[SciPy-dev] Online SciPy Journal

[Alan G Isaac]

On Mon, 02 Oct 2006, Travis Oliphant apparently wrote: 
> My preferred approach is to have this divided into two 
> Journals (call them A and B for now) which clarify the 
> difference in novelty. 

> The "A" journal would discuss contributions where a novel 
> algorithm, implementation, or idea is expressed while the 
> "B" contributions are module-style Python implementations 
> of previously-known algorithms.  Another candidate for the 
> "A" journal might be documentation and "packaging" of 
> several "B" contributions into something that could be 
> a SciPy sub-package. 

Here is an alternate proposal: have one journal with well 
designated sections.  If desirable, a section that 
experiences large growth in quality submissions can be split 
off later.  Until then, all citations will be to a single 
journal, which will be helpful for name recognition (which 
is needed for several reasons).  Four of the sections could 
simply be called "Algorithms", "Packages", 
"Implementations", and "Reviews".  Each can have specific 
criteria for submission.

Oddly enough, I do not think the name "Computational 
Science" is taken, and it might be nice ...

Finally, to reduce the editor's burden, it will be important 
to limit the formats allowed for submission.  If it is to be 
a free journal, authors must typeset articles themselves.  
I recommend requiring LaTeX and allowing the use of the 
listings package.  This may be overkill, although some math 
journal(s) have almost fully automated the publication 
process this way.  Also allowing restructured text, which 
has a LaTeX writer, may be useful---I do not know.

Cheers,
Alan Isaac