[Tex/LaTex] Set natbib options after loading natbib package

bibliographiesnatbibpackage-optionssortingsv-classes

Is it possible to set (or change) the natbib package options after its loading (i.e. after the line \usepackage{natbib})?

The reason I need it is that I'm using a LaTeX style from a journal and it has a natbib option which means it "…handles reference entries in the author-year system by using the natbib package", according to the journal style documentation, and I need to tune some settings (like 'sort&compress', for example), but I do not know how to do that since I do not load the 'natbib' package directly.

I know there is a command \biboptions{} in Elsevier LaTeX style which does exactly what I want. But as far as I understand, this command is specific to their style and does not belong to the natbib package itself, or am I wrong?

P.S. I'm working with the Springer's 'SVJour3' document class currently. It is a widely used one, I believe. So, maybe someone can suggest me a way to sort the citations so that they do not look like [2,3,1] instead of [1-3] or at least [1,2,3] in the text?

Thank you!

Best Answer

You can use \PassOptionsToPackage{OPTIONS}{PACKAGE} to set additional options which should be used when the package gets loaded. But you have to use it before the package gets loaded.

Or you could use PreventPackageFromLoading from the scrfile package, which is part of KOMA-Script. You could prevent the package from loading and later load it yourself after you reset the prevented packages with \ResetPreventPackageFromLoading. More in the KOMA-Script Guide (scrguide).

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[Tex/LaTex] Natbib package error? Bibliography not compatible with author-year citations

Storing your references in a bibtex database and using bibtex would be the best option. However, if you want to edit manually your bibliography you have to use the appropriate format for natbit.

The format of the bibliography entries for natbibt is

\bibitem[NameShort(year)NameLong]{citation-label}
author's last name, author's first name initial.
``Author's article.'' 
\textit{journal} (year)

NameShort can be use to list only the first name an the et al. abbreviation. NameLong is the full list of authors. NameShort is what is used in the majority of cite commands.

Thus, you can modify you \bibitem entry as follows

\bibitem[Name1 et~al(2012)Name1, Name2, Name3]{cite-label}
...

or as follows

\bibitem[Name1, Name2, and Name(year){cite label}]
...

[Tex/LaTex] Bibliography style (vancouver)

Based on our discussion in the comments, you created a new .bst file using the custom-bib package. This .bst file then needs to be modified to be used with the jabbrv package.

It seems that the .bib files created by custom-bib package are a bit more sophisticated than the basic .bst files assumed by the package, and the modification suggested in the package web site doesn't work. Thanks to some discussion in chat with Joseph Wright, here's a modified function that works:

FUNCTION {format.journal}
{journal duplicate$ empty$
  'pop$
  {
    "\JournalTitle{" swap$ * "}" *
    emphasize
    output
  }
if$
}

This function is added to the .bst file and the following line in the {article} function of the .bst file

journal "journal" output.check

is changed to

format.journal "journal" output.check

Name the new .bst file jabbrv_thesis. I've put a copy here:

Modified .bst file

Now you can use the jabbrv package to do the abbreviations. To do this you use:

\usepackage[warnundef]{jabbrv}
\bibliographystyle{jabbrv_thesis}

If there are particular journal names that you don't want abbreviated (e.g. Nature) then you need to edit the jabbrv-ltwa-en.ldf file (located in the jabbrv folder) and comment out the \DefineJournalAbbreviation lines for those names. If there words that aren't abbreviated, but should be, (these will show up in the warnings) then you need to add lines like the following to your document.

\DefineJournalAbbreviation{<full name>}{<abbreviation>} % no final '.'

Best Answer

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[Tex/LaTex] Natbib package error? Bibliography not compatible with author-year citations

[Tex/LaTex] Bibliography style (vancouver)

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