The AAS Three-Year Plan for Electronic Publishing
By Peter B. Boyce, Heather Dalterio and Chris Biemesderfer
 
The American Astronomical Society's three year "Plan for Electronic
Publishing" was prepared specifically with the aim of helping to
develop a more efficient system for the AAS to distribute
peer-reviewed research results to the astronomical community.

 The goals of the plan are to:
 1. Enable faster distribution of results
 2. Enable electronic searching of research results/articles
 3. Include access to relevant data in end products
 4. Provide integrated referencing, hypersearch capability 
      and forward references available with articles
 5. Maintain quality and reputation of final product 
 6. Keep financial base of the final product intact
 7. Maintain long-term archive of Journal material

 Following the philosophy outlined in the lead article in this
insert, the plan embodies a logical series of small steps designed
to provide answers, help master the techniques and technologies
required for progress and to guide further electronic efforts. 
 The plan makes two basic assumptions:  The first is that 
peer review and clear writing are essential aspects of archival
scientific literature in both electronic and paper forms.  The
second is that a developing a standardized system of generalized
markup is essential to make full use and effectiveness of the
electronic literature.
 The plan defines seven basic areas which need attention, which
include the following:

Electronic submission  (Capture of author keystrokes)

 A revised set of standard LaTeX macros, known as 
AASTeX will be developed and distributed by the end of 1992 and
tests will start immediately thereafter.  Interim standards for
transmission of graphics will be adopted. 

Editorial Process 

 The editorial offices of the AAS journals are being prepared 
and the staff trained to accept and use (edit/typeset/ format)
electronic manuscripts.  Inherent in this step is the realization
that the traditional roles and relationships between the author,
editor and publisher will change.  Both AAS publishers (AIP and
Unniversity of Chicago Press) are cooperating with our efforts to
achieve the ability to typeset from electronic manuscripts .  

 Peer Review/Referee Process 

Transmission of manuscripts to the reviewers, ability of reviewers
to handle electronic documents and inclusion of paper-based reviews
in the system have to be dealt with.  Security of the manuscripts
and the reviews during the review process is an area of concern. 
The plan calls for gradual integration of electronic reviews into
the system.  Training of editorial office staff, monitoring and
feedback of the process and adoption of procedures that work are
included in the plan.

Storage and Interchange of Articles and Data

One of the major strengths of our present system is the redundancy
and local availability of the research literature and the
permanence of the bound paper versions.  There are three elements
of concern in this area:  permanence, integrity and method of
distribution.  The plan calls for addressing all three elements in
concert with the library community.  Discussions will be held on
preventing unauthorized changes in electronic material, maintaining
long term storage and possible changes in cost of network use.  The
production of paper copies will be maintained for the duration of
the plan.  The effectiveness of various method(s) of distribution
will be investigated as part of other projects.
    
Search and Retrieval

Effective search and retrieval systems are the cornerstone to the
use of electronic literature.  The plan has three steps: 
 a. Examine existing systems for effectiveness, 
 b. Undertake project STELAR, a three year project with  NASA to
test various on-line search, retrieval and delivery  mechanisms,
and 
 c. Experiment with publishing data on CD-Rom to evaluate  that
medium as a method of distribution. 
Work in this area will be coordinated with other organizations'
efforts; the Library of Congress may participate in various tests
of distribution methods.

Intellectual Property Rights  

The plan calls for maintaining contact with the library and
publisher communities  to develop information about questions of
ownership and copyright of electronic information.  Copyright
enforcement, possible changes in the law and legal remedies will be
investigated in concert with other organizations.  Subtle questions
include the effects upon copyright of including the necessary
indexing and retrieval tags in the original documents.

Financial Aspects

As in all efforts, it costs money to produce the journals.  It is
not likely that dramatic cost savings will result from the switch
to electronic procedures.  Therefore ways must be found to continue
to collect the revenue necessary to continue to produce the
journals.  As part of the plan, various charging methods will be
investigated, debated and tried on a small scale in various pilot
projects.

Specific Projects
 In addition to the general information gathering and
 planning, the following specific projects are being done this year
by the AAS:

1. Continue participation in Project STELAR.  Provide abstracts and
full text on-line to the astronomical community in a test mode.
2. Develop and expand electronic submission of meeting abstracts.
3. Provide electronic distribution of meeting announcements,
programs and abstracts.
4. Test electronic submission of abstracts with new macros.
5. Prepare individual editorial offices to accept and use
electronic manuscripts.
6. Develop CD-Rom of data tables from AJ and ApJ.
7. Integrate electronic manuscripts into production process.