formatting and the other regarding what is shown in the abbreviations table. This SO question refers to the latter. I have also checked: Combined glossary and list of acronyms: Same backlinks for full entry and acronym, or none at all at the latter? but although I think it is related to my question, I can't come with a proper solution as I have not enough expertise.

Best Answer

Use \newacronym to define abbreviations with the glossaries package. The glossary.tex file should look like:

\newacronym{dht}{DHT}{Distributed Hash Table}
\newacronym{mdpi}{MDPI}{Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute}
\newacronym[longplural={Directories of open access journals}]
 {doaj}{DOAJ}{Directory of open access journals}
\newacronym{tla}{TLA}{Three letter acronym}
\newacronym{ld}{LD}{linear dichroism}

The document should input this file using just \input or \loadglsentries. Fancier inclusion commands, such as \subimport or \include, should be avoided.

The document:

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage[utf8]{inputenc}

\usepackage[nopostdot,style=super,nonumberlist,toc]{glossaries}

\makeglossaries

\setacronymstyle{long-short}
\input{glossary}% input definitions

\begin{document}
First use: \gls{dht}. Next use: \gls{dht}.

Reset.\glsreset{dht}

First use plural \glspl{dht}. Next use plural: \glspl{dht}.

\printglossary[type=\acronymtype,title={List of Acronyms}]
\end{document}

The document build process (assuming the file is called myDoc.tex):

pdflatex myDoc
makeglossaries myDoc
pdflatex MyDoc

Or (if you don't have Perl):

pdflatex myDoc
makeglossaries-lite myDoc
pdflatex myDoc

Result:

image of document

If you want all defined entries included, even if they haven't been used in the document, add \glsaddallunused at the end of the document:

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage[utf8]{inputenc}

\usepackage[nopostdot,style=super,nonumberlist,toc]{glossaries}

\makeglossaries

\setacronymstyle{long-short}
\input{glossary}% input definitions

\begin{document}
First use: \gls{dht}. Next use: \gls{dht}.

Reset.\glsreset{dht}

First use plural \glspl{dht}. Next use plural: \glspl{dht}.

\printglossary[type=\acronymtype,title={List of Acronyms}]
\glsaddallunused
\end{document}

This produces:

image of document

The vertical gaps are caused by a change in letter group. Use nogroupskip to omit them:

\usepackage[nopostdot,style=super,nonumberlist,toc,nogroupskip]{glossaries}

If you want the entries listed in order of definition, use sort=def:

\usepackage[nopostdot,style=super,nonumberlist,toc,nogroupskip,sort=def]{glossaries}

If you want to use the glossaries-extra extension package, you need to replace \setacronymstyle with \setabbreviationstyle[acronym]:

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage[utf8]{inputenc}

\usepackage[style=super,nonumberlist,nogroupskip,sort=def]{glossaries-extra}

\makeglossaries

\setabbreviationstyle[acronym]{long-short}
\input{glossary}% input definitions

\begin{document}
First use: \gls{dht}. Next use: \gls{dht}.

Reset.\glsreset{dht}

First use plural \glspl{dht}. Next use plural: \glspl{dht}.

\printglossary[type=\acronymtype,title={List of Acronyms}]
\glsaddallunused
\end{document}

In this case (all defined entries and in order of definition and nonumberlist) you can simplify the build process:

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage[utf8]{inputenc}

\usepackage[style=super,nogroupskip,sort=none]{glossaries-extra}

\setabbreviationstyle[acronym]{long-short}
\input{glossary}% input definitions

\begin{document}
First use: \gls{dht}. Next use: \gls{dht}.

Reset.\glsreset{dht}

First use plural \glspl{dht}. Next use plural: \glspl{dht}.

\printunsrtglossary[type=\acronymtype,title={List of Acronyms}]
\end{document}

The build process is now just:

pdflatex myDoc

Result:

image of document

With glossaries-extra, you can change \newacronym to \newabbreviation, in which case you also need to change \acronymtype to \glsxtrabbrvtype and just use \setabbreviationstyle{long-short} (without the optional argument).

If you have a mixture of some abbreviations with descriptions and some without, the best method is to use glossaries-extra, which allows multiple abbreviation styles.

For example, use \newacronym for terms without a description:

\newacronym{dht}{DHT}{Distributed Hash Table}

with the acronym style set to long-short:

\setabbreviationstyle[acronym]{long-short}

and use \newabbreviation for terms with a description:

\newabbreviation[description={description text here}]{tla}{TLA}{Three letter acronym}

and use the long-short-desc style:

\setabbreviationstyle{long-short-desc}

You might need a different glossary style or split the entries into two glossaries, depending on how they need to be displayed.

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