Contents of AAS Newsletter insert on Electronic Publishing

By Peter B. Boyce, Executive Officer; Catherine Pilachowski, Publications Board Chair, and Heather Dalterio, AAS Publications Coordinator

Electronic Publishing means different things to different people. To an author, it means preparing the manuscript on some word processor and sending it to an editor over the network. To the scientific editor, it means transmitting the manuscript to the referees and getting back the comments electronically. The copy editor and typesetters have an entirely different view. They look for a saving in the keystrokes needed to get the manuscript into a publishable form, with effective use of language, understandable equations and appropriate and readable layout of the text and graphics. With yet another view altogether, the scientist thinks of electronic publishing as easy access to the literature, smart search techniques and instant retrieval of relevant material, with ApJ pages of selected, interesting articles emerging from the local laser printer within minutes. Mention electronic publishing to a network visionary and all sorts of ideas spring to mind -- new uses, hypertext linking, forward referencing, data from articles available for instant use, animations and simulations callable directly from the article, etc.

In reality, electronic publishing is all of the above, and more. We tend to limit ourselves by carrying too many preconcieved ideas about publishing with us. When we think about any kind of publishing, our usual first response is to think in terms of books or journals, volumes and issues, words on pages, etc. A normal response - yet one that can be very limiting to the way we view the possibilities available through this new technology. Electronic publishing does not simply mean taking a current print publication and reproducing it exactly in an electronic form. The whole point of making information available electronically is to take advantage of the host of new uses for the information that would not otherwise be possible with a simple printed page.

Role of the AAS

In the scheme of traditional publishing, the AAS is a small society with limited resources. The technology of electronic publishing is developing at a breathtaking pace. One might not expect the AAS to be able to play a significant role in the development of electronic publishing, yet the astronomical community is well-positioned to move aggressively in this arena. Our members are technically literate, highly knowledgeable about the advantages of electronic communications, and well connected to the electronic networks. Our research literature is of manageable size, and largely under our own control. Finally, we have access to and make frequent use of a large body of widely available, non-proprietary software which unites our community with a common language for communication.

All of these factors have played an important role in our development of a strategy to address electronic publishing. The AAS has chosen a path that addresses long-term needs and goals, yet allows us to move forward in small, manageable steps, testing possible solutions, examining individual aspects of the publishing process and gaining experience and capability without jeopardizing the quality and financial health of our journals. We remain committed to the use and development of standards wherever possible.

The Plan

The Executive Office, the Publications Board and a small group of volunteers have, under the direction of the AAS Council, developed a three year strategy document defining a series of goals with corresponding projects, tasks and experiments. Our strategy recognizes that we are not alone in facing these issues. Among others, we have worked with the AIP, other societies, the Library of Congress and with interested groups within NASA. Together, we have identified a number of guiding principles as we try to find our way to workable solutions to the problems posed by the electronic revolution. (See related article by Dalterio and Boyce on page 6)

We recognize the need for flexibility to respond to the inevitable rapid changes in technology, the marketplace, and our own expectations. We have to identify long term goals and avoid directions which lead to technological dead ends. We must gain experience (since only experience can show us what we truly need and want from our new electronic tools) and develop infrastructure for futute ventures, all with the Society's very limited resources. We have chosen to avoid proprietary hardware and software in an effort to help assure that costs remain affordable to members, institutions, libraries, and the Society. To do this, we must take advantage of the existing strengths of our community and Society, and we must identify the trends in the commercial world and adapt our own strategy for consistency with the larger marketplace.

Typesetting v. Markup

In our deliberations on strategy, we have identified one crucial, philosophical decision which dominates all our planning, the distinction between author typesetting and generalized author mark-up. It is worth a few words to explain why this is so important to our long term strategy.

The use of a generalized logical markup language (for example, LaTeX), rather than a typesetting language (like plain TeX), allows us to write our papers with the identification of the logical components of the paper (e.g. title, abstract, section, references, table, etc.) built in. In this form, the compuscript can be easily translated into whatever typesetting language is used for production, and can be just as easily prepared for inclusion in an electronic archive or for electronic distribution, either on the network or on some physical medium like a CD-Rom. A "typeset" compuscript contains no such standardized logical structure, and cannot be translated into any other format without significant human intervention. We believe that not only is author-typesetting an unnecessary drain on our authors, but also that it is an undesirable direction for the long term, and may prove prohibitive to many future options. (See the article by Biemesfderfer on page 7 for further details.)

Importance of Refereed

Journals A second decision we have made is to concentrate upon applying our resources to two areas, the refereed scientific literature and specific Society functions. We have decided not to tackle the area of informal (or preprint) literature. It is quite clear that a major problem with electronic communication is the weeding out of significant, accurate and reliable information from among the vast array of available information. Without the twin filters of peer review and editorial quality control, it is our feeling that there is simply too much information to be scanned and that encouraging the flow of informal literature would not be the proper area on which to expend our effort.

Finances

One overriding priority is to maintain the income necessary to produce high quality journals which will retain their reputation and prestige while being archived and delivered electronically. As measured by citation studies, our journals are the most important astronomy journals in the world. The AAS Publications Board is unwilling to sacrifice any of their present quality in the process of converting to an electronic format.

Other Projects

Other important issues from our strategy document which will require resolution soon are standards for transmitting figures and tables and various questions of copyright and ownership of the electronic versions of papers, the abstracts and any data which might be published concurrently.

Following the definition of our overall strategy, we have focused our effort on developing a few projects and new services for Society members. These projects have been chosen for their value to the members and to astronomy, for their value in developing the infrastructure to carry out more ambitious projects, and for their value in gaining experience in electronic publishing. New services which allow e-mail submission of abstracts of papers for AAS meetings, and registration for AAS meetings are also available. These new services, already in use by many AAS members, are described in this special section by the people who are helping to spearhead these particular projects. Without the enormous contributions that these particular people have made, (in many cases, acting in purely voluntary capacities) the AAS would not have been able to make the progress that it has.

It is an exciting time in publishing. We hope to continue forward at as quick a pace as we can, while maintaining the integrity and quality of scientific research results which we publish. We hope that this insert will be of interest to you.

Astrophysical Journal Plans for Electronic Publication By Helmut A. Abt, Managing Editor, The Astrophysical Journal

Currently, scientific authors generally prepare manuscripts on word processors in a language that the printers cannot use. Therefore manuscripts are keyboarded again by the typesetters. Then because printed journals are not computer-readable and the tapes from which they were produced have mostly been destroyed, the STELAR project has been optically scanning the journals for its information retrieval experiments. However the publishing industry is swinging rapidly toward SGML as a standard language and a translation program from TeX to SGML has been written. Therefore there is the expectation that soon the AASTeX-prepared manuscripts from authors will be used directly by the printers and then for information retrieval uses.

To implement this procedure requires considerable effort. The Tucson office has updated its computer network to be much faster and has installed a laser printer to accept manuscripts by e-mail. The AAS has contracted with Chris Biemesderfer to update the AASTeX program and to help the Tucson staff develop the necessary tools and expertise to handle incoming electronic manuscripts. He and Evan Owens of the University of Chicago Press staff are working toward making appropriate preparations at the Press.

Meanwhile other changes in procedure have occurred to help speed publication. Almost all referee reports are received by FAX or e-mail, although some referees send duplicate copies by postal mail for increased assurance of receipt. The faster transmission saves much time because about one-quarter of the referees are abroad. Manuscripts are no longer returned to authors by postal mail; instead the referees' reports and covering letters are sent by FAX or e-mail. We generally do not return original figures and plano tables for revision to save postal damage to them.

The one aspect of the reviewing process that has not been speeded drastically is the peer review. Scientists are increasingly busy with multiple responsibilities, the longer more-complex papers that appear in ApJ, relative to other journals, take large amounts of time for careful reviewing. Referees must find a whole afternoon or even several to review an ApJ manuscript properly. We send e-mail messages to referees at the same time that a manuscript is sent for review to find out whether they are at their home institutions and able to review the manuscript, but good intentions are sometimes defeated by other emergencies that arise. We give up hoping for a review after two months in an effort to reduce the long tail in the reviewing times, but more than half of the referees conscientiously respond within a month.

We foresee that after scientific acceptance, publication of papers will occur more rapidly through use of computer-readable manuscripts by the printers. It is not clear whether a saving in costs will materialize because any changes require more effort than simply a green pen. And when ApJ authors have been given the option between shorter publication times and viewing the papers twice during publication, they chose the latter. But we are trying for the more rapid publication of papers.

Proposed CD-Rom Series
Helmut A. Abt
Managing Editor, Astrophysical Journal

Astrophysicists make extensive use of tabular material, digitized
graphics, and other numerical data.  Unfortunately such material
published in our journals is not computer readable.  Some authors
have noted that tapes containing their data may be obtained
directly from them or from central depositories, but some of those
sources have not been completely reliable, such as when an author
moves to a new address.
     It seems reasonable to start the distribution to all
subscribers of computer-readable data involving extensive numerical
tabulations published in our journals, or supporting data for those
papers, such as photoelectric photometry, spectral-line equivalent
widths, model atmosphere or interior data, radio sources, and other
useful catalogs.
     The current medium for storing extremely-large amounts of data
is CD-Roms, so we plan to distribute those about twice yearly to
all subscribers.  The frequency of publication is selected to be
not so infrequent that the data lags the published papers by long
intervals but not so frequent that the CD-Roms are mostly empty. 
The initial ones will be limited to extensive (15 KB) tabular
numbers, but with experience we will broaden their scope.  Each set
of data will be reviewed by the same referees consulted for the
associated papers and those referees will be asked about the
usefulness of the data to many people.  This is not a depository
for all data coming from telescopes or computer simulations.  The
associated papers describing the data and giving the resulting
astronomical conclusions will be published in the Astrophysical
Journal (Part 1 or the Letters), Astrophysical Supplement Series,
or the Astronomical Journal.  Every author has the option of having
his or her longer tables printed only in the printed journal, only
on a CD-Rom, it would be well for authors to include in the printed
papers a partial sample (e.g. one-third of a page) showing the
table's content.  Normally the CD-Roms would include data published
in the printed journal in the previous half year, but we can also
include useful tables published years ago.
     If, as occurs with most contemporary media, CD-Roms 
are later replaced by other technologies, we will transfer the data
to the new technology and make available the current and previous
collections.
     Data submitted in FITS format will be distributed in both FITS
and ASCII formats ASCII data will only be distributed in ASCII
format.   There will be a modest "page charge" for distributing
data on CD-Roms, initially $2 per KB for the first 10 KB and $ 1
per KB thereafter.
     For details of formatting, please contact Lee Brotzman
(Internet:  [email protected]); for editorial questions please
contact the Managing Editor.

AASTex: The Foundation of Electronic Submission
By Chris Biemesderfer

The AAS has been working for some time on a package for authors to
use when preparing articles for the Society's journals. 
Preliminary versions of these materials have been distributed on
the Internet, and the newest version of the package is now
available.  This new package, known officially as AASTeX, has been
coordinated with editors, publishers, and other societies, and
should be used in preference to any other versions.  Details about
the retrieval and installation of the package can be obtained by
sending an e-mail message to: [email protected]
The main purpose of the package is to provide a markup language
with which to identify the structural elements of an article, and
to do this in a standardized way.  When an article is marked up in
this way, its information is accessible for many purposes;
formatting is an obvious one, but there are many others, such as
the extraction of text for an on-line abstract service, the
collection of bibliographic data for a citation database, on-line
search and retrieval of articles based on full text indexing, and
so on.  The electronic delivery of journal articles is a much more
tractable and promising prospect in a standardized tagged ASCII
form.  This approach differs from plain TeX, or commercial packages
like Microsoft Word and WordPerfect, which utilize embedded markup
to implement typesetting instructions (such as when to change a
font or indent text). 
The ability to prepare a manuscript with a tool that displays the
text in a fully or partially formatted way is very attractive to
many authors.  (Such tools are the so-called "WYSIWYG", or
"what-you-see-is-what-you-get" editors.)  There are a number of
tools that serve this purpose; however, few of them permit files to
be saved with the structural information preserved, several of them
run on only one or two platforms, and nearly all of them cost
money.  As a class, these tools are not nearly so versatile or as
ubiquitous as tagged ASCII text.  Consequently,  at this time it is
impossible to select one as a standard authoring environment, and
it is impractical to support the full panoply (or even a limited
range) of these products.   
It is worth noting that the perception of "electronic 
publishing" by the AAS encompasses a wider range of services than
merely being able to format pages with a computer.  A number of
possibilities have been mentioned above, and it's important to
recognize that on-line article delivery doesn't necessarily mean
displaying pictures of Astronomical Journal pages on the monitor. 
The literature can be used as an interactive research tool, with
automated searching, electronic links between articles, adaptive
algorithms that respond as literature is selected or rejected and
adjust search criteria accordingly.  These are exciting, valuable
prospects, and the AASTeX author markup package is written so that,
as these capabilities develop, astronomical research articles
prepared in accordance with the AASTeX package can be utilized in
new ways as quickly and as effectively as possible.  

Facts about the AASTeX package
The AAS author-preparation package is available on-line, and can be
retrieved by authors either by anonymous FTP or by e-mail.  As
mentioned earlier, information about the retrieval and installation
of the package can be obtained by sending an e-mail message to: 
[email protected]  
In order for a paper to be accepted for electronic 
submission, authors will have to prepare computer manuscripts with
the AASTeX markup package.  Manuscripts won't be accepted if they
are written in plain TeX, or just vanilla LaTeX, or AMSTeX, etc. 
The reason for this restriction is that we need be sure that the
language (tags) used by authors to mark up papers will be both
complete and uniform.  The AAS author-prepared package is a minor
augmentation of the standard LaTeX markup language, so it's
necessary to use it to ensure completeness. Since we do need
extensions that are not provided with standard LaTeX, the use of
one, well-defined language (set of tags) by all authors helps to
ensure that any recipient of the electronic manuscripts will
understand the markup.  
Authors will find instructions for preparing the manuscript
(writing the paper and putting in the correct markup) provided in
the package.  This "user guide" describes the markup tags, explains
various style options if they exist, and so on.  Instructions for
submitting completed manuscripts are also included in the package. 
These include details on e-mail addresses to which submissions
should be made, how the file(s) should be identified in the e-mail
message(s), and how figures (line art) can be submitted.  
Line art graphics will be accepted as PostScript files, or 
even better, as Encapsulated PostScript.  Other graphics
meta-languages or page description languages are not acceptable. 
These kinds of figures should not be submitted as LaTeX picture
environments, or using PicTeX, or other such TeX-based
meta-languages.  Drawings that have been prepared using TeX-based
tools should be formatted and translated into PostScript for
submission. 
Special styles will be available in the package to allow 
authors to produce "plano", or camera-ready, tables.  These are
long (multi-page) tables that are really wanted in print, but for
which reduced page charges are desired.  
At this time, authors will be able to define a nominal amount of
simple "keystroke saver" macros at the beginning of their
manuscript.  Such macros must be very straightforward:  there may
be no arguments, no conditionals, absolutely no typesetting
instructions, etc.  
The package is compatible insofar as it is possible, with RevTeX (a
similar product designed by the  American Physical Society). 
Manuscripts prepared with the AAS markup will eventually be usable
in production by the publisher.  The AAS is working diligently with
both its publishers (the University of Chicago Press and the AIP)
to guarantee that this can be done reliably, and at the soonest
possible juncture. 

Longevity of the Package; Future Possibilities

A markup package based on LaTeX serves the astronomical community's
needs for electronic publishing as we see it today.  However, the
evolution of publishing technology, particularly related to
computer language, will undoubtedly make a change in the future
inevitable.  In fact, our publishers will not be using LaTeX for
page production; the University of Chicago Press will use SGML, and
the AIP will use a proprietary system.  Both will translate AAS
author-prepared files into their internal typesetting language.
  We anticipate that SGML (the Standard Generalized Markup
Language) will be used both in production and for archival storage
of documents.  In time, new formatting tools and markup editors
will be available, new techniques for identifying document
structure will emerge, and new authoring tools will appear.  It is
our intention that the AAS be in a position to take advantage of
these technologies as they are introduced, and we feel that a
markup-based approach to publication best facilitates this.  The
specific package we are using today will be replaced, but we expect
the concept of the marked-up article to remain.

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.

Current Electronic Services Available to 
AAS Members
by Peter B. Boyce and Heather Dalterio

As members of the AAS  connect to the Internet in increasing
numbers, the effectiveness of electronic communication has
increased dramatically.  Presently,  most communication between
astronomers is taking place electronically and a high percentage of
the astronomical community has access to the Internet.   
     In this milieu it becomes practical to use the network to
deliver many of the traditional services which the AAS provides its
members and to offer some new and improved ones.  In addition to
the move toward electronic production and distribution of peer
reviewed articles which is the focus of this insert, the AAS is
also using the Internet to provide several other services.  While
some of the services may, at first look, appear to be rather remote
from the topic of electronic publishing, they provide valuable
experience in specific areas of electronic communications without
endangering the health of our refereed publications. They are all
geared towards helping the scientific community to function more
effectively and that, after all, is why we exist.

Electronic Submission of Meeting Abstracts

Meeting abstracts for meeting papers are now being accepted
electronically, provided that they are submitted using the
LaTeX-based template specifically designed for this purpose.  The
first time this service was offered, over half the total meeting
abstracts were submitted this way.  The vast majority (85%) of
these abstracts were able to be processed automatically without
human intervention at a significant saving of time and a
corresponding increase in the accuracy of the meeting program.

On-Line, Searchable Database of Abstracts

Those abstracts which have been submitted electronically are now
put into an on-line database which is searchable using a WAIS
server (see accompanying article on WAIS on page 10).  The
abstracts are made available to members well in advance of the
meeting, (earlier than the final program) to help facilitate
meeting travel plans. The searchable database of abstracts will be
available for demonstration at the January 1993 AAS meeting in
Phoenix. 

Electronic Distribution of Critical News Items

Meeting announcements and important news items are now being
distributed to the two-thirds of the AAS membership for which
e-mail addresses are available at the Executive Office.  Foreign
members with long postal mail delivery times particularly benefit
from this service.   

On-Line, Searchable List of Jobs

Plans are nearing completion for moving the AAS Job Register fully
into an electronic format.  Presently, the Job Register is loaded,
after publication, into a WAIS database available over the Internet
and is also available via the PiNet service of the American
Institute of Physics. The WAIS database of job listings will be
available for demonstration at the January 1993 AAS meeting in
Phoenix. 

Electronic Registration for Meetings 

Starting with the January, 1993, meeting it will be possible to
register for AAS meetings over the Internet by using a special
electronic form and providing either a credit card or a purchase
order number.  Electronic registration lends itself to automatic
processing of forms, holding out a promise of savings in time and
effort for future meetings.   

Electronic Change of Address:

For the first time this year, special change of address forms have
been sent out electronically to the AAS membership, and have been
used to update member records.  Further automation of the record
updating process is also planned.  

Internet Connections at AAS Meetings:

For several years the AAS and NASA have been bringing an Internet
line to AAS meetings for use by all meeting attendees.  In addition
to providing the e-mail connectivity to which the astronomical
community has become accustomed, the Internet is used to
demonstrate databases, software and data reduction procedures of
particular interest to astronomers.

Updated General Information

Other useful general information is available via anonymous ftp
from the AAS computer (blackhole.aas.org) including:  information
on how to contact Congress, lists of Agency Advisory Committee
members, hints on writing proposals, lists of AAS Committee
members, the latest versions of AASTeX, plus meeting registration
and abstract submission forms.  

Electronic Publishing at Astrophysical Journal Letters
A. Dalgarno, Letters Editor,
E. Avrett, Deputy Letters Editor

     The ApJ Letters Office currently receives a small fraction of
new papers electronically, but paper copies of such submissions are
sent to referees, by express mail or sometimes by fax, since most
papers contain figures and other material that are not easily
handled in computer readable form. Once a paper has been refereed,
revised, and accepted, faster publication  will be possible if the
Press is sent the electronic file along with the printed paper to
avoid typesetting by hand.  The AASTeX macro program should be used
for this purpose.
     ApJ Letters now maintains an on-line file of the abstracts of 
all Letters that have been accepted but not published.  (See the
inside back cover of the Letters.)  We hope that in the future it
will be possible to include full articles in such a file so that a
Letter could be available electronically in advance of the printed
version.
     The Letters Office has asked that the AASTeX macro program
include a formatting option that could allow authors to see
approximately how their paper would appear in the ApJ two-column
page layout.  This could help authors determine whether they can
lengthen their paper or would have to shorten it to stay within the
limit of four journal pages. 

Electronic Publishing in the Real World;
The AAS and Its Outreach Efforts
By Heather Dalterio and Peter B. Boyce

In the world of electronic publishing, no organization is an
island. The relevant technologies are developing and changing so
quickly and so constantly that it is impossible for one
organization (particularly one the size of the AAS) to expect to
master it alone.  The AAS has actively sought to pursue dialogue
and cooperative projects with a number of organizations whose
interests lie within the same realm as our own, and whose strengths
complement our strengths. 
     Within the community of scientific professionals and 
scientific publishing, both of the Institutes  which publish AAS
journals (The American Institute of Physics and the University of
Chicago Press), have taken an active role in the research and
development of ways for the AAS to make use this new technology. 
     For the past few years, the AAS has been an active member 
of the  Joint Society Task Force on Electronic Publishing, a group
of member societies of  the American Institute of Physics,  which
meets regularly to discuss common publishing concerns, share
information gained in individual electronic publishing efforts, and
to investigate areas of possible cooperative projects. These
conversations have not been limited to member societies of AIP, but
have also expanded to include other scientific societies active in
this arena, including the  American Mathematical Society and the
American Chemical Society. Similarly, the Association of Research
Libraries has hosted  a series of workshops on electronic
publishing in which the AAS has participated.  These have been
helpful in facilitating discussions with a wide base of users. 
     Some of the most valuable contributions to date to the 
AAS' electronic publishing efforts have stemmed from a cooperative
relationship with NASA's project STELAR, a pilot project to study
on-line astronomical literature (see article on page 11). This
project has strengthened our ties to the library community and
their expertise on this subject. In particular the Library of
Congress has agreed to a tentative distribution agreement to test
various delivery methods of the electronic documents stored in the
STELAR database. 
     The Online Computer Library Center in Columbus, Ohio 
has also proven to be a source of valuable information. OCLC has
committed a significant amount of time and energy into the 
preparation and release one of the first truly on-line refereed
scientific journals (Current Clinical Trials On-Line).  The AAS is
presently exploring options for future cooperative projects with
OCLC.

Services Available on the Network
Robert J. Hanisch, STScI; Chair, AAS Working Group on Astronomical
Software

Although the primary usage of the electronic networks has been
e-mail, there are a wide variety of other services and resources
available via the Internet.  The new tools and capabilties made
possible by electronic networks are changing how we operate,
freeing us from our traditional, limited approach to the storage,
recovery and exchange of knowledge.  I have compiled a review of
these services and how to access them.  This report is available
via anonymous FTP on blackhole.aas.org in the info/net directory. 
This article provides a brief summary of the information contained
in the full report.
     Network services consist of on-line databases and catalogs,
listservers (automated e-mail servers and distribution lists),
anonymous FTP archives, indices to published papers in astronomy
and astrophysics, and abstracts for both published papers and
preprints.  Several observatories provide on-line information
services that describe the telescopes and instruments they support
and procedures for submitting proposals.  Most of the major
astronomical software packages are available via the network, as
are libraries of numerical algorithms and information concerning
the FITS data format standard. 
     The on-line catalogs and database services available to
astronomers include SIMBAD (Set of Identifications, Measurements,
and Bibliography for Astronomical Data), NED (NASA Extragalactic
Database), NODIS (NASA On-line Data and Information Service), NDADS
(NASA Data Archive and Distribution Service), Einline (Einstein
X-ray data on-line service), HEASARC (High Energy Astrophysics
Science Archive Research Center), STEIS (Space Telescope Electronic
Information Service), DIRA2 (Distributed Information Retrieval from
Astronomical files), and ADS (NASA's Astrophysics Data
System).Titles and authors of papers published in ApJ, AJ, and PASP
are stored on-line at the CfA.  Preprints are available on-line via
a listserver operated by the International School for Advanced
Studies in Trieste, Italy.  Project STELAR is now providing on-line
abstract search and retrieval and soon will provide full-text
search and retrieval.
     Also of interest to astronomers are several newsgroups in 
the Usenet news, such as sci.astro, sci.astro.fits,
sci.astro.hubble,  alt.sci.astro.aips, and alt.sci.astro.figaro. 
The on-line service Archie can be used to locate software and
documentation in anonymous FTP archives throughout the world. 
     To retrieve the complete article which describes how to use
these services, FTP to blackhole.aas.org (192.102.234.112), login
as user "anonymous" (give your e-mail address as the password),
`cd' to the directory info/net, and `get' the file called
`net_resources.mem'. 

Electronic Astronomical Journal by Paul Hodge, Editor, The Astronomical Journal

The Editorial Office of the Astronomical Journal has been preparing for the electronic journal age since early in 1990, when the office issued a plan called "The Electronic AJ". Recognizing that there were many details to work out (specific formats for text and illustrations, distribution, subscriptions, page charges, if any, etc.), the staff projected a complete conversion of the Journal to electronic format by the middle of the decade. Preliminary analysis indicated that the result would be much faster, more efficient and (ultimately) much less expensive than the present paper version. We envisioned an electronic journal that would have the same handsome format of the present Astronomical Journal, but would be distributed electronically. Papers would be refereed as at present (electronically transmitted back and forth). Each subscriber would receive a monthly Table of Contents, from which he or she could call up either abstracts or complete papers, as desired. Files would be kept available for instant transmittal for five years; older papers would be available on a delayed basis. To those few persons for whom e-mail is still unavailable, the Journal would be sent out on computer disk and, possibly, a few paper copies would even be printed out at the Editorial Office. The latter service would be fairly expensive, compared to the normal subscription rate, which we expect to be much less than present rates. Since that plan was distributed, some of the problematical details have been worked on by the experts, especially C. Biemesderfer for the Society, and a gradual conversion is taking place (some of us feel that it's too gradual, but revolutions aren't always as easy as one hopes). E-mail is used now in almost all of our author and referee correspondence. In late 1992 we have started to send manuscripts by e-mail to referees, in the few cases where possible so far, and more actively have begun to solicit manuscripts in electronic form.

Standards for Electronic Publishing: SGML and ANSI Z39.59
By Evan Owens
Journals Division, The University of Chicago Press

Until fairly recently, paper was the universal format for text
interchange between authors, editors, publishers, and readers.  As
we move into an electronic future, however, we find ourselves using
a plethora of file formats: typesetting systems (e.g., Penta,
XyVision, or TeX), proprietary word processors (e.g., WordPerfect
or Microsoft Word), text interchange formats (e.g., ASCII,
Rich-Text-Format, or Navy DIF), and markup languages (e.g., LaTeX
or SGML).  The choice of a standard format is critical because we
expect to use electronic files not just as a new way to produce the
paper journal but as the basis for new ways to store and distribute
texts electronically.  We have five years of the Astrophysical
Journal stored on magnetic tape in a proprietary typesetting
format; once a format is chosen, these tapes can be translated and
used as the basis of an electronic archive to which new material
can be added as it is published. 
     A consensus has emerged in the publishing community that the
foundation for electronic publishing will be the adoption of
Standard Generalized Markup Language (SGML) otherwise known as ISO
8879 (1986).  SGML was designed as a language for electronic
documents and is well suited for text databases, hypertext, CD-ROM,
and electronic books and journals.  SGML documents are not
dependent on any hardware, software, formatter, or operating
system.   The concept is important.  Generalized  markup is codes
or tags that describe the content of the text such as "heading" or
"title" or "footnote"; it is completely different from procedural
markup, codes that describe the format such as "10 point Times
Roman" or "indent 1 em."  SGML provides a way to describe and
validate the structure or hierarchy of a document (e.g., second
level headings go inside first level headings, front matter comes
before the body of the article, and so on) through a document type
definition (DTD).  This is important for text databases, because it
makes it possible to search selected portions of the text; for
example, the footnotes, display equations, headings, references,
etc. 
     To use SGML, one has to have a suitable SGML document type
definition (DTD).   There is an ANSI standard DTD for articles  and
books which resulted from a joint project of the Association of
American Publishers (AAP), the Council on Library Resources, and
other organizations; it also includes markup specifications for
mathematics and tables.  We are constructing a superset of the AAP
DTDs to use for the Astrophysical Journal and other AAS 
publications. 
     With a DTD available, one then creates documents using 
the  specified names to tag the various parts of the manuscript. 
Ideally, the author would create an SGML document directly;
however, SGML coding is tedious without special software.  There
are SGML-aware validating text editors available, some with WYSIWYG
equation and table editors, but they are currently very expensive
or not suited for general use.  The situation should change for the
better early next year, however, as new SGML products are expected
from WordPerfect, Frame Technology, and others. 
     Not everyone will want to write using an SGML editor, 
even when such tools are widely available.  Fortunately, it is
possible to translate from one format to another.  At the
University of Chicago Press we now accept files for some of our
journals in common word processor formats and then translate, edit,
code, and translate again to typesetting systems.  For the
Astrophysical Journal, we plan to accept manuscripts in the AAS 
version of LaTeX and translate to SGML; this translation works
particularly well because of the structured markup present in a
properly coded LaTeX manuscript.   Plain TeX files can not be
translated as they contain procedural rather than generalized
markup codes.  We will then supply SGML files to our typesetters
and get SGML files back for archival use.  

Mark-Up or Typeset - the Springer-Verlag Dilemma
By Catherine Pilachowski, NOAO;  Chair, AAS Publications Board

Among the most difficult issues we are facing is the question of
whether or not authors should assume the responsibility for
typesetting their own papers.  One major astronomy journal,
Astronomy and Astrophysics, following the guidance of the
publishing house Springer-Verlag, has already adopted this route
toward electronic publishing.  Authors are supplied with
typesetting tools, fonts, and macros to prepare the journal pages
exactly as they appear in Astronomy and Astrophysics. The papers
are submitted and processed using the macros, and then reproduced
in the journal exactly as prepared by the author.
     This approach results in several advantages for authors.
Authors have control over the layout of the material and the size
and arrangement of figures and tables. Authors can have the final
say over the exact wording of their papers.  And since the author
uses fonts supplied with the macro package, she or he knows
precisely how long a paper will be when it appears in the journal.
When the author does the  composition, the material can be
published faster. And some people enjoy seeing "real" journal pages
coming out of the laser printer.   Authors who have used the
Springer-Verlag macros have found the process very satisfying once
the macros and fonts are installed.  
     However, this approach also offers some major disadvantages.
Authors must spend their own time and effort to typeset the paper,
rather than devoting their time to the content itself. Authors must
become proficient at typesetting skills in order to produce a paper
which looks as good as we are used to seeing in the Astrophysical
Journal and Astronomical Journal. In general, authors are not
skilled in typesetting and page layout, so the appearance of their
papers vary in quality, and are generally of lower quality than the
ApJ standards for organization, clarity and layout. 
     From the perspective of production, the publishing house must
train its personnel to work in a TeX or LaTeX environment; while
these tools are familiar to many astronomers, TeX and LaTeX are not
in the mainstream of electronic publishing. Utilizing TeX or LaTeX
for actual typesetting might put our publishers at a competitive
disadvantage in the industry, and drive up our costs. 
     The alternative to authors typesetting papers is for authors
to provide a more generalized "mark-up" of their compuscript,
identifying in a simple way only the logical components of the
paper (title, author, abstract, section, subsection, references,
etc.) The author is not required to spend time on the details of
composition and typesetting. The mark-up can then be easily edited
during the journal composition stage and translated during
production into whatever typesetting language is ultimately used to
print the journal. But of overriding importance, the final
marked-up compuscript, in a generalized mark-up language like SGML,
is ready to serve as well for electronic distribution or for
modern, high-powered search algorithms.
     After much discussion, the Publications Board has recommended
this latter course for Society journals.  We believe, and our
membership surveys confirm, that most authors do not want to spend
time typesetting their own papers.  Authors who have tried the
Springer-Verlag macros should now try our new AASTeX macros for
submitting papers to the Astrophysical Journal and the Astronomical
Journal.  We hope you will find them simpler to use than the other
approach of typesetting your papers. And finally, we believe that
author "mark-up" is the approach that will lead most readily to
truly electronic journals.    

STELAR: An Experiment in the Electronic Distribution of
Astronomical Literature
By M. E. Van Steenberg (NASA/GSFC), J. Gass, L. Brotzman, A.
Warnock, D. Kovalsky (Hughes STX), and F. Giovane (NASA/HQ)

Astronomical research is being transformed by improvements in
wide-area networking and the availability of low-cost computing
power.  These developments have resulted in remote observing,
distributed access to large quantities of scientific data, and the
first steps to the electronic submission of articles for
publishing.  However, the cornerstone of scientific research, 
refereed literature, has not yet benefitted from these advances. 
The result has been tremendous growth in what is being published,
without improvements in the researchers' ability to locate and
retrieve articles of interest. 
     It is now technically feasible to place much of the
astronomical literature and documentation on-line, providing
researchers with direct access to this information.  More
importantly, with the addition of modern text searching methods,
astronomers have the ability to quickly find articles about a
particular topic and examine them as they wish.
     Not only do many technical details have to be addressed before
the journal publishers can move in this direction, the impact on
the scientific community, the financial health of the journals, and
the impact on libraries must also be carefully considered.  In
fact, there are two components to the problem of establishing
on-line documents and literature: (1) the conversion of existing
materials from printed pages to electronic files, and (2) the
production of new literature in a form which can be placed on-line
as published. 

The STELAR Project

In March 1991, NASA and the AAS began hosting a series of workshops
to  explore the methods and potential impact of placing most of the
astronomical documentation and literature on-line.  These meetings
identified a need for an experiment to study the technical and
practical issues. In response STELAR, the STudy of Electronic
Literature for  Astronomical Research, was launched.  This project
is a joint effort of AAS, ASP, NASA, publishers, editors, research
libraries, and astronomers. Support is also being provided by AIP,
Library of Congress, NSF, and UNC Chapel Hill.
     STELAR is a pilot project managed at NASA's 
Astrophysics Data Facility (ADF).  Its formal goal is to explore
the use of electronic means for improving access to scientific
literature; using astronomical publications to evaluate
distribution, search, and retrieval techniques for full text and
graphics display.  The project is conducting a multi-phased study.
The initial phases focus on the problem of converting existing
literature for on-line access.  STELAR will incorporate
machine-readable abstracts provided by NASA's Scientific and
Technical Information (STI) program and page images of several
years' worth of the ApJ, ApJ Supplement, AJ and the PASP. 
Recently, the publishers of Astronomy & Astrophysics have agreed to
include their journal in this study. 
     In the current phase of the study, a prototype system is under
development to allow a limited number of test subjects to search
these materials and view the articles of interest.  The libraries
at the Space Telescope Science Institute, NOAO/KPNO, 
NRAO/Charlottesville, and Goddard  will work with selected
astronomers to evaluate the initial prototype expected to be
available this Fall. 

Current Status

The STELAR prototype system uses a highly portable and fully open,
multi-disciplinary document query and delivery system known as WAIS
(Wide Area Information Server), (see article on WAIS on page 10). 
 STELAR currently provides access to machine-readable abstracts for
eight leading academic journals of interest to the astronomical
community (ApJ, ApJS, AJ, PASP, A&A, A&AS, MNRAS and JGR).  These
abstracts have been supplied by NASA/STI from a database prepared
for NASA's RECON system by an independent abstraction service.  The
RECON  database contains abstracts from as early as the mid-1960's. 
The ADF will update the set of available abstracts on a regular
basis.  
     The completed prototype will link the abstracts to scanned
bitmaps of the individual article pages.  Access to the bitmaps
will be limited to test groups at the libraries to protect the
copyright concerns of the societies and the journal publishers.
     In addition to this controlled study, the ADF and STI are
making the abstracts and several other text databases available to
the astronomical community as part of NASA's commitment to its
science community.  (See Electronic Services article on page 4). 
The STELAR project is seeking feedback from researchers on the
usability of the system. This feedback will guide the refinement of
successive prototypes. 

Future Plans

Subject to the approval of the copyright holders of the various
journals, the STELAR Project plans to gradually make the scanned
bitmaps of the article pages available to the astronomical
community. Additional enhancements being investigated include
indexing of the full text of the articles,  making articles
available in a mark-up language or device-independent form, and the
addition of errata and other forward references to the basic
structure.  
     For additional information about the STELAR Project, please
contact the authors at [email protected]  

On-line WAIS Search Capability Brings Astronomy To The Internet 
By  A. Warnock, J. Gass, L. Brotzman, (Hughes STX), 
M. E. Van Steenberg (NASA/GSFC), D. Kovalsky (Hughes STX), and F.
Giovane (NASA/HQ)

As part of the STELAR pilot project, NASA's Astrophysics Data
Facility (ADF) is making astronomical abstracts and job listings
available to the astronomical community.  To make these databases
available for easy search and retrieval, the ADF is using a highly
portable and fully open, multi-disciplinary document query and
delivery system known as WAIS (Wide Area Information Server).  WAIS
is a client/server system originally developed by Thinking Machines
Corp. and distributed by them free of charge.  It is based on an
ISO standard communications protocol (Z39.50 1988).  WAIS servers
have been ported to UNIX, VMS and, recently, MS-DOS.  WAIS clients
run on a wide variety of machines, from UNIX-based X-windows
systems and character terminals, to MS-DOS and Macintosh
microcomputers.  The WAIS system includes full-text indexing and
searching of documents, network interface and easy access to a
variety of document viewers.  The WAIS software, for both clients
and servers, is available via anonymous FTP from the Internet site
think.com.

How WAIS Works

WAIS uses a client/server model to communicate both locally and
over wide area networks like the Internet.  The WAIS system, as
distributed by Thinking Machines Corp., consists of three software
packages - the text indexer, the database server and the client
program.   The text indexer builds a master index of all  words
occurring in a database of documents.  This index is then used by
the retrieval software to find which documents contain the words in
a query. 
     The WAIS server software runs on the computer hosting the
database of documents and handles the job of responding to queries. 
A query can either be a search of the document index or a request
to retrieve a document to pass back to the client. 
     The client is the user interface.  The user formulates a
free-format text query which the client translates into the
appropriate protocol and then sends to the server.  The server
processes the query, and sends the results back to the client for
display or local storage. 
     The search engine supplied with the free distribution version
is quite simple, but surprisingly fast and effective.  It matches
occurrences of words in the query with the individual words in the
documents, and tallies a score for each document based on the
number of "hits".  The underlying assumption is that, if a document
has many words in common with the query, the document is probably
relevant.  Documents are then returned in ranked order of relevance
to the query.
     A simple extension of this search technique is the notion of
"relevancy feedback".  The user can select part (or all) of a
retrieved document and use it as a query to get, in effect, "all
documents like this one."  This allows detailed searches without
requiring the user to formulate a detailed query. 
     The source code in the distribution system is quite modular,
and allows for replacement of individual components.  It is
possible, therefore, to replace the current engine in the server
with a more sophisticated one which might, for example, be capable
of handling word stems and/or synonyms, or which might use advanced
techniques such as factor spaces. 
     The client uses a "source file" to identify and locate each
WAIS database on the network.  The source file is a simple ASCII
text file which contains the name and description of the database
and the network location of the server.  More than one source file
may be selected by the user, which allows searches to be posed to
multiple sources at one time (though they are searched
sequentially, not simultaneously). 
     Source files may be obtained by any number of means.  The ADF
distributes its source files by anonymous FTP, as described below.
Other source files, for specialized databases, for example, may be
distributed individually via electronic mail or by postings to
networks like Usenet.  There is also a "white pages" facility by
which new public sources may be located by querying the master
registry of sources (a WAIS server called directory-of-servers),
maintained by Thinking Machines Corp.  The source file for this
server comes with the distribution software, or may be retrieved by
anonymous FTP from the Internet site think.com.

Access To The ADF WAIS Databases

To get access to WAIS you must first obtain the WAIS client
software and get it running on your local machine.  Clients for
UNIX and the Apple Macintosh (called WAIS-station) are available by
anonymous FTP at think.com (IP address 131.239.2.1).  The VMS,
MS-DOS and Microsoft Windows clients are available by anonymous FTP
from wais.oit.unc.edu (IP address 128.109.157.30).  The ADF
currently offers three text databases to the astronomical
community.  The corresponding source files are available by
anonymous FTP from hypatia.gsfc.nasa.gov (IP address
128.183.115.29), in the directory wais-sources.  The source file
for the STELAR journal abstracts is called "abstracts.src".  The
AAS Job Register source file is in "AAS_jobs.src", and the AAS
electronic meeting abstracts source file is in "AAS_meeting.src". 
It is also possible to obtain these source files by automatic mail
request.  Send an E-mail message to [email protected] 
In the body of the mail message put the commands:

     get stelar abstracts.src
     get stelar AAS_jobs.src
     get stelar AAS_meeting.src 

The source files (not the contents of the databases) will be
returned to you by electronic mail.  Save these files (without any
accompanying message headers) in plain ASCII files in your
"wais-sources" directory where they will be accessible to your WAIS
client software. 
     For additional information or assistance about the
astronomical WAIS server, please contact the authors at
[email protected] 

Vision Committee Statement
By Sidney Wolff, NOAO;  President, AAS

One of the most important activities of the American Astronomical
Society is the publication of the Astrophysical Journal and the
Astronomical Journal. These two journals are among the most
respected journals in the world in the field of astronomy, setting
the standards against which other journals are measured.   Our
traditional journals are the primary means by which we convey the
results of our work to our peers, and they form the essential
archive of astronomical knowledge through which we pass on our
discoveries to new generations of astronomers.
     The process of refereeing papers in our journals provides
assurance that the papers we publish merit a reader's attention and
will stand up to scrutiny. The journals are an essential element of
the scientific process - providing for open dissemination of the
results of our research in a forum which allows ş and even
encourages ş independent confirmation and disputation. 
     The rapidly changing technology of the 20th (and soon to be
21st) century for publishing and communications has led to an
equally rapidly changing vision of scholarly journals. The era of
electronic publishing has arrived, and the new technology offers
many opportunities in the production, distribution, and use of our
journals to enhance their scientific value and broaden the kinds of
information that they contain. Many articles on the future of
scholarly publications have appeared recently in such publications
as Physics Today and Science, discussing such new ideas as having
journals serve as scholarly electronic forums, with "papers"
submitted for widespread discussion. Are these ideas appropriate
for astronomy? What form should the astronomy journals of the 21st
century take?  How will we use them?  What new capabilities should
be developed to make the journals more useful to our community? And
what strategies can we adopt to lead us smoothly from the journals
we have today to the journals of the next century? 
     The Council, the Executive Office, and the Publications Board
have, for several years, been exploring options, developing
strategies, and formulating a vision of our journals 10 years from
now.  John Bahcall, when President of the AAS, created a special ad
hoc committee, which I chair, to explore "the vision thing," and to
develop our vision of the astronomy journals of the future. The
decisions we make today can and will have a profound impact on how
research is carried out in astronomy for a long time to come.
     The American Astronomical Society has been very active in the
development of new "electronic" member services and in planning for
the electronic publication of its journals. This special section of
the newsletter has been prepared to inform you, the members of the
AAS, of what your Society is doing, what new services are or will
soon be available, and what direction the Society is headed to
develop the journals of the 21st century. These activities include
the electronic submission of manuscripts to the journals,
electronic submission of abstracts for our meetings, CD-Rom's
containing data from papers published in our journals, new search
mechanisms to find papers of interest in the literature, and
electronic production and distribution of our journals.  We
encourage your thoughtful reading of this special section on
electronic publishing, and welcome your advice and comments.