develop-search-translator

Development

Develop a search translator that looks up items by identifier (DOI, ISBN, PMID, arXiv ID, etc.) via an external API. NOT for websites with search pages — use develop-web-translator for those.

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What is a search translator?

A search translator takes a structured identifier (DOI, ISBN, PMID, arXiv ID, etc.) and looks up metadata from an external API. It does NOT receive a web page or document.

Common confusion: if the user wants to translate items from a website that has a search page, that's a web translator, not a search translator. Use develop-web-translator for that. Search translators are for identifier-based lookup services (like Crossref, OpenAlex, Library of Congress, etc.).

Prerequisites

Fetch and read the Zotero translator documentation:

Also read index.d.ts for type definitions.

Step 1: Gather information

Label: The service name (e.g. "OpenAlex")
Creator: The author's name
Identifier types: What identifiers does this service accept? (DOI, ISBN, PMID, arXiv, etc.)
API documentation: URL of the service's API docs

Look for existing search translators for patterns:

grep -l "detectSearch\|doSearch" *.js

Step 2: Initialize

node .bin/init-translator.mjs --label "<Label>" --creator "<Creator>" --type search

This scaffolds the file from the search translator template at .bin/templates/search.js. That file is the canonical structure a search translator should follow — read it when you need to know the expected shape of detectSearch/doSearch, or when a task asks you to make an existing translator better conform to the template.

Search translators have no target regex. They're triggered by identifier lookups in Zotero.

Step 3: Write the code

`detectSearch(items)`

Return true if the input contains identifiers this translator handles. The items parameter is an object (or array of objects) with identifier fields.

function detectSearch(items) {
    if (Array.isArray(items)) {
        return items.some(item => item.DOI || item.ISBN);
    }
    return !!(items.DOI || items.ISBN);
}

Valid search fields: DOI, ISBN, PMID, arXiv, identifiers, contextObject, adsBibcode, ericNumber, openAlex.

`doSearch(item)`

Look up the identifier via the service's API and create Zotero items.

async function doSearch(item) {
    let doi = item.DOI;
    if (!doi) return;

    let url = `https://api.example.com/works/${encodeURIComponent(doi)}`;
    let data = await requestJSON(url);

    let newItem = new Zotero.Item('journalArticle');
    newItem.title = data.title;
    newItem.date = data.published_date;
    newItem.DOI = doi;
    for (let author of data.authors) {
        newItem.creators.push({
            firstName: author.given,
            lastName: author.family,
            creatorType: 'author',
        });
    }
    // ... map other fields ...
    newItem.complete();
}

Key APIs:

requestJSON(url), requestText(url), request(url) — make HTTP requests to the external API.
new Zotero.Item(itemType) — create an item, set fields, call .complete().
ZU.cleanDOI(), ZU.cleanISBN(), ZU.cleanISSN() — normalize identifiers.
ZU.cleanAuthor(name, creatorType) — parse author name strings.

Step 4: Create tests

node .bin/create-test.mjs "<Label>.js" --search '{"DOI":"10.1234/example"}'

Test with multiple identifier types if supported.

Step 5: Verify and submit

Update lastUpdated every time you modify translator code.

node .bin/update-metadata.mjs "<Label>.js"
npm run lint -- "<Label>.js"
node .bin/run-tests.mjs "<Label>.js"