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Citoid replaces non-bare URL references in Visual editor
Open, Needs TriagePublicBUG REPORT

Description

Steps to replicate the issue (include links if applicable):

  • Open article with non-bare URL reference to be edited using visual editor
  • Select reference to be edited and click convert

What happens?:

  • The visual editor will overwrite the reference with the result from citoid without any checks if the generated reference is working. Information of the old reference is lost..

What should have happened instead? (minimal):

  • The visual editor should not try to replace the non-bare URL references

What should have happened instead?: (optimal)

  • The visual editor should show the information of old and new references side by side as part of the conversion process. The user can review the changes and manually copy the missing information from the old reference if needed.

Example diff:

Discussions in Finnish wikipedia:

Event Timeline

Fixing this in the Citoid UI would be very difficult and add a lot of complexity. I would suggest this particular problem could be addressed another way, maybe:

  • An upstream fix to Zotero to recommend the non paywalled URL instead
  • A local bot to fix URLs

@Esanders If I understand correctly that there is already detection if reference contains template (example: <ref>{{url|https://www.google.com}}</ref>) and if template is detected then it doesn't show convert-button. How detecting non-bare url would be more difficult or complicated?

Also for suggestions for how to fix. The url:s in general aren't broken (ie. for example, if you have paid access to hs.fi then urls will work) and even if they would be broken it doesn't change it that currently conversion will lose original information. Sure this is user error in the end, but currently citoid implementation will guide user to make the error.