I'm using biblatex and biber and sometimes I create my own commands for special citations, like so:
\newcommand{\met}[3]{(\emph{Met.} #1\textsuperscript{#2}#3)\nocite{metaphysics}\mancite}
\met{987}{b}{5}
The thing is, I also use the backref option, so regular citations have back references in the bibliography, like "(See pp. 5-7)".
The same doesn't happen for my own custom citations, though, since \nocite
adds the entry to the bibliography but doesn't care for where it was called from.
So is there a different way I can define my \met
command and others of the sort to account for that and have back references pointing to them?
I'm actually trying to write my own biblatex style, so I'm thinking I could declare a cite command that doesn't print anything and use that… but it doesn't sound like a very elegant solution, so I'm hoping there's a better way to achieve what I want.
Edit: Here's an MWE:
\documentclass{article}
\usepackage[backend=biber, backref]{biblatex}
\addbibresource{bib.bib}
\newcommand{\met}[3]{(\emph{Met.} #1\textsuperscript{#2}#3)\nocite{metaphysics}\mancite}
\begin{document}
`Twas brillig, and the slithy toves did gyre and gimble in the wabe; all mimsy were the borogoves, and the mome raths outgrabe. \met{987}{b}{5} %\cite{metaphysics}
\printbibliography
\end{document}
bib.bib
includes:
@incollection{metaphysics,
Address = {New Jersey},
Author = {Aristotle},
Booktitle = {The Complete Works of {Aristotle}},
Editor = {Jonathan Barnes},
Publisher = {Princeton University Press},
Title = {Metaphysics},
Volume = {2},
Year = {1995}}
Uncommenting \cite{metaphysics}
adds "(cit. on p. 1)" to the references. I want that to happen with my \met
command.
Edit 2:
I'm using @incollection
because I was using bibtex with a crazy brazilian style file and that was my only option. Now I'm trying to move to biblatex little by little.
Anyway, using shorttitle
seems great for this specific case, I didn't even know that existed. But I would have to declare a lot of new cite commands for many specific cases. And some of the citations might actually have nothing to do with the bibliography entry. For instance, to cite pre-socratic philosophers I'd use the Diels-Kranz numbering. So I could have one bibliography entry for Parmenides and another one for Heraclitus and they'd both be cited as something like "(28B1 DK)".
So I think it would be better to have something like \nocite
except it would work with the back references, wouldn't it?
My first thought was to declare a cite command like \hiddencite
and have it print nothing at all (or maybe just the prenote
and postnote
). I was just wondering if there wasn't a better option, since I just started using biblatex and I don't know much about it.
.bib
entries. I have some of these set up for various things. Some are quite specific e.g.EHU
/EPM
/T
for Hume orAK
for Kant (although I seem not to actually use the Kant one for some reason) and some are more general e.g.bk\adddot
/bks\adddot
etc..bib
entry. That's obviously only worth doing for something cited repeatedly and, even then, it might be best avoided. Now you're asking about using the same format for different entries without defining a different citation command for each entry. That's perfectly reasonable, so don't. Use entry-neutral commands for those cases, as you usually would. If I had to make a recommendation, I'd say avoid entry-specific commands. But for a book on Aristotle's Metaphysics, I can see the case for using one.biblatex-examples.bib
. It doesn't have any examples of custom pagination, but it does illustrate the use ofshorthand
(e.g. seekant:ku
). These entries are annotated with comments concerning the use of various of Biblatex's features.