Citar completion tells me there is a note file, but there is none

[publicimageltd]

Describe the bug First of all: I haven't update bibtex for quite a while, great to see how much it has grown and improved! Now the bug: I understand that the three columns in the completion list mean "F" = File (PDF, for example); "N" = Note, "L" = Link. Now I often see a "N" where there is not a note file.

To Reproduce

Use this bibtex entry:

@article{oleary_2005_Foucault,
  title = {Foucault, {{Dewey}}, and the {{Experience}} of {{Literature}}},
  author = {O'Leary, Timothy},
  date = {2005},
  journaltitle = {New Literary History},
  shortjournal = {New Literary History},
  volume = {36},
  number = {4},
  pages = {543--557},
  issn = {1080-661X},
  url = {http://muse.jhu.edu/content/crossref/journals/new_literary_history/v036/36.4oleary.html},
  file = {/home/jv/Zotero/storage/MZTA899N/36.4oleary.pdf}
}

Expected behavior There should be only a "F" and an "L", since there is no note file associated.

Emacs version: 27.2

[bdarcus]

I don't see that myself, but this is the code that determines presence of a note:

https://github.com/bdarcus/citar/blob/43f92a94022966a6ad1d4ac373bc2f4e1cc821c2/citar.el#L464-L469

So:

ELISP> (citar-file--files-for-entry 
        "low2001" 
        nil ; not actually used here
        citar-notes-paths 
        citar-file-extensions) 
("/home/bruce/org/roam/biblio/low2001.org")

ELISP> (citar-file--files-for-entry 
        "low001" 
        nil 
        citar-notes-paths 
        citar-file-extensions) 
nil

Do you see anything there that would explain what you're seeing?

[publicimageltd]

Thanks for the fast reply. As to the problem itself: I set a breakpoint at the format function and found out that the passage you pointed to actually returns the pdf name. Here's the reconstruction with the real values used in that iteration:

ELISP> test-entry
(("file" . "/home/jv/Zotero/storage/MZTA899N/36.4oleary.pdf")
 ("url" . "http://muse.jhu.edu/content/crossref/journals/new_literary_history/v036/36.4oleary.html")
 ("date" . "2005")
 ("author" . "O'Leary, Timothy")
 ("title" . "Foucault, {{Dewey}}, and the {{Experience}} of {{Literature}}")
 ("=type=" . "article")
 ("=key=" . "oleary_2005_Foucault"))

ELISP> test-citekey
"oleary_2005_Foucault"
ELISP> test-notes-paths
("~/Dokumente/Hefte/zettelkasten")

ELISP> test-file-extensions
("pdf" "org" "md")

ELISP> (citar-file--files-for-entry test-citekey test-entry test-notes-paths test-file-extensions)
("/home/jv/Zotero/storage/MZTA899N/36.4oleary.pdf")

In my understanding, the last value should be nil, correct? Excluding the entry "pdf" from citar-file-extensions doesn't help, either.

[publicimageltd]

Update: When I pass nil instead of the entry value, it correctly returns nil:

ELISP> (citar-file--files-for-entry test-citekey nil test-notes-paths test-file-extensions)
nil

[bdarcus]

Update: When I pass nil instead of the entry value, it correctly returns nil:

So that might be the simple solution.

Except I don't understand the problem.

I see that citar-file--possible-names looks in the file field without considering the directory, but the citar-file--files-for-entry function that calls it DOES check if the file exists.

:shrug:

[bdarcus]

So that might be the simple solution.

I merged this. Can you confirm it works as expected now?

And if you have any ideas why the problem to begin with me ...

[publicimageltd]

It's definitely the entry value which is causing the problem:

ELISP> (citar-file--possible-names test-citekey test-notes-paths test-file-extensions nil)
("/home/jv/Dokumente/Hefte/zettelkasten/oleary_2005_Foucault.pdf" "/home/jv/Dokumente/Hefte/zettelkasten/oleary_2005_Foucault.org" "/home/jv/Dokumente/Hefte/zettelkasten/oleary_2005_Foucault.md")

ELISP> (citar-file--possible-names test-citekey test-notes-paths test-file-extensions test-entry)
("/home/jv/Dokumente/Hefte/zettelkasten/oleary_2005_Foucault.pdf" "/home/jv/Dokumente/Hefte/zettelkasten/oleary_2005_Foucault.org" "/home/jv/Dokumente/Hefte/zettelkasten/oleary_2005_Foucault.md" "/home/jv/Zotero/storage/MZTA899N/36.4oleary.pdf")

So in the latter case, the pdf file "36.4oleary.pdf gets added. Since it does exist, it is not wed out by file-exists-p.

I see you changed it quicker than I could finish reply. :smile: :+1: Thanks!

[publicimageltd]

It does work now.

[bdarcus]

OIC; the code was working "correctly"; it just wasn't able to distinguish note file from other files.

I suppose another approach would be to have a separate note-extension defcustom. But that doesn't seem necessary; this will do for now.