Guide for Authors
JCSS Guide for Authors
JCSS Guide for Authors
The Journal of Computer and System Sciences (JCSS) publishes
original research papers on computer science and system science, with emphasis on the relevant mathematical theory and its applications.
Among the subject areas covered by JCSS are classical traditional subjects like computability theory, theory of algorithms, formal language
theory and abstract automata theory. Contemporary and modern subject areas covered include complexity theory, parameterized complexity,
database theory and practice, parallel and distributed computing, computational learning theory, cellular automata and abstract systems,
computer security and cryptography, computer networks, and computational biology/genomics.
For the most expeditious review of a
paper in any of these varied areas authors are advised to submit the paper directly to the managing Editor, E.K. Blum (see below) or
to a pertinent Area Editor listed below. Submission by email with an attached text or pdf file (see preparation of manuscripts below
for details) is recommended. To assure proper handling and login, especially for papers where the subject area is not clearly determined,
each email submission should be cc'd to the Managing Editor as listed below.
Managing Editor
Edward K. Blum:
blum@usc.edu
Complexity Theory Area Editors
Jin-Yi Cai:
jyc@cs.wisc.edu
Alan Selman:
selman@cs.buffalo.edu
Ramamohan Paturi:
paturi@cs.ucsd.edu
William Gasarch:
gasarch@cs.umd.edu
Database Area Editors
Ronald
Fagin:
fagin@almaden.ibm.com
Georg Gottlob:
org.gottlob@comlab.ox.ac.uk
Michael Benedikt:
@comlab.ox.ac.uk
Computability, Automata and Formal Languages Area Editors
Alfred V. Aho
aho@cs.columbia.edu
Mihalis Yannakakis
mihalis@cs.columbia.edu
Joel Seiferas
joel@cs.rochester.edu
Computer
Networks Area Editors
Fan Chung Graham:
fan@ucsd.edu
Edith Cohen:
edith@research.att.com
Computational Learning Theory Area Editors
Sally Goldman:
sg@cs.wustl.edu
Sanjoy Dasgupta:
dasgupta@cs.ucsd.edu
Parallel
and Distributed Computing Area Editors
Christian Scheideler:
scheideler@in.tim.de
Michael Goodrich:
goodrich@cs.umd.edu
Fuzzy Computing Area Editor
Lotfi
Zadeh:
zadeh@cs.berkeley.edu
Computer Security/Cryptography Editor
Wayne Raskind:
raskind@usc.edu
Computational Biology Area Editor
Ming Li:
mli@cs.uwaterloo.ca
Quantum Computing Area Editor
Todd Brun:
brun@usc.edu
The purpose of the
Journal
of Computer and System Sciences is to publish original research papers in computer science and system science, with emphasis on
the relevant mathematical theory and its applications. Papers may deal with such subjects as automata theory, databases, complexity,
computational learning theory, parallel computation, quantum computation, computational biology, computer network algorithms, cryptography
and computer/communication security, theory of formal languages and formal systems, theory of algorithms, computer programming theory,
mathematical theory of systems (discrete or continuous, deterministic or stochastic), optimization of systems, mathematical programming,
computational biology and genomics, and applications of mathematics to the study of complex systems.
Ethics in publishing
For information
on Ethics in publishing and Ethical guidelines for journal publication see
http://www.elsevier.com/publishingethics and
http://www.elsevier.com/ethicalguidelines.
Conflict of interest
All
authors are requested to disclose any actual or potential conflict of interest including any financial, personal or other relationships
with other people or organizations within three years of beginning the submitted work that could inappropriately influence, or be perceived
to influence, their work. See also
http://www.elsevier.com/conflictsofinterest.
Submission declaration
Submission of an article implies that the work described has not been published previously (except
in the form of an abstract or as part of a published lecture or academic thesis), that it is not under consideration for publication
elsewhere, that its publication is approved by all authors and tacitly or explicitly by the responsible authorities where the work was
carried out, and that, if accepted, it will not be published elsewhere including electronically in the same form, in English or in any
other language, without the written consent of the copyright-holder.
Contributors
Each author is required to declare his or her individual contribution to the article: all authors must have materially participated
in the research and/or article preparation, so roles for all authors should be described. The statement that all authors have approved
the final article should be true and included in the disclosure.
Changes to authorship
This policy concerns the addition, deletion, or rearrangement of author names in the authorship of accepted manuscripts:
Before
the accepted manuscript is published in an online issue: Requests to add or remove an author, or to rearrange the author names,
must be sent to the Journal Manager from the corresponding author of the accepted manuscript and must include: (a) the reason the name
should be added or removed, or the author names rearranged and (b) written confirmation (e-mail, fax, letter) from all authors that they
agree with the addition, removal or rearrangement. In the case of addition or removal of authors, this includes confirmation from the
author being added or removed. Requests that are not sent by the corresponding author will be forwarded by the Journal Manager to the
corresponding author, who must follow the procedure as described above. Note that: (1) Journal Managers will inform the Journal Editors
of any such requests and (2) publication of the accepted manuscript in an online issue is suspended until authorship has been agreed.
After
the accepted manuscript is published in an online issue: Any requests to add, delete, or rearrange author names in an article published
in an online issue will follow the same policies as noted above and result in a corrigendum.
Copyright
Upon acceptance of an article, authors will be asked to complete a 'Journal Publishing Agreement' (for more
information on this and copyright see
http://www.elsevier.com/copyright). Acceptance of the agreement will ensure the widest
possible dissemination of information. An e-mail will be sent to the corresponding author confirming receipt of the manuscript together
with a 'Journal Publishing Agreement' form or a link to the online version of this agreement.
Subscribers may reproduce tables of
contents or prepare lists of articles including abstracts for internal circulation within their institutions. Permission of the Publisher
is required for resale or distribution outside the institution and for all other derivative works, including compilations and translations
(please consult
http://www.elsevier.com/permissions). If excerpts from other copyrighted works are included, the author(s)
must obtain written permission from the copyright owners and credit the source(s) in the article. Elsevier has preprinted forms for use
by authors in these cases: please consult
http://www.elsevier.com/permissions.
Retained author rights
As an author you (or your employer or institution) retain certain rights; for details you are referred
to:
http://www.elsevier.com/authorsrights.
Role of the funding source
You are requested to identify who provided financial support for the conduct of the research and/or preparation of the article
and to briefly describe the role of the sponsor(s), if any, in study design; in the collection, analysis and interpretation of data;
in the writing of the report; and in the decision to submit the article for publication. If the funding source(s) had no such involvement
then this should be stated. Please see
http://www.elsevier.com/funding.
Funding body agreements and policies
Elsevier has established agreements and developed policies to allow authors whose
articles appear in journals published by Elsevier, to comply with potential manuscript archiving requirements as specified as conditions
of their grant awards. To learn more about existing agreements and policies please visit
http://www.elsevier.com/fundingbodies.
Open access
This journal offers you the option of making your article freely available to all via the ScienceDirect
platform. To prevent any conflict of interest, you can only make this choice after receiving notification that your article has been
accepted for publication. The fee of $3,000 excludes taxes and other potential author fees such as color charges. In some cases, institutions
and funding bodies have entered into agreement with Elsevier to meet these fees on behalf of their authors. Details of these agreements
are available at
http://www.elsevier.com/fundingbodies. Authors of accepted articles, who wish to take advantage of this
option, should complete and submit the order form (available at
http://www.elsevier.com/locate/openaccessform.pdf). Whatever
access option you choose, you retain many rights as an author, including the right to post a revised personal version of your article
on your own website. More information can be found here:
http://www.elsevier.com/authorsrights.
Language and language services
Please write your text in good English (American or British usage is accepted,
but not a mixture of these). Authors who require information about language editing and copyediting services pre- and post-submission
please visit
http://webshop.elsevier.com/languageservices
or our customer support site at
http://support.elsevier.com
for more information.
Submission
Authors should submit papers as PDF files
in email addressed to the Managing Editor,
blum@usc.edu, and the Administrative assistant
cwill@usc.edu.
Manuscripts must be written in clear, concise, and grammatical English and should be submitted in duplicate
to:
Professor Edward. K. Blum, Managing Editor
Journal of Computer and System Sciences
Mathematics Department
University
of Southern California
Los Angeles, CA 90089, USA
Telephone: (213) 740-2391
Fax: (213) 740-2424
E-mail:
blum@usc.edu
Editorial Assistant: Chaunte Williams
Telephone: (213) 740-2400
Fax: (213) 740-2424
E-mail: cwill@usc.edu
There are
no submission fees or page charges. Each manuscript should be accompanied by a letter outlining the basic findings of the paper and their
significance.
Articles and any other material published in the
Journal
of Computer and System Sciences represent the opinions of the authors and should not be construed to reflect the opinions of the
Editor(s) or the Publisher.
Use of wordprocessing software
It is important that the file be saved in the native format of the wordprocessor
used. The text should be in single-column format. Keep the layout of the text as simple as possible. Most formatting codes will be removed
and replaced on processing the article. In particular, do not use the wordprocessor's options to justify text or to hyphenate words.
However, do use bold face, italics, subscripts, superscripts etc. When preparing tables, if you are using a table grid, use only one
grid for each individual table and not a grid for each row. If no grid is used, use tabs, not spaces, to align columns. The electronic
text should be prepared in a way very similar to that of conventional manuscripts (see also the Guide to Publishing with Elsevier:
http://www.elsevier.com/guidepublication).
Note that source files of figures, tables and text graphics will be required whether or not you embed your figures in the text. See also
the section on Electronic artwork.
To avoid unnecessary errors you are strongly advised to use the 'spell-check' and 'grammar-check'
functions of your wordprocessor.
LaTeX
Authors are strongly encouraged
to use the LaTeX template available at
http://www.authors.elsevier.com/latex for manuscript preparation. Note that the
extensive use of custom macro may necessitate conventional typesetting from the hard-copy manuscript. Hard-copy printouts of the manuscript
and art that exactly match the electronic file must be supplied. The manuscript will be edited according to the style of the journal,
and authors must read the proofs carefully.
Style
Manuscripts should be
prepared according to the following style rules. Deviation from these rules causes publication delays. Manuscripts should be double-spaced
throughout on one side of 8.5 x 11-inch or A4 white paper. Number all pages consecutively and organize the paper as follows.
Vitae
Include in the manuscript a short (maximum 100 words) biography of each author, along with a
passport-type photograph accompanying the other figures.
Essential title page information
•
Title.
Concise and informative. Titles are often used in information-retrieval systems. Avoid abbreviations
and formulae where possible.
•
Author names and affiliations.
Where the family name may be ambiguous (e.g., a
double name), please indicate this clearly. Present the authors' affiliation addresses (where the actual work was done) below the names.
Indicate all affiliations with a lower-case superscript letter immediately after the author's name and in front of the appropriate address.
Provide the full postal address of each affiliation, including the country name and, if available, the e-mail address of each author.
•
Corresponding author.
Clearly indicate who will handle correspondence at all stages of refereeing and publication, also
post-publication.
Ensure that telephone and fax numbers (with country and area code) are provided in addition to the e-mail address
and the complete postal address. Contact details must be kept up to date by the corresponding author.
•
Present/permanent
address.
If an author has moved since the work described in the article was done, or was visiting at the time, a 'Present address'
(or 'Permanent address') may be indicated as a footnote to that author's name. The address at which the author actually did the work
must be retained as the main, affiliation address. Superscript Arabic numerals are used for such footnotes.
This page should contain the article title, authors' names and complete affiliations, footnotes to the
title, and the address for manuscript correspondence (including e-mail address and telephone and fax numbers).
The abstract must be a single paragraph that summarizes the main findings of the paper in less than 150 words.
Highlights
Highlights are mandatory for this journal. They consist of a short collection of bullet points
that convey the core findings of the article and should be submitted in a separate file in the online submission system. Please use 'Highlights'
in the file name and include 3 to 5 bullet points (maximum 85 characters, including spaces, per bullet point). See
http://www.elsevier.com/highlights
for examples.
After the abstract a list of up to 10 keywords that will be
useful for indexing or searching should be included.
In text, footnotes
should be avoided. If absolutely necessary, identify them by superscript Arabic numerals in order of their appearance and type them
together on a separate page, double-spaced.
Artwork
Electronic artwork
General points
• Make sure you use uniform lettering and sizing
of your original artwork.
• Save text in illustrations as 'graphics' or enclose the font.
• Only use the following
fonts in your illustrations: Arial, Courier, Times, Symbol.
• Number the illustrations according to their sequence in the text.
• Use a logical naming convention for your artwork files.
• Provide captions to illustrations separately.
•
Produce images near to the desired size of the printed version.
• Submit each figure as a separate file.
A detailed guide
on electronic artwork is available on our website:
http://www.elsevier.com/artworkinstructions
You are urged
to visit this site; some excerpts from the detailed information are given here.
Formats
Regardless of the application
used, when your electronic artwork is finalised, please 'save as' or convert the images to one of the following formats (note the resolution
requirements for line drawings, halftones, and line/halftone combinations given below):
EPS: Vector drawings. Embed the font or save
the text as 'graphics'.
TIFF: Color or grayscale photographs (halftones): always use a minimum of 300 dpi.
TIFF: Bitmapped line
drawings: use a minimum of 1000 dpi.
TIFF: Combinations bitmapped line/half-tone (color or grayscale): a minimum of 500 dpi is required.
If your electronic artwork is created in a Microsoft Office application (Word, PowerPoint, Excel) then please supply 'as is'.
Please
do not:
• Supply files that are optimised for screen use (e.g., GIF, BMP, PICT, WPG); the resolution is too low;
•
Supply files that are too low in resolution;
• Submit graphics that are disproportionately large for the content.
Figures
Figures should be in a finished form suitable for publication. Number figures with Arabic numerals,
and indicate the top and the authors on the back of each figure. Lettering on drawings should be professional quality or generated by
high-resolution computer graphics and must be large enough to withstand appropriate reduction for publication. Figures should not be
embedded in the text. Digital artwork of at least 300 dpi resolution is accepted in eps or TIFF formats. Please visit our Web site
at
http://authors.elsevier.com/artwork for detailed instructions on preparing electronic artwork.
Color artwork
Please make sure that artwork files are in an acceptable format (TIFF, EPS or MS Office
files) and with the correct resolution. If, together with your accepted article, you submit usable color figures then Elsevier will ensure,
at no additional charge, that these figures will appear in color on the Web (e.g., ScienceDirect and other sites) regardless of whether
or not these illustrations are reproduced in color in the printed version.
For color reproduction in print, you will receive information
regarding the costs from Elsevier after receipt of your accepted article. Please indicate your preference for color: in print or
on the Web only. For further information on the preparation of electronic artwork, please see
http://www.elsevier.com/artworkinstructions.
Please note: Because of technical complications which can arise by converting color figures to 'gray scale' (for the printed version
should you not opt for color in print) please submit in addition usable black and white versions of all the color illustrations.
Type all legends consecutively on a separate sheet.
Tables
Number tables consecutively with Arabic numerals in order of appearance in text. Type each table double-spaced on a separate
pages with a short descriptive title directly above and essential footnotes below. Authors should submit complex tables as camera-ready
copy.
Numbers for displayed equations should be placed in parentheses at the right margin. References to equations should use the
form "Eq. (3)" or simply "(3)".
References
Citation in text
Please ensure that every reference cited in the text is also present in the reference
list (and vice versa). Any references cited in the abstract must be given in full. Unpublished results and personal communications are
not recommended in the reference list, but may be mentioned in the text. If these references are included in the reference list they
should follow the standard reference style of the journal and should include a substitution of the publication date with either 'Unpublished
results' or 'Personal communication'. Citation of a reference as 'in press' implies that the item has been accepted for publication.
Web references
As a minimum, the full URL should be given and the date when the reference was last
accessed. Any further information, if known (DOI, author names, dates, reference to a source publication, etc.), should also be given.
Web references can be listed separately (e.g., after the reference list) under a different heading if desired, or can be included in
the reference list.
References in a special issue
Please ensure that
the words 'this issue' are added to any references in the list (and any citations in the text) to other articles in the same Special
Issue.
Reference management software
This journal has standard templates
available in key reference management packages EndNote (
http://www.endnote.com/support/enstyles.asp) and Reference Manager
(
http://refman.com/support/rmstyles.asp). Using plug-ins to wordprocessing packages, authors only need to select the appropriate
journal template when preparing their article and the list of references and citations to these will be formatted according to the journal
style which is described below.
Reference style
Text: Indicate
references by number(s) in square brackets in line with the text. The actual authors can be referred to, but the reference number(s)
must always be given.
Example: '..... as demonstrated [3,6]. Barnaby and Jones [8] obtained a different result ....'
List:
Number the references (numbers in square brackets) in the list in the order in which they appear in the text.
Examples:
Reference to a journal publication:
[1] J. van der Geer, J.A.J. Hanraads, R.A. Lupton, The art of writing a scientific article,
J. Sci. Commun. 163 (2010) 51–59.
Reference to a book:
[2] W. Strunk Jr., E.B. White, The Elements of Style, fourth ed.,
Longman, New York, 2000.
Reference to a chapter in an edited book:
[3] G.R. Mettam, L.B. Adams, How to prepare an electronic
version of your article, in: B.S. Jones, R.Z. Smith (Eds.), Introduction to the Electronic Age, E-Publishing Inc., New York, 2009, pp.
281–304.
Journal abbreviations source
Journal names should
be abbreviated according to
Index Medicus journal abbreviations:
http://www.nlm.nih.gov/tsd/serials/lji.html;
List
of title word abbreviations:
http://www.issn.org/2-22661-LTWA-online.php;
CAS (Chemical Abstracts Service):
http://www.cas.org/sent.html.
Submission checklist
The following list will be useful during the final checking of an article prior to
sending it to the journal for review. Please consult this Guide for Authors for further details of any item.
Ensure that the following
items are present:
One author has been designated as the corresponding author with contact details:
• E-mail address
• Full postal address
• Telephone and fax numbers
All necessary files have been uploaded, and contain:
•
Keywords
• All figure captions
• All tables (including title, description, footnotes)
Further considerations
•
Manuscript has been 'spell-checked' and 'grammar-checked'
• References are in the correct format for this journal
•
All references mentioned in the Reference list are cited in the text, and vice versa
• Permission has been obtained for use
of copyrighted material from other sources (including the Web)
• Color figures are clearly marked as being intended for color
reproduction on the Web (free of charge) and in print, or to be reproduced in color on the Web (free of charge) and in black-and-white
in print
• If only color on the Web is required, black-and-white versions of the figures are also supplied for printing purposes
For any further information please visit our customer support site at
http://support.elsevier.com.
Use of the Digital Object Identifier
The Digital Object Identifier (DOI) may be used to cite and link to
electronic documents. The DOI consists of a unique alpha-numeric character string which is assigned to a document by the publisher upon
the initial electronic publication. The assigned DOI never changes. Therefore, it is an ideal medium for citing a document, particularly
'Articles in press' because they have not yet received their full bibliographic information. The correct format for citing a DOI is shown
as follows (example taken from a document in the journal
Physics Letters B):
doi:10.1016/j.physletb.2010.09.059
When
you use the DOI to create URL hyperlinks to documents on the web, the DOIs are guaranteed never to change.
Proofs
One set of page proofs (as PDF files) will be sent by e-mail to the corresponding author (if we do
not have an e-mail address then paper proofs will be sent by post) or, a link will be provided in the e-mail so that authors can download
the files themselves. Elsevier now provides authors with PDF proofs which can be annotated; for this you will need to download Adobe
Reader version 7 (or higher) available free from
http://get.adobe.com/reader. Instructions on how to annotate PDF files
will accompany the proofs (also given online). The exact system requirements are given at the Adobe site:
http://www.adobe.com/products/reader/tech-specs.html.
If you do not wish to use the PDF annotations function, you may list the corrections (including replies to the Query Form) and return
them to Elsevier in an e-mail. Please list your corrections quoting line number. If, for any reason, this is not possible, then mark
the corrections and any other comments (including replies to the Query Form) on a printout of your proof and return by fax, or scan the
pages and e-mail, or by post. Please use this proof only for checking the typesetting, editing, completeness and correctness of the text,
tables and figures. Significant changes to the article as accepted for publication will only be considered at this stage with permission
from the Editor. We will do everything possible to get your article published quickly and accurately – please let us have all your
corrections within 48 hours. It is important to ensure that all corrections are sent back to us in one communication: please check carefully
before replying, as inclusion of any subsequent corrections cannot be guaranteed. Proofreading is solely your responsibility. Note that
Elsevier may proceed with the publication of your article if no response is received.
Offprints
The corresponding author, at no cost, will be provided with a PDF file of the article via e-mail. For an extra
charge, paper offprints can be ordered via the offprint order form which is sent once the article is accepted for publication. The PDF
file is a watermarked version of the published article and includes a cover sheet with the journal cover image and a disclaimer outlining
the terms and conditions of use.
For inquiries relating
to the submission of articles (including electronic submission) please visit this journal's homepage. Contact details for questions arising
after acceptance of an article, especially those relating to proofs, will be provided by the publisher. You can track accepted articles
at
http://www.elsevier.com/trackarticle. You can also check our Author FAQs (
http://www.elsevier.com/authorFAQ)
and/or contact Customer Support via
http://support.elsevier.com.
