How to add URL access date to MLA or APA

Question

I'm currently using the mla-good.bst file for natbib (available as mla-good.bst.zip), but I suppose I don't really care if I use APA or MLA, so I may switch later. The problem I am having is that I can't figure out a way to add URL access dates to the bibliography. I would like to add notes to the sources in the bibliography that state the date an online material was retrieved.

Unfortunately, I cannot find any good way to do this. I've seen methods of doing this using MLA and APA formats for biblatex, but none for natbib.

Perhaps I should consider switching to biblatex, but I'm still fuzzy on the differences (advantages/disadvantages) of using biblatex versus natbib.

score 2 · Answer 1 · answered Dec 18 '10 at 08:04

2

http://texnik.dante.de/misc/

there is a mla-goodURL, which knows the field "urldate", which should be printed if not empty.

Herbert

answered Dec 18 '10 at 08:04

Thanks for pointing me in the right direction. Unfortunately, the bst file didn't work as it was, but I've posted the diff for a modified one that does work. – peskal Dec 19 '10 at 05:31

score 2 · Accepted Answer · answered Dec 19 '10 at 05:30

Here is a diff between mla-good.bst and one that enables the "urldate" field.

76a77
>     urldate
365c366,371
<     { "\newline\urlprefix\url{" url * "}" * write$ newline$ }
---
>     { "\newline\urlprefix\url{" url * "}" * write$ newline$ 
>       urldate empty$
>         { skip$ }
>         { "(accessed on " urldate * ")" * write$ newline$ }
>       if$
>     }

(thanks Herbert).

How to add URL access date to MLA or APA

2 Answers2

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