Markup Language Journal and Markup Technologies Conference

[Peter Murray-Rust]

At 16:32 25/06/98 -0400, Deborah Aleyne Lapeyre wrote:

>I was also very serious about personally inviting this list to really
>consider the journal.  This list is where the practioners post and lurk.
>We want both theory and down-in-the-trenches experience.  I think this list
>has both in abundance.

I agree. It is very important that *ML is realised as a worthy academic
discipline. And, that the J sets high standards. 

Does the J consider:
	- papers in XML. If so, how are they processed?
	- e-only publications (i.e. interactive papers which cannot be rendered on
cellulose?
	- dynamic papers (e.g. with revisions, annotations, distributed
authorship, etc.)

I am not suggesting anything gimmicky per se, but XML - for me - is an
enormous liberating influence for publication. I would like to see Js
accept non-conventional submissions. [I have recently come back from a week
with the International Federation of Science Editors]. The role of
*editors* is being transformed into quality review - which it should be -
rather than technical processing. I don't know how many of you publish
technical papers - but it can be a nightmare with different formats for
tables, graphics, etc.

	Henry runs a very innovative e-publication. Each summer he runs an
e-conference for chemistry. It's peer reviewed and there are comments on
other papers. One major feature is that we are gradually adding CML
facilities so that the molecules in the papers can be captured at source. 

	I have very severe reservations about the automatic assessment of Js (the
'impact factor'). This always works against new Js - like this one - and it
takes time to build up a reputation.  it is important that the J is
abstracted. For Henry's conference this requires it to be captured on CDROM
and sent to Chemical Abstracts Service (they automatically abstract all
printed chemical and related papers). He is assigned an ISBN for each
CDROM, and the papers are citable.

	Anyway - I'd be interested in hearing ideas from the editoriat. I think  -
within reason - there could be some useful discussion here about
e-publication and XML.

	P.
	

Peter Murray-Rust, Director Virtual School of Molecular Sciences, domestic
net connection
VSMS http://www.nottingham.ac.uk/vsms, Virtual Hyperglossary
http://www.venus.co.uk/vhg

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