Why modify?
Modify
a Mendeley style if:
- Mendeley
does not have your style - first see if it's available in View > Citation Style >
More Styles... > Get More Styles > Download
- The style
that Mendeley does have is a little different to the version your unit or
journal requires.
Selecting the style you wish to modify
1.
In the More Styles...
box, select the style you wish to edit, eg American Psychological Association
6th edition. Tip: Find a
style to modify that is as close to the style you need to use as possible.
2.
Right-click on the style and select Edit
Style
3.
This will open the Visual CSL Editor in a web page in your
browser. You may need to login to your Mendeley account if you are
not already logged into Mendeley Web. Make sure to change the name of
this style to something else by choosing 'Save Style As' under
the Style dropdown on the top left-hand side of the screen. This is
so you won't lose the original style.
Modify in-text citations
1.
To modify your in-text citation style, first click on the Inline Citations
heading on the left-hand menu. This will allow you to make global formatting
changes to in-text citations only
2.
To make changes to the layout of your in-text citations, click Layout on the
left-hand menu, under
Inline Citations OR click on an element of the in-text citation
in the Example Citations
3.
From here you can make changes to the text formatting, such as
bold/italics/capitalisation, or go further to set up more detailed changes such
as text case, delimiters etc. There are a lot of fields for specific elements
and conditional variables, and it can get quite complex, so make sure you
are in the section you want to make the changes to. Tip: Keep an eye
on the example citations to see if your changes are being reflected correctly.
4.
Click the Style
menu on the top left-hand corner and click Save Style to save your changes.
Modify bibliography
1.
To modify your bibliography style, first click on the
Bibliography heading on the left-hand menu. This will allow you to make
global formatting changes to the bibliography only eg choose an indent or
set line spacing
2.
To make changes to the layout of your bibliography, click Layout on
the left-hand menu, under Bibliography OR click on an element
of the bibliography citation in the Example Citations
3.
From here you can make changes to the text formatting, such as
bold/italics/capitalisation, or go further to set up more detailed changes such
as text case, delimiters etc. There are a lot of fields for specific elements
and conditional variables, and it can get quite complex, so make sure you
are in the section you want to make the changes to. Tip: Keep
an eye on the example citations to see if your changes are being reflected
correctly.
4.
Click the Style menu on the top left-hand corner and
click Save Style to save your changes.
Saving & using your modified style
Save
your modifications by clicking the Style
menu and selecting Save
Style As. Choose a new style ID for your style if you have not
done so already. You should get a message, highlighted in yellow, at the
top of the screen that contains the URL to your new style.
To
use your new style:
1. Copy
the URL before you close the browser window
2. Go
to View >
Citation Style > More Styles... > Get More Styles in
Mendeley Desktop
3. Paste the URL into the
Download Style
box and click Download.
Your new style should be available and selected for use. It will be named with
the original style name + your Mendeley user name, NOT the style ID you
saved it as.
Support for the Visual CSL editor
Mendeley
has a guide for using the Visual CSL editor on their website. See the link to
it below for more examples of how to modify styles using the editor.
There
are more advanced features, such as editing at the code level, which will not
be discussed in either of our guides, but feel free to explore them if you are
comfortable with your skill level.
This is another useful
and in-depth guide to editing citation styles, put together by a Mendeley user
on GitHub.
Global formatting options
The
main modifications to your style can be made by selecting Global Formatting Options
from the top of the left-hand menu.
Here
you can change:
Class: Do
you want in-text or note (footnote/endnote) style in-text citations?
Name form: Set
the name form as short (surname only) or long (surname with initial)
Et al use: Set
the minimum number of names needed to activate et al abbreviation
Page range format: How should the page numbers display?
eg 123-25; 123-25; 123-5
Add nodes
As
well as modifying existing style elements, you can add your own.
1.
Select the area you want to add a new element to, eg Global Formatting Options
2.
Click the +
button on the left-hand side menu to Add node
3.
Choose an element you want to add from the provided list
4.
Fill in the fields you require.
5.
Remember to use Style
> Save Style to keep your changes.