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I need to write an article with APA citations. I have sample code that works fine with style=authoryear, but if I switch to style=apa I get the following error message: 

Error Line 21 ! Undefined control sequence.<argument> \printdateextralabel

I'm using TexMaker with biber. I've gone through example after example and I can't figure out what's wrong. I suspected it was with TexMaker or MiKTeX, but I just uninstalled and reinstalled both programs and I'm having the same issue. The same error message always pops up with the line number after \printbibliography. I tried copying corrected MWE's from other questions (such as this one answered by Alan Munn) and I get the same error. I included a MWE and my .bib file (borrowed from another thread) below.

File MWE:

\documentclass[article,12pt,letterpaper]{apa6}
\usepackage[american]{babel}
\usepackage{csquotes}
\usepackage[style=apa,natbib=true,backend=biber]{biblatex}
\DeclareLanguageMapping{american}{american-apa}


\title{Annotated Bibliography 1}
\author{Joe Smith}
\affiliation{Spectacular University}
\addbibresource{bib.bib}

\begin{document}
\abstract{abstract goes here}
\maketitle
this is a test
\cite{Kim1999188}
\printbibliography
\end{document}

bib:

@article{Kim1999188,
title = "Absorption of water vapour into lithium bromide-based solutions with additives using a simple stagnant pool absorber ",
journal = "International Journal of Refrigeration ",
volume = "22",
number = "3",
pages = "188 - 193",
year = "1999",
note = "",
issn = "0140-7007",
doi = "10.1016/S0140-7007(98)00061-9",
url = "http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0140700798000619",
author = "Jin-Soo Kim and Huen Lee and Sun Il Yu",
keywords = "Absorption",
keywords = "Water",
keywords = "Lithium bromide",
keywords = "Absorption",
keywords = "Eau",
keywords = "Bromure de lithium "
}

Commands Tab Quick Build

Here is a link to my Log File.

Community
  • 1
Chris
  • 307

1 Answers1

7

biblatex-apa has been updated to use the new commands introduced in biblatex 3.5, if you still have this problem, make sure to update your biblatex styles. The modifications described in the answer below should not be necessary any more. If you have a similar problem with another style, update the style and contact the maintainer if the problem persists.

The date format handling has been drastically changed in biblatex 3.5, some of these changes are not backwards compatible. See the release notes.

One of the changes is that \printdateextralabel has been renamed. With

\def\printdateextralabel{\printlabeldateextra}

you can get back the old name, so biblatex-apa does not throw errors any more.

The github version of biblatex-apa is already updated to work properly with biblatex 3.5 and use the new features, but on CTAN we still only have version 6.9. PLK has just submitted version 7.0 to CTAN (see this github ticket) so it should be available in MikTeX and TeX live in a few days.

The MWE

\documentclass[article,12pt,letterpaper]{apa6}
\usepackage[american]{babel}
\usepackage{csquotes}
\usepackage[style=apa,natbib=true,backend=biber]{biblatex}
\DeclareLanguageMapping{american}{american-apa}

\addbibresource{biblatex-examples.bib}

\def\printdateextralabel{\printlabeldateextra}

\begin{document}
\cite{sigfridsson}
\printbibliography
\end{document}

works just fine, but issues some warning messages about deprecated commands and options.

moewe
  • 175,683
  • thanks for the answer and pointing to the CHANGELOG of biblatex; it greatly helped me debugging/understanding a similar problem and saved my day. – MWiesner Feb 07 '17 at 15:29