How to change bibliographic style file (.bst) in case of entry with same authors

Question

I'm using BibTeX for editing my references in a dissertation with the mcbride.bst style. According to the rules I have to write --- when I have a reference entry with the same authors, e.g.

Author 1. 2011. Title....

Author 2. 2011. Title 1....

---. 2012. Title 2....

Now instead of ---, I get a solid line. I'd really appreciate any help in knowing what to change in the mcbride.bst file to get the described result.

Answer 1

According to the description of mcbride.bst, "[t]hree-em dashes are used in place of repeated author names". Here's the relevant function:

FUNCTION {name.or.dash}
{ 's :=
   oldname empty$
     { s 'oldname := s }
     { s oldname =
         { "---------" }
         { s 'oldname := s }
       if$
     }
   if$
}

If you really must use three separated em dashes, you could copy mcbride.bst to your working directory, rename it and then in the above function change --------- to ---\/---\/--- or
---\,---\,---.