BibLaTeX `@set` in authoryear style for translated article

Question

When using the @set entry type in combination with the authoryear style in BibLaTeX, I obtain unexpected results. Instead of giving the correct year for each entry in the set, the year of the main entry gets repeated.

An example explains this better:

\begin{filecontents*}{\jobname.bib}
@SET{set,
  entryset = {original,translation}
}

@ARTICLE{original,
  author = {Author, A.},
  journal = {Journal de France},
  year = {1999}
}

@ARTICLE{translation,
  author = {Author, A.},
  journal = {American Journal},
  year = {2000},
  translator = {Traducteur, T.}
}
\end{filecontents*}

\documentclass{article}

\usepackage[style=authoryear]{biblatex}
\addbibresource{\jobname.bib}

\begin{document}
\nocite{set}
\printbibliography
\end{document}

I would have expected the second appearance of 1999 to give 2000... Or maybe, that the bibliography style would change on subsequent set entries. Could someone clarify this to me or propose a workaround?

Answer 1

You should probably use the the related and relatedtype fields instead of the @set entry type. There is a relatedtype called bytranslator defined by default. However, it is meant to be used in combination with @book entries rather than @article entries as in your case. But you can still define your own relatedtype as shown in the example below:

\begin{filecontents*}{\jobname.bib}
@ARTICLE{original,
  author = {Auteur, A.},
  journal = {Journal de France},
  year = {1999},
  title = {Always English},
  related = {translation},
  relatedtype = {articletranslatedin}
}

@ARTICLE{translation,
  author = {Author, A.},
  journal = {American Journal},
  year = {2000},
  title = {Always English},
  translator = {Traducteur, T.}
}
\end{filecontents*}

\documentclass{article}

\usepackage[style=authoryear]{biblatex}
\addbibresource{\jobname.bib}

\makeatletter
%% Here we basically just re-use code from different places in BibLaTeX
\newbibmacro*{related:articletranslatedin}[1]{%
 \entrydata{#1}{%
  \renewbibmacro*{name:hook}[1]{%
   \ifnumequal{\value{listcount}}{1}
    {\begingroup
     \mkrelatedstring%
     \lbx@initnamehook{#1}%
     \endgroup}
    {}}%
  \usebibmacro{byeditor+others}%
  \newunit\newblock
  \usebibmacro{in:}%
  \usebibmacro{journal+issuetitle}%
  \setunit{\addspace}%
  \printtext[parens]{\printdate}
  \newunit
  \usebibmacro{note+pages}%
  \newunit\newblock
  \iftoggle{bbx:isbn}
   {\printfield{issn}}
   {}%
  \newunit\newblock
  \usebibmacro{doi+eprint+url}%
}}
\makeatother

\begin{document}
\nocite{original}
\printbibliography
\end{document}

But be careful with this example. It is not very portable and expects the following:

1. The author should be the same in both entries. It is therefore omitted in the related article. We do not check for differing names.
2. The title is expected to be the same as well and is omitted for the second entry.