How to create an author index using BibLaTeX with Biber backend and APA style

Question

I'm working on the template for a thesis, and I was able to get it almost all the way to where I would like, even though I'm fairly new to LaTeX. I'm using Overleaf and I started with the clean thesis style, which I have successfully customized with several changes and additions.

Regarding the bibliography, I wanted to include them by chapter and also have a final complete list of references. I was able to do this using this structure:

\begin{filecontents*}{local_ref.bib}
@BOOK{reference1,
  title = {{Some title}},
  publisher = {Publisher},
  year = {2001},
  author = {{Institutional Author}},
  shortauthor = {IA},
  address = {Netherlands},
  edition = {1},
  isbn = {0 7506 5080 X}
  }

  @PHDTHESIS{reference2,
  author = {John Doe},
  title = {Another title},
  school = {{The University of Here}},
  year = {2020},
  type = {PhD {T}hesis}
  }

    @PHDTHESIS{reference3,
  author = {Name Surname},
  title = {A third title},
  school = {{Some University}},
  year = {2019},
  type = {PhD {T}hesis}
  }
\end{filecontents*}

\documentclass{scrreprt}
 \usepackage[style=apa, 
             backend=biber, 
             natbib=true,
             backref=false,
             maxnames=3,
             minnames=1,
             maxbibnames=5,
             minbibnames=3,
             maxcitenames=2,
             mincitenames=1,
             defernumbers=true,
             refsegment = chapter,
             sorting=ynt
                            ]{biblatex}

 \addbibresource{local_ref.bib}

 \begin{document}

 \tableofcontents

 \chapter{First chapter}
 \section{Section Name}
 Some text \cite{reference1}.
 \printbibliography[segment = \therefsegment, heading = subbibintoc]


 \chapter{Second chapter}
 \section{Another Section}
 Some text \cite{reference2}.
 \printbibliography[segment = \therefsegment, heading = subbibintoc]

 \printbibliography

 \end{document}

As you can see, it works well to include a single reference in chapter one, another in chapter two and then to have both of them at the reference list, while ignoring the uncited one that is part of the bib.

But now I have a problem that I cannot seem to find a solution: I want to have a final index of authors, in the following format:

---

Author Index

Andersen 1, 3, 5
Arbersman 2, 3, 4

Barker 3

Carpenter 2, 3
Chang 4, 5
NASA 3, 4

---

As you can see, I would like to have:

• A list with just the last name of authors;
• The short name for institutions (NASA, instead of National Agency...);
• Page references to where they appear over the whole thesis;
• Alphabetical grouping of names;
• Page numbers as links to the original page.

Package AuthorIndex would do that and I've seen some other alternatives working with either BibTeX or BibLaTeX (with BibTeX in the backend). The problem is, because of all of the dependencies I have in my thesis, and the fact I have started from a ready template, if I change even the backend from biber it crashes the whole thing (as I need to use APA style, for example).

Another problem I see is that I needed to disable backref, as I do not want the chapter references to include "(cit. on pg X). With that, I don't know if the page reference in the author index would be able to link back to the citation. (I am using hyperref, by the way).

Thank you very much for any help you can give me.

André Brasil

Answer 1

biblatex comes with a few example files for cite/bibliography indexing: 20-indexing-single.tex for simple indices and 21-indexing-multiple.tex, 22-indexing-subentry.tex for more complex setups.

If you only want a single index (namely the author index) then the following based on 20-indexing-single.tex should work.

• Load an indexing package (here the standard LaTeX makeidx).
• Activate indexing (here with \makeindex).
• Tell biblatex to start indexing citations with indexing=cite,.
• Redefine the bibmacro citeindex which executes the indexing commands to only index the name (we instruct it to index all names by telling it to index names 1-999 and to index only the family name by defining a new index name format).
• Add the indexing printing command where you'd like to have the index (here with \printindex).

In this set-up the index is automatically grouped by letter categories and with hyperref the page numbers are linked. biblatex indexes the short author name used in citations ("IA" instead of "Institutional Author").

\documentclass{scrreprt}
\usepackage[style=apa, 
            backend=biber, 
            natbib=true,
            backref=false,
            maxbibnames=5,
            minbibnames=3,
            maxcitenames=2,
            mincitenames=1,
            defernumbers=true,
            refsegment = chapter,
            indexing=cite,
]{biblatex}

\usepackage{makeidx}
\usepackage{hyperref}

\makeindex

\renewbibmacro*{citeindex}{%
  \ifciteindex
    {\indexnames[family][1-999]{labelname}}
    {}}

\DeclareIndexNameFormat{family}{%
  \let\namepartgiven\empty
  \usebibmacro{index:name}
    {\index}
    {\namepartfamily}
    {\namepartgiven}
    {\namepartprefix}
    {\namepartsuffix}}

\begin{filecontents*}{\jobname.bib}
@BOOK{reference1,
  title       = {{Some title}},
  publisher   = {Publisher},
  year        = {2001},
  author      = {{Institutional Author}},
  shortauthor = {IA},
  address     = {Netherlands},
  edition     = {1},
  isbn        = {0 7506 5080 X},
}
@PHDTHESIS{reference2,
  author = {John Doe},
  title  = {Another title},
  school = {{The University of Here}},
  year   = {2020},
  type   = {PhD Thesis},
}
@PHDTHESIS{reference3,
  author = {Name Surname},
  title  = {A third title},
  school = {{Some University}},
  year   = {2019},
  type   = {PhD Thesis},
}
\end{filecontents*}
\addbibresource{\jobname.bib}

\begin{document}

\tableofcontents

\chapter{First chapter}
\section{Section Name}
Some text \autocite{reference1}.
\printbibliography[segment = \therefsegment, heading = subbibintoc]

\chapter{Second chapter}
\section{Another Section}
Some text \autocite{reference2}.
\printbibliography[segment = \therefsegment, heading = subbibintoc]

\printbibliography

\printindex
\end{document}