An experiment in processing electronic documents

Abstract

Trends in technology now support a "paperless" environment, but in the author's experiment to produce an entire issue of a technical journal using electronic documents, more paper was generated than ever before. The conclusion is that it is possible to achieve efficient handling of technical journal papers in electronic form throughout a cycle that encompasses peer-level review, author revision, editing, print production, but in most organizations this efficiency will require additional software, changes to hardware, and adaptation to new processes. The author presents the highlights of an experiment to investigate how a journal publication process could evolve to accommodate the new processes, methods, and capabilities of some selected software applications. The author reports on experiences and suggest what may be practical to do in a current publishing environment.