This article provides a report about the Scientific Journal Publishing in India (SJPI) Project which promotes electronic publishing of scholarly journals. It covers briefly the objectives, implementation and outcomes of the Project. Open Journal Systems and Open Archives Harvester were used to achieve the goals of the Project

Abraham, Thomas

Minj, Suvarsha

First Monday

Provides a report about the Scientific Journal Publishing in India (SJPI) Project which promotes electronic publishing of scholarly journals. It covers briefly the objectives, implementation and outcomes of the Project. Open Journal Systems and Open Archives Harvester were used to achieve the goals of the Project

E-LIS

Abraham http://www.uic.edu/htbin/cgiwrap/bin/ojs/index.php/fm/article/viewA...1 of 7 11/25/2007 01:17 AMFirst Monday, Volume 12 Number 10 - 1 October 2007HOME  ABOUT  LOG IN  REGISTER  SEARCH  CURRENT  ARCHIVESSUBMISSIONS  Home > Volume 12 Number 10 - 1 October 2007 > AbrahamThis article provides a report about the Scientific Journal Publishing in India (SJPI) Project which promoteselectronic publishing of scholarly journals. It covers briefly the objectives, implementation and outcomes of the Project. Open Journal Systems and Open Archives Harvester were used to achieve the goals of the Project.ContentsIntroductionAbout the SJPI ProjectObjectives of the SJPI ProjectOpen Journal Systems (OJS)Open Archives HarvesterProject implementationOutcomesFuture workConclusion  IntroductionThe publication and access of scholarly literature has changed around the world. In this scenario, scholarlyliterature from developing countries like India has fewer barriers, at least ideologically, to embrace open access. Unlike much of the scholarly journal industry in developed countries, scholarly journals in the developing world are not huge economic enterprises. For scholars and scholarly publishers in the developing world, there are enormous rewards of sheer recognition and access to a broad and diverse audience; these factors overcome economic and financial inhibitions to publish on the Web with open access. It is necessary to recognize that:the world has grown flat and provides immense opportunities through the Web, freely available technologies, and new standards for sharing information.1.Training is critical to optimally use technologies to publish scholarly literature.2.The purpose of the SJPI Project was to work with the journal publishing community in India to make them aware of these factors. The standards of open access publishing and the availability of tools like the OpenJournal Systems were used by the Project to meet these goals.At the time the project began, a large number of journals in India were not published electronically. Althoughthose published were openly accessible, they did not use e–publishing tools or adhere to publishingstandards like Open Archives Initiative — Protocol for Metadata Harvesting (OAI–PMH). One of thepurposes of the Project was to highlight the need for structured metadata and standards like OAI–PMHamong Indian publishers to make scholarly content more visible in electronic media. While educating editorsof journals about these, the Project also looked at what features publishers were looking for in a journalmanagement system like Open Journal Systems (OJS). The outcome of the project incorporated a few ofAbraham http://www.uic.edu/htbin/cgiwrap/bin/ojs/index.php/fm/article/viewA...2 of 7 11/25/2007 01:17 AMthese features into OJS. A Hindi interface for OJS was also developed to support local language content. About the SJPI ProjectThe SJPI Project was based at National Centre for Science Information at the Indian Institute of Science in Bangalore, India. The Project was sponsored by the Asian Media Information and Communication Center (AMIC) and the Pan Asia ICT Grants Program (based in Singapore) of the International Development Research Centre (IDRC). The Project was carried out from October 2004 to March 2007. The Public Knowledge Project (PKP), headed by John Willinsky, partnered for Project SJPI.  Objectives of the SJPI ProjectThe Project was done in two phases. The primary objective of the first phase of the Project was to set upprototype journal indexing and management systems for a sample of Indian journals. The PKP’s OJS wasused for setting up prototype journals and the PKP’s Harvester was used to harvest metadata from them.These aspects of the Project demonstrated the usefulness of incorporating structured metadata during theworkflow process to the journal editors. Making the content of the journals metadata OAI–PMH compliantincreased accessibility of content, revealed by indexing and searching across all of the journals.The specific objectives of first phase were:To install a prototype indexing system using a sample of open access journals;To install the harvester to index all of the journal prototypes and enable searching across all of them from a single interface;To demonstrate and consult with editors of journals on the following issues:How to capture metadata during the submission process;Demonstrate the harvester with the objective of revealing the advantages of publishing withOAI–PMH compliance; and,Obtain their feedback on features of the publishing system;To refine the system based on the feedback received; and,To organize a workshop at the national level to transfer knowledge and skills gained by the project team to those involved in actual journal publishing.The specific objectives of the second phase were:To help Indian journals to go online;To develop a Hindi language interface for OJS;To incorporate new features to OJS;LaTeX support for special characters; and,Classification scheme;To conduct another national level workshop on journal publishing. Open Journal Systems (OJS)OJS is a journal management and publishing system that has been developed by the Public Knowledge Project (http://pkp.sfu.ca/). It is an open source software for online management and publishing of journalswith OAI–PMH compliance. It is made freely available for the purpose of making open access publishing aviable option for more journals.OJS is Web–based and hence requires a Web server. It uses a database management system like MySQLat the backend and is scripted using PHP. The look and feel of the journal can be changed to a certainextent. Since it is open source, it can be customized to suit the needs of a specific journal. Open Archives HarvesterThe Open Archives Harvester is a free metadata indexing system developed by the PKP. The HarvesterAbraham http://www.uic.edu/htbin/cgiwrap/bin/ojs/index.php/fm/article/viewA...3 of 7 11/25/2007 01:17 AMcreates a searchable index of the metadata from Open Archives Initiative (OAI)–compliant archives. Project implementationStudying OJS: OJS version 1.18 was installed on the server to create a hypothetical journal. Editors,users and other profiles were created on the system. Sample content for the journal was also added.1.The purpose of this part of the Project was to analyze OJS’ metadata as well as indexing andsearching mechanisms. We also studied workflow mechanisms and interfaces as well asadditional features supported by OJS (such as uploading of back issues, searchengine–friendly URL generation, LOCKSS support, etc.). We also examined the limitations ofthe software (full–text indexing was not done by OJS, which we considered a seriouslimitation; in the later versions of OJS, it is possible).Installing and configuring OJS for journal prototypes: Initially we set up the OJS for two journals: Journal of Indian Institute of Science (JIISc) and Sarada Ranganathan Endowment for Library Science Journal of Information Management (SRELS JIM).2.The objective was to determine approximately how much time it took to enter a record into thesystem. This would help us determine how many man–hours it would require to enter data intothe other journal prototype systems. We also looked at how we can change default looks, colorschemes, images, etc.Installing and configuring OJS for the 11 Indian Academy of Sciences (IAS) journals: OJS was then setup for all the 11 journals of the IAS (see Appendix for the complete list of journals). This included setting up the OJS, configuring it to the journal by inserting information like the editor, editorial boardmembers, changing the default images and color schemes of OJS, etc.3.Customizing the journal Current Science: We also customized the Current Science prototype installation, so that its online publishing and workflow process were separated. The look and feel of Current Science was also modified so that it looked similar to the online journal. This task demonstrated to the editors how the system could be adapted to suit their requirements. A comparison of the Current Science live Web site with the SJPI prototype site can be seen in Figures 1 and 2.4. Figure 1: Current Science online Web site hosted at the Indian Academy of Sciences.  Abraham http://www.uic.edu/htbin/cgiwrap/bin/ojs/index.php/fm/article/viewA...4 of 7 11/25/2007 01:17 AMFigure 2: Current Science prototype installed by the SJPI Project. Uploading content to all journals: Six issues (two issues of three volumes or years) were entered into the journal prototype systems. For all of the journals, except one, we obtained content from their Web sites. The content of SRELS Journal of Information Management was delivered on CD by the editors of the journal as it does not have an online version.5.Installing PKP Harvester: The PKP Harvester was set up at http://sjpi.ncsi.iisc.ernet.in/harvester/.Entitled the ‘SJPI Cross Journal Search Service’, it was configured to harvest data from all of thethirteen prototype journals.6. Figure 3: The SJPI Harvester Web site.Abraham http://www.uic.edu/htbin/cgiwrap/bin/ojs/index.php/fm/article/viewA...5 of 7 11/25/2007 01:17 AM Demonstration and feedback: The journal prototypes and Harvester were demonstrated to the editors of the journals and we obtained their feedback on additional features they required.7.Other than formal communication with editors, we also met with journal staff and helped themwith installation and training. One such meeting was with the editors and staff of the Journal of Tropical Agriculture.Incorporating a classification scheme into OJS: A classification scheme was incorporated into the OJS (version 2); this scheme can be used by authors to classify their papers during the process of submission.8.Workshops: Two workshops were organized on 10–11 February 2006 and 14–15 December 2006.About twenty participants involved in journal publishing participated in each workshop. Participantswere trained to install and use the OJS software.9.Feedback on OJS: Feedback obtained from the editors was provided to the Project partners (PKP)on the shortcomings of the OJS version 1.1.8. Some of the suggestions have been incorporated inthe next version of OJS.10.Enabling search engine–friendly URLs: We have also enabled search engine–friendly URLs for thejournals. This helps content to be indexed individually in search engines like Google, givingindividual papers greater visibility.11.Hindi version of OJS: Hindi language interface for OJS was developed with the help of tools and files provided in OJS.12.Project Web site: A Project Web site was created with information about related projects, resourcesand information for editors to know more about our project and also issues in journal publishing athttp://sjpi.ncsi.iisc.ernet.in.13.OAJP — Open Access Journal Publishing in India mailing list: A mailing list was estabilished tofacilitate discussion of issues relative to open access publishing in India(http://ncsi.iisc.ernet.in/mailman/listinfo/oajp).14. OutcomesOther than the outcomes given under the heading Project implementation, we also learned a number of issues in journal publishing that we would like to share here:Features suggested by journal editors:While interacting with editors of journals, they suggested some features to be incorporated into OJS namely:a. Classification schemeProblem: Many scholarly journals categorize articles using a classification scheme. This scheme may be based on a standard like IAN followed by the journal Pramana or a local scheme like the one used by Current Science.Solution: Enabling OJS to incorporate a classification scheme, instead of users just having to type innumbers, could be a useful feature. It could also be used to assign articles to editors or reviewerswith specializations in specific areas.b. Finding reviewersProblem: Current Science (http://www.ias.ac.in/currsci/) has about 1,000 reviewers in its database.Each reviewer has a number of parameters assigned to them. For example, areas of specialization,number of papers reviewed in the past, papers currently under review, average time taken to work on a paper, and number of assignments accepted or rejected. Assigning papers for reviewing is a huge task in itself.Solution: A much richer interface for the editors while assigning papers for review. This interface would have greater input functions and as a consequence generate more data for each reviewer; the interface in turn would allow an editors to more easily assign reviewers.c. Suggesting potential reviewers by authorsProblem: Most scholarly journals deal with different varieties of subjects within their scope. Usuallyreviewers have expertise in their areas of research only. While assigning reviewers to articles submitted by authors, there can be some confusion on the part of editors.Solution: If there is an option for authors to suggest potential reviewers along with their contactdetails and area(s) of expertise, this problem can be solved to a great extent.1.Plagiarism and online journals: One of the journals used for our prototype system is a print–onlyjournal. Hence, the six issues uploaded by our prototype are the only online issues. By virtue of itsonline access, one of the papers was detected as a plagiarism from a book. The paper wassubsequently withdrawn from the journal following complaints by the author of the original as well asthe publisher. Thus we can conclude that going online will make authors and publishers more aware2.Abraham http://www.uic.edu/htbin/cgiwrap/bin/ojs/index.php/fm/article/viewA...6 of 7 11/25/2007 01:17 AMof intellectual property rights and enhance the overall quality of scholarly journals.Journal of Tropical Agriculture: One of the most important outcomes of the Project was onlineavailability of the hitherto print–only journal, the Journal of Tropical Agriculture. Members of the Project provided training and helped setup the online version of journal using OJS. The journal is available online at http://www.jtropag.in.3. Future workThe workshops and meetings, other than the training in the use of the software, also provided a platform to bring together a group of people who dealt with journal publishing. It brought to our attention the problems faced by journal publishers in general and those specifically in India. Based on the feedback given, the following work could be taken up in the future:With the Hindi version of OJS, customization of OJS to Indian languages should be easy.1.Add the new features identified and developed by the OJS team into the official OJS software release.2.Enhance OJS to support special characters.3.A centralized organization or regional support system for creating online journals in India.4.More intensive training for the editors of journals to use the system.5.Handhold a few journals which are interested in publishing online to setup their site.6. ConclusionMaking a scholarly journal openly available increases visibility both in terms of numbers and range. In addition, more paper submissions are generated from a geographically wider audience. These advantages need to be brought to the attention of variety of Indian journal publishers.  About the authorsThomas Abraham is the a member of the staff of the SJPI Project, which is carried out at National Centre for Science Information of the Indian Institute of Science in Bangalore. Suvarsha Minj, now working at Yahoo! India R&D, was a team member of the Project.Direct comments to tomuhs [at] gmail [dot] com AcknowledgementsWe thank Sanjo Jose for his editorial assistance with condensing the text for this paper. We thank Prof. John Willinsky for his help throughout this Project. We thank the sponsor of the Project, the Asian Media Information and Communication Center (AMIC), the Pan Asia ICT Grants Programme of the International Development Research Centre (IDRC). We are grateful to (Late) Dr. T.B. Rajasekhar, who initiated this Project. We thank Prof. A.G. Menon, Prof. N.V. Joshi, Mr. Francis Jayakanth and Mr. Filbert Minj for their support and suggestions. Appendix: List of journals used in the ProjectOJS was used to create journal prototypes for the journals in this table. This list includes a link to the original Web site of each journal as well as Web sites of prototypes. Table 1: Journals included in the Scientific Journal Publishing in India (SJPI) Project.Sl No.Journal title URL of prototype Original URLAbraham http://www.uic.edu/htbin/cgiwrap/bin/ojs/index.php/fm/article/viewA...7 of 7 11/25/2007 01:17 AM1SRELS Journal of Information Managementhttp://sjpi.ncsi.iisc.ernet.in/sjim not published online2Journal of the Indian Institute of Sciencehttp://sjpi.ncsi.iisc.ernet.in/jiisc http://journal.library.iisc.ernet.in3Current Sciencehttp://sjpi.ncsi.iisc.ernet.in/ias/cs http://www.ias.ac.in/currsci/index.html4 Pramana http://sjpi.ncsi.iisc.ernet.in/ias/pramana http://www.ias.ac.in/pramana/index.htm5Journal of Chemical Scienceshttp://sjpi.ncsi.iisc.ernet.in/ias/jcs http://www.ias.ac.in/chemsci/index.html6Proceedings—MathematicalScienceshttp://sjpi.ncsi.iisc.ernet.in/ias/pms http://www.ias.ac.in/chemsci/index.html7Proceedings— Earth andPlanetarySciences(title changed to Journal of Earth System Sciences)http://sjpi.ncsi.iisc.ernet.in/ias/peps http://www.ias.ac.in/jessci/index_body.html8 Sadhana http://sjpi.ncsi.iisc.ernet.in/ias/sadhana http://www.ias.ac.in/sadhana/index.html9Journal of Bioscienceshttp://sjpi.ncsi.iisc.ernet.in/ias/jbs http://www.ias.ac.in/jbiosci/index.html10Bulletin of Material Scienceshttp://sjpi.ncsi.iisc.ernet.in/ias/bms http://www.ias.ac.in/matersci/index.html11Journal of Astrophysics & Astronomyhttp://sjpi.ncsi.iisc.ernet.in/ias/jaa http://www.ias.ac.in/jaa/index.html12Journal of Geneticshttp://sjpi.ncsi.iisc.ernet.in/ias/jgen http://www.ias.ac.in/jgenet/index.html13 Resonance http://sjpi.ncsi.iisc.ernet.in/ias/resonance http://www.ias.ac.in/resonance/index.htm    Copyright ©2007, First Monday.Copyright ©2007, Thomas Abraham and Suvarsha Minj.Scientific journal publishing in India: Promoting electronic publishing of scholarly journals in India by ThomasAbraham and Suvarsha MinjFirst Monday, Volume 12 Number 10 - 1 October 2007http://www.uic.edu/htbin/cgiwrap/bin/ojs/index.php/fm/article/viewArticle/1954/1831

English

Scientific Journal Publishing in India: Promoting electronic publishing of scholarly journals in India

This article provides a report about the Scientific Journal Publishing in India (SJPI) Project which promotes electronic publishing of scholarly journals. It covers briefly the objectives, implementation and outcomes of the Project. Open Journal Systems and Open Archives Harvester were used to achieve the goals of the Project.</jats:p

Thomas Abraham

Suvarsha Minj

Crossref

Scientific journal publishing in India: Promoting electronic publishing of scholarly journals in India

E-Lis: Research in Computing and Library and Information Science

Abraham http://www.uic.edu/htbin/cgiwrap/bin/ojs/index.php/fm/article/viewA...
1 of 7 11/25/2007 01:17 AM
First Monday, Volume 12 Number 10 - 1 October 2007
HOME  ABOUT  LOG IN  REGISTER  SEARCH  CURRENT  ARCHIVES
SUBMISSIONS  
Home > Volume 12 Number 10 - 1 October 2007 > Abraham
This article provides a report about the Scientific Journal Publishing in India (SJPI) Project which promotes
electronic publishing of scholarly journals. It covers briefly the objectives, implementation and outcomes of 
the Project. Open Journal Systems and Open Archives Harvester were used to achieve the goals of the 
Project.
Contents
Introduction
About the SJPI Project
Objectives of the SJPI Project
Open Journal Systems (OJS)
Open Archives Harvester
Project implementation
Outcomes
Future work
Conclusion
 
 
Introduction
The publication and access of scholarly literature has changed around the world. In this scenario, scholarly
literature from developing countries like India has fewer barriers, at least ideologically, to embrace open 
access. Unlike much of the scholarly journal industry in developed countries, scholarly journals in the 
developing world are not huge economic enterprises. For scholars and scholarly publishers in the 
developing world, there are enormous rewards of sheer recognition and access to a broad and diverse 
audience; these factors overcome economic and financial inhibitions to publish on the Web with open 
access. It is necessary to recognize that:
the world has grown flat and provides immense opportunities through the Web, freely available 
technologies, and new standards for sharing information.
1.
Training is critical to optimally use technologies to publish scholarly literature.2.
The purpose of the SJPI Project was to work with the journal publishing community in India to make them 
aware of these factors. The standards of open access publishing and the availability of tools like the Open
Journal Systems were used by the Project to meet these goals.
At the time the project began, a large number of journals in India were not published electronically. Although
those published were openly accessible, they did not use e–publishing tools or adhere to publishing
standards like Open Archives Initiative — Protocol for Metadata Harvesting (OAI–PMH). One of the
purposes of the Project was to highlight the need for structured metadata and standards like OAI–PMH
among Indian publishers to make scholarly content more visible in electronic media. While educating editors
of journals about these, the Project also looked at what features publishers were looking for in a journal
management system like Open Journal Systems (OJS). The outcome of the project incorporated a few of
Abraham http://www.uic.edu/htbin/cgiwrap/bin/ojs/index.php/fm/article/viewA...
2 of 7 11/25/2007 01:17 AM
these features into OJS. A Hindi interface for OJS was also developed to support local language content.
 
About the SJPI Project
The SJPI Project was based at National Centre for Science Information at the Indian Institute of Science in 
Bangalore, India. The Project was sponsored by the Asian Media Information and Communication Center 
(AMIC) and the Pan Asia ICT Grants Program (based in Singapore) of the International Development 
Research Centre (IDRC). The Project was carried out from October 2004 to March 2007. The Public 
Knowledge Project (PKP), headed by John Willinsky, partnered for Project SJPI. 
 
Objectives of the SJPI Project
The Project was done in two phases. The primary objective of the first phase of the Project was to set up
prototype journal indexing and management systems for a sample of Indian journals. The PKP’s OJS was
used for setting up prototype journals and the PKP’s Harvester was used to harvest metadata from them.
These aspects of the Project demonstrated the usefulness of incorporating structured metadata during the
workflow process to the journal editors. Making the content of the journals metadata OAI–PMH compliant
increased accessibility of content, revealed by indexing and searching across all of the journals.
The specific objectives of first phase were:
To install a prototype indexing system using a sample of open access journals;
To install the harvester to index all of the journal prototypes and enable searching across all of them 
from a single interface;
To demonstrate and consult with editors of journals on the following issues:
How to capture metadata during the submission process;
Demonstrate the harvester with the objective of revealing the advantages of publishing with
OAI–PMH compliance; and,
Obtain their feedback on features of the publishing system;
To refine the system based on the feedback received; and,
To organize a workshop at the national level to transfer knowledge and skills gained by the project 
team to those involved in actual journal publishing.
The specific objectives of the second phase were:
To help Indian journals to go online;
To develop a Hindi language interface for OJS;
To incorporate new features to OJS;
LaTeX support for special characters; and,
Classification scheme;
To conduct another national level workshop on journal publishing.
 
Open Journal Systems (OJS)
OJS is a journal management and publishing system that has been developed by the Public Knowledge 
Project (http://pkp.sfu.ca/). It is an open source software for online management and publishing of journals
with OAI–PMH compliance. It is made freely available for the purpose of making open access publishing a
viable option for more journals.
OJS is Web–based and hence requires a Web server. It uses a database management system like MySQL
at the backend and is scripted using PHP. The look and feel of the journal can be changed to a certain
extent. Since it is open source, it can be customized to suit the needs of a specific journal.
 
Open Archives Harvester
The Open Archives Harvester is a free metadata indexing system developed by the PKP. The Harvester
Abraham http://www.uic.edu/htbin/cgiwrap/bin/ojs/index.php/fm/article/viewA...
3 of 7 11/25/2007 01:17 AM
creates a searchable index of the metadata from Open Archives Initiative (OAI)–compliant archives.
 
Project implementation
Studying OJS: OJS version 1.18 was installed on the server to create a hypothetical journal. Editors,
users and other profiles were created on the system. Sample content for the journal was also added.
1.
The purpose of this part of the Project was to analyze OJS’ metadata as well as indexing and
searching mechanisms. We also studied workflow mechanisms and interfaces as well as
additional features supported by OJS (such as uploading of back issues, search
engine–friendly URL generation, LOCKSS support, etc.). We also examined the limitations of
the software (full–text indexing was not done by OJS, which we considered a serious
limitation; in the later versions of OJS, it is possible).
Installing and configuring OJS for journal prototypes: Initially we set up the OJS for two journals: 
Journal of Indian Institute of Science (JIISc) and Sarada Ranganathan Endowment for Library 
Science Journal of Information Management (SRELS JIM).
2.
The objective was to determine approximately how much time it took to enter a record into the
system. This would help us determine how many man–hours it would require to enter data into
the other journal prototype systems. We also looked at how we can change default looks, color
schemes, images, etc.
Installing and configuring OJS for the 11 Indian Academy of Sciences (IAS) journals: OJS was then 
setup for all the 11 journals of the IAS (see Appendix for the complete list of journals). This included 
setting up the OJS, configuring it to the journal by inserting information like the editor, editorial board
members, changing the default images and color schemes of OJS, etc.
3.
Customizing the journal Current Science: We also customized the Current Science prototype 
installation, so that its online publishing and workflow process were separated. The look and feel of 
Current Science was also modified so that it looked similar to the online journal. This task 
demonstrated to the editors how the system could be adapted to suit their requirements. A 
comparison of the Current Science live Web site with the SJPI prototype site can be seen in Figures 
1 and 2.
4.
 
Figure 1: Current Science online Web site hosted at the Indian Academy of Sciences.
 
 
Abraham http://www.uic.edu/htbin/cgiwrap/bin/ojs/index.php/fm/article/viewA...
4 of 7 11/25/2007 01:17 AM
Figure 2: Current Science prototype installed by the SJPI Project.
 
Uploading content to all journals: Six issues (two issues of three volumes or years) were entered 
into the journal prototype systems. For all of the journals, except one, we obtained content from their 
Web sites. The content of SRELS Journal of Information Management was delivered on CD by the 
editors of the journal as it does not have an online version.
5.
Installing PKP Harvester: The PKP Harvester was set up at http://sjpi.ncsi.iisc.ernet.in/harvester/.
Entitled the ‘SJPI Cross Journal Search Service’, it was configured to harvest data from all of the
thirteen prototype journals.
6.
 
Figure 3: The SJPI Harvester Web site.
Abraham http://www.uic.edu/htbin/cgiwrap/bin/ojs/index.php/fm/article/viewA...
5 of 7 11/25/2007 01:17 AM
 
Demonstration and feedback: The journal prototypes and Harvester were demonstrated to the 
editors of the journals and we obtained their feedback on additional features they required.
7.
Other than formal communication with editors, we also met with journal staff and helped them
with installation and training. One such meeting was with the editors and staff of the Journal of 
Tropical Agriculture.
Incorporating a classification scheme into OJS: A classification scheme was incorporated into the 
OJS (version 2); this scheme can be used by authors to classify their papers during the process of 
submission.
8.
Workshops: Two workshops were organized on 10–11 February 2006 and 14–15 December 2006.
About twenty participants involved in journal publishing participated in each workshop. Participants
were trained to install and use the OJS software.
9.
Feedback on OJS: Feedback obtained from the editors was provided to the Project partners (PKP)
on the shortcomings of the OJS version 1.1.8. Some of the suggestions have been incorporated in
the next version of OJS.
10.
Enabling search engine–friendly URLs: We have also enabled search engine–friendly URLs for the
journals. This helps content to be indexed individually in search engines like Google, giving
individual papers greater visibility.
11.
Hindi version of OJS: Hindi language interface for OJS was developed with the help of tools and 
files provided in OJS.
12.
Project Web site: A Project Web site was created with information about related projects, resources
and information for editors to know more about our project and also issues in journal publishing at
http://sjpi.ncsi.iisc.ernet.in.
13.
OAJP — Open Access Journal Publishing in India mailing list: A mailing list was estabilished to
facilitate discussion of issues relative to open access publishing in India
(http://ncsi.iisc.ernet.in/mailman/listinfo/oajp).
14.
 
Outcomes
Other than the outcomes given under the heading Project implementation, we also learned a number of 
issues in journal publishing that we would like to share here:
Features suggested by journal editors:
While interacting with editors of journals, they suggested some features to be incorporated into OJS 
namely:
a. Classification scheme
Problem: Many scholarly journals categorize articles using a classification scheme. This scheme 
may be based on a standard like IAN followed by the journal Pramana or a local scheme like the 
one used by Current Science.
Solution: Enabling OJS to incorporate a classification scheme, instead of users just having to type in
numbers, could be a useful feature. It could also be used to assign articles to editors or reviewers
with specializations in specific areas.
b. Finding reviewers
Problem: Current Science (http://www.ias.ac.in/currsci/) has about 1,000 reviewers in its database.
Each reviewer has a number of parameters assigned to them. For example, areas of specialization,
number of papers reviewed in the past, papers currently under review, average time taken to work 
on a paper, and number of assignments accepted or rejected. Assigning papers for reviewing is a 
huge task in itself.
Solution: A much richer interface for the editors while assigning papers for review. This interface 
would have greater input functions and as a consequence generate more data for each reviewer; 
the interface in turn would allow an editors to more easily assign reviewers.
c. Suggesting potential reviewers by authors
Problem: Most scholarly journals deal with different varieties of subjects within their scope. Usually
reviewers have expertise in their areas of research only. While assigning reviewers to articles 
submitted by authors, there can be some confusion on the part of editors.
Solution: If there is an option for authors to suggest potential reviewers along with their contact
details and area(s) of expertise, this problem can be solved to a great extent.
1.
Plagiarism and online journals: One of the journals used for our prototype system is a print–only
journal. Hence, the six issues uploaded by our prototype are the only online issues. By virtue of its
online access, one of the papers was detected as a plagiarism from a book. The paper was
subsequently withdrawn from the journal following complaints by the author of the original as well as
the publisher. Thus we can conclude that going online will make authors and publishers more aware
2.
Abraham http://www.uic.edu/htbin/cgiwrap/bin/ojs/index.php/fm/article/viewA...
6 of 7 11/25/2007 01:17 AM
of intellectual property rights and enhance the overall quality of scholarly journals.
Journal of Tropical Agriculture: One of the most important outcomes of the Project was online
availability of the hitherto print–only journal, the Journal of Tropical Agriculture. Members of the 
Project provided training and helped setup the online version of journal using OJS. The journal is 
available online at http://www.jtropag.in.
3.
 
Future work
The workshops and meetings, other than the training in the use of the software, also provided a platform to 
bring together a group of people who dealt with journal publishing. It brought to our attention the problems 
faced by journal publishers in general and those specifically in India. Based on the feedback given, the 
following work could be taken up in the future:
With the Hindi version of OJS, customization of OJS to Indian languages should be easy.1.
Add the new features identified and developed by the OJS team into the official OJS software 
release.
2.
Enhance OJS to support special characters.3.
A centralized organization or regional support system for creating online journals in India.4.
More intensive training for the editors of journals to use the system.5.
Handhold a few journals which are interested in publishing online to setup their site.6.
 
Conclusion
Making a scholarly journal openly available increases visibility both in terms of numbers and range. In 
addition, more paper submissions are generated from a geographically wider audience. These advantages 
need to be brought to the attention of variety of Indian journal publishers. 
 
About the authors
Thomas Abraham is the a member of the staff of the SJPI Project, which is carried out at National Centre 
for Science Information of the Indian Institute of Science in Bangalore. Suvarsha Minj, now working at 
Yahoo! India R&D, was a team member of the Project.
Direct comments to tomuhs [at] gmail [dot] com
 
Acknowledgements
We thank Sanjo Jose for his editorial assistance with condensing the text for this paper. We thank Prof. John 
Willinsky for his help throughout this Project. We thank the sponsor of the Project, the Asian Media 
Information and Communication Center (AMIC), the Pan Asia ICT Grants Programme of the International 
Development Research Centre (IDRC). We are grateful to (Late) Dr. T.B. Rajasekhar, who initiated this 
Project. We thank Prof. A.G. Menon, Prof. N.V. Joshi, Mr. Francis Jayakanth and Mr. Filbert Minj for their 
support and suggestions.
 
Appendix: List of journals used in the Project
OJS was used to create journal prototypes for the journals in this table. This list includes a link to the original 
Web site of each journal as well as Web sites of prototypes.
 
Table 1: Journals included in the Scientific Journal Publishing in India (SJPI) Project.
Sl 
No.
Journal title URL of prototype Original URL
Abraham http://www.uic.edu/htbin/cgiwrap/bin/ojs/index.php/fm/article/viewA...
7 of 7 11/25/2007 01:17 AM
1
SRELS 
Journal of 
Information 
Management
http://sjpi.ncsi.iisc.ernet.in/sjim not published online
2
Journal of 
the Indian 
Institute of 
Science
http://sjpi.ncsi.iisc.ernet.in/jiisc http://journal.library.iisc.ernet.in
3
Current 
Science
http://sjpi.ncsi.iisc.ernet.in/ias/cs http://www.ias.ac.in/currsci/index.html
4 Pramana http://sjpi.ncsi.iisc.ernet.in/ias/pramana http://www.ias.ac.in/pramana/index.htm
5
Journal of 
Chemical 
Sciences
http://sjpi.ncsi.iisc.ernet.in/ias/jcs http://www.ias.ac.in/chemsci/index.html
6
Proceedings
—
Mathematical
Sciences
http://sjpi.ncsi.iisc.ernet.in/ias/pms http://www.ias.ac.in/chemsci/index.html
7
Proceedings
— Earth and
Planetary
Sciences
(title 
changed to 
Journal of 
Earth 
System 
Sciences)
http://sjpi.ncsi.iisc.ernet.in/ias/peps http://www.ias.ac.in/jessci/index_body.html
8 Sadhana http://sjpi.ncsi.iisc.ernet.in/ias/sadhana http://www.ias.ac.in/sadhana/index.html
9
Journal of 
Biosciences
http://sjpi.ncsi.iisc.ernet.in/ias/jbs http://www.ias.ac.in/jbiosci/index.html
10
Bulletin of 
Material 
Sciences
http://sjpi.ncsi.iisc.ernet.in/ias/bms http://www.ias.ac.in/matersci/index.html
11
Journal of 
Astrophysics 
& Astronomy
http://sjpi.ncsi.iisc.ernet.in/ias/jaa http://www.ias.ac.in/jaa/index.html
12
Journal of 
Genetics
http://sjpi.ncsi.iisc.ernet.in/ias/jgen http://www.ias.ac.in/jgenet/index.html
13 Resonance http://sjpi.ncsi.iisc.ernet.in/ias/resonance http://www.ias.ac.in/resonance/index.htm
 
 
 
 
Copyright ©2007, First Monday.
Copyright ©2007, Thomas Abraham and Suvarsha Minj.
Scientific journal publishing in India: Promoting electronic publishing of scholarly journals in India by Thomas
Abraham and Suvarsha Minj
First Monday, Volume 12 Number 10 - 1 October 2007
http://www.uic.edu/htbin/cgiwrap/bin/ojs/index.php/fm/article/viewArticle/1954/1831


Scientific journal publishing in India: Promoting electronic publishing of scholarly journals in India

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