Name particle abbreviator

[Quintus]

Is your feature request related to a problem? Please describe.

This feature request was prompted by the problem described in andras-simonyi/citeproc-el#111. German names occasionally contain name particles, notably “von”, which are commonly abbreviated in citations (so that the name “Axel von Hellfeld” ends up as being cited as “v. Hellfeld”). Name particles other than “von” (like “de la” or “van”) are not abbreviated in German citaions.

It gets even more complicated with certain house styles like those of the Deutsches Verwaltungsblatt (DVBl.). This footnote-based style requires to write out the name in full on the first citation, including the given name, and in subsequent citations to use only the surname in abbreviated form with a cross-reference to the footnote containing the full citation.

Describe the solution you'd like
An attribute should be added to the cs:name element that inidicates that name particles are to be abbreviated. This would allow the full name to be recorded in the bibliography and automatically abbreviated in the citations.

Describe alternatives you've considered
As outlined in andras-simonyi/citeproc-el#111 I requested a callback filter function be added to citeproc-el. I attempted to write an abbreviation callback with pure org export filters, but I failed on that.

Recording the abbreviated name in the bibliography file is not an option, because some publishers do require to write out the names in full.

A clear and concise description of any alternative solutions or features you've considered.

Additional context
I am afraid, but German judicial publishers have usually quite terse citation guidelines plus the comment “use common sense”, which normally boils down to reading existing articles in the existing journal and looking at their citing habits. DVBl.’s citation styleguide includes a “von” example, but it is not available online as it is only send privately by e-mail to authors. I can provide it on request (but it’s in German).

[bdarcus]

We should implement this; just a question of how.

Right now, we have a distinction, in the data, between "dropping" and "non-dropping" particles.

https://docs.citationstyles.org/en/stable/specification.html#name-particles

In this, I guess, rather than "dropping," we'd be intiializing.

WDYT @bwiernik @denismaier?

[bwiernik]

Given that it is specific to a single particle in a single language, I think this should be an instruction built into the processor, similar to how citeproc-js handles some French, Hungarian, and Japanese idiosyncrasies, with a global style attribute controlling whether to abbreviate particles (same as with particle demotion).

Note that this is a different case than dropping versus non dropping. The CSL name structure has 5 parts for personal names--given, family, suffix, dropping particle, and non dropping particle. "von" is a non-dropping particle, but one which has an idiosyncratic formatting requirement in some languages and styles (like how "Phillipe" is abbreviated "Ph." rather than "P." in French).