Citations not found when copy paste text to new g doc

Support
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1

I have written text (with Paperpile citations) in one Google Document, which I have now copied and pasted into another Google Document. Although the Paperpile citations are still blue and underlined, the sidebar says that there are no active citations and that I need to add citations before generating a bibliography.

I am imagining writing chapters of a thesis on different g docs and then compiling them into one at the end, and would like to know how I can do this and:

  1. retain the citations
  2. generate a bibliography with references correctly listed and without duplication

I don’t know if I’m misunderstanding something, or whether this is not a supported feature?

1 Like
2

Sorry, this seems to be working today. Not sure if I was just missing something yesterday. However, the list on the Google Document sidebar of citations included in the document is not complete.

3

I am facing the same problem. Namely, I have a Google docs document with many paperpile references. However, when I make a copy of the document (via the ‘make copy’ command of google docs), the new copy is missing all the references. They are still in the text and are marked as links, but paperpile does not recognize them. Any ideas?

4

@staszek_sdh, citations inserted with Paperpile should be recognized when copied this way. Did you continue experiencing this issue, even after clicking Format citations? Let me know if still relevant.

6

I figured it out. Essentially you need to copy the ENTIRE google document that you want to move (including reference list at the end), then paste it into the other google doc, then format citations, then you can trim it down. Note: the references list updates as well but it may move. You can cut/paste it to be back at the end.

7

I am having this issue and not having luck. What Corina says above worked for combining the first two documents, but then the third loses all its PP links, and I have two more docs to add in. Any advice would be appreciated! The amount of work it will be to regenerate these citations is daunting.

8

I find that sometimes “make a copy” brings in the references, and sometimes it doesn’t.

9

Hi Deanne! Just to clarify how Paperpile handles this — the reference information is actually stored in the in-text citations themselves, so pasting with formatting intact (simple Ctrl+V) into the new document and then running Format citations should be enough for them to be recognized. No need to include the reference list from the source document.

To format, you can use the Paperpile menu at the top, or our sidebar add-on as an alternative pathway (Extensions > Paperpile > Manage Citations).

If you’ve already tried both and the citations are still not being picked up, let us know the exact steps you are following so we can try to reproduce.