Biblatex changing citationstyle to include shortened version of firstname

Question

I've now looked into this topic for quite some time, but can't seem to find a proper solution or pre-defined style that fits my needs. Maybe you guys can help or point towards a solution, because I'm kinda stuck right now.

I'm currently using Biblatex for my bibliography and want to cite my sources in footnotes like the following, where the firstname is shortened to only the first respective letter:

Lastname, Firstname (year), p. from-to

So an example would be:

Clark, A. (2003), p. 30-45

If I understand correctly, I need to alternate the citestyle option passed when loading the biblatex package.

I've found various styles that include the lastname and year in the format I want. However, I failed to find a style that includs the shortened version of the first name.

Answer 1

You don't need to use a completely different citation style, it should be enough to redefine the labelname name format.

In the example I use biblatex-ext's ext-authoryear as a simple way to obtain parentheses around the year in the footnotes, but there are other methods to do that as well.

\documentclass[british]{article}
\usepackage[T1]{fontenc}
\usepackage[utf8]{inputenc}
\usepackage{babel}
\usepackage{csquotes}

\usepackage[style=ext-authoryear, backend=biber, autocite=footnote]{biblatex}

\DeclareInnerCiteDelims{footcite}{\bibopenparen}{\bibcloseparen}

\DeclareNameFormat{labelname}{%
  \ifnum\value{uniquename}<2
    \ifuseprefix
      {\usebibmacro{name:family-given}
        {\namepartfamily}
        {\namepartgiveni}
        {\namepartprefix}
        {\namepartsuffixi}}
      {\usebibmacro{name:family-given}
        {\namepartfamily}
        {\namepartgiveni}
        {\namepartprefixi}
        {\namepartsuffixi}}%
  \else
    \usebibmacro{name:family-given}
      {\namepartfamily}
      {\namepartgiven}
      {\namepartprefix}
      {\namepartsuffix}%
  \fi
  \usebibmacro{name:andothers}}

\addbibresource{biblatex-examples.bib}


\begin{document}
Lorem\autocite[380]{sigfridsson}
ipsum\autocite[12-34]{nussbaum}
\printbibliography
\end{document}