BibTeX, biblatex and biber ⇒ Undefined control sequence when using BibTeX in Texmaker

[Chuchu]

Hello everyone,

I'm a newbie and just trying to figure my way around in referencing using BibTeX.

I created "References.bib" file to be used in my "SummaryControlStrategyReviews.tex", see attached. I used the commands \cite, \bibliographystyle{apacite} and \bibliography{References} to cite the references in my article.

However, I encountered many errors and I'm pretty sure they are complaining about the same thing. the error states:
! Undefined control sequence.
\b@Tucker2015 ->\citeauthoryear
{Tucker\ \BOthers {.}}{Tucker\ \BOthers {.}}...
l.24 The review in \cite{Tucker2015}
has divided control strategies into thr...
The control sequence at the end of the top line
of your error message was never \def'ed. If you have
misspelled it (e.g., `\hobx'), type `I' and the correct
spelling (e.g., `I\hbox'). Otherwise just continue,
and I'll forget about whatever was undefined.

I've also attached the related log file.

Could someone please help me with this?

Thank you very much!

[Johannes_B]

Welcome,

how about loading package apacite?

Apart from that, very good question and example.

[Chuchu]

Hi Johannes,

Thank you for your reply! Do you mean including \usepackage{apacite} in the preambles?

I did that. However, when I ran 'LaTeX' I came across an error claiming that I "! Misplaced alignment tab character &."?!

This error was followed by "I can't figure out why you would want to use a tab mark
here. If you just want an ampersand, the remedy is
simple: Just type `I\&' now. But if some right brace
up above has ended a previous alignment prematurely,
you're probably due for more error messages, and you
might try typing `S' now just to see what is salvageable.
! Misplaced alignment tab character &."

oh.my.gosh!

[Johannes_B]

I am a bit surprised that this message causes trouble for so many people. Especially since the extended help message is quite clear.

Have a look at your entries, there are alignment tabs (that is the thing you use to explicitely tell LaTeX that a new table cell starts), which are unexpected. For normal instances, the message tells you what to do. In this special case, load package url in your preamble.

[Chuchu]

oh woah! thanks for that! My problem is fixed.

I later got rid of all the links in my reference, and was able to create the article without loading package url. My understanding is that maybe the https:// is causing the error.

However, I still do't understand why " Misplaced alignment tab character &" would lead to not including package url, since https:// hasn't got any "&" in it? I guess my REAL question is: how did you arrive to the conclusion that I need to load package url from reading the error message?

Thanks again for your patience, haha, I'm sure in 3 years time when I'm writing my thesis I'd look back at this post thinking, oh dear, what a noob I was.

[Johannes_B]

I didn't know that by just looking at the error message, but where the alignment tab is. It is inside an url. Package url just reads the urls and prints them, no matter if a &, or _ or any other special symbol for LaTeX is included.

[Chuchu]

Ah Thank you! Lesson learned.