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Guide for Authors.
Submission Guidelines
Mass Timber Construction Journal is hosted on OJS, a web based online submission and peer review system. Login here and submit your article online. IMPORTANT: Please check whether you already have an account in the system before trying to create a new one. If you have reviewed or authored for the journal in the past it is likely that you will have had an account created.
Before you begin
Do you offer pre-registration?
Yes, we do offer pre-registration of articles for a publication spot. Please submit your article proposal and we shall assess the quality and suitability of the article.
What are your terms and conditions?
For information about terms and conditions, visit the section about our open-access policy and licensing.
Preparing your manuscript
Word template
- Copy will be Arial, Times New Roman, or Other generic font, double spaced, left justified only, all 11 to 12-point font size including headings, and saved as an electronic file in Microsoft Word (.doc or .docx) only.
- The body of the article will include a header or footer on every page with the title of the manuscript and the date of submission, with page numbers on every page. The body of the article must not include any identifying details of the author(s).
- The author(s) will need to fill in the online form ‘Author Submission Form’ and submit this form in addition to the file containing their article as described above. The online form will be used to record author(s) details.
- All articles (regardless of their focus or format) will contain an abstract describing the content of the article. Abstracts will be 150 – 200 words or less.
- All tables and figures should be numbered and presented in the text where they appear. Illustrations originated by the author(s) are accepted as digital reproductions only in jpg format.
- Written permission from copyright holders must be obtained by the author for any illustration, table, or quote of more than 100 words published elsewhere.
- Articles may be between 1500 – 5000 words in length. For qualitative articles and systematic literature reviews additional allowance is made.
- Referencing will be APA, Harvard, or other suitable referencing style.
LaTex template
We understand that many researchers prefer to use LaTeX when preparing a manuscript for submission, but that it can sometimes be difficult to navigate. That’s why we’re partnering with Overleaf,
We recommend that you use the Mass Timber Construction Journal LaTeX authoring template, which you can access via Overleaf. This template takes a ‘content first’ approach with minimal formatting. Instead it is designed to promote editorial policy best practice, and move seamlessly through editorial and production systems.
Permissions
In order to avoid unnecessary delays in the publication process, you should start obtaining permissions as early as possible. Written permission should be obtained to adapt a part of or reprint an entire table, graph, or illustration that has been previously published. Authors are responsible for obtaining permission from the copyright holder to use copyrighted material prior to submission, unless permission is granted by a Creative Common license. MTCJ cannot publish material from other publications without permission.
The copyright holder may give you instructions on the form of acknowledgement to be followed; otherwise follow the style: Reproduced with permission from [author], [book/journal title]; published by [publisher], [year].’ at the end of the caption of the Table, Figure or Scheme.
Submitting your manuscript
Word template
Coming soon.
LaTex template
If your are submitting your manuscript in a LaTex format, you should make sure you submit the following:
- A PDF of the compiled article.
- The LaTex source code used to produce the PDF.
- A copy of any author-defined macros and style files.
- Any other files necessary to prepare the article for typesetting.
The files for the final article should be text-only with no system-dependent control codes.
Our system cannot accept .bib files. If you prepare references using BibTeX, please include the .bbl file with your submission as a supplementary file in order for it to be processed correctly; this file is included automatically in the zip file generated by Overleaf for submissions. Please see this help article on Overleaf for more details. Alternatively, you can make sure that the references (source code) are included within the manuscript file itself. As a final precaution, you should ensure that the complete .tex file compiles successfully on its own system with no errors or warnings, before submission.
Revised submissions
Revised papers must be received within 2 months of the revision decision or they will be treated as new submissions. If you require additional time, please notify the MTCJ editorial team. In addition to the information provided at initial submission, revised submissions must also include:
- a point-by-point response to reviewer comments, and
- a tracked-changes version of the revised manuscript.
Please note that there is no guarantee that the paper will be accepted after revisions. Please contact us if you have any questions regarding manuscript formatting or the revision process.
After acceptance
Copyediting, Proofing & Typesetting
Once your article has been accepted, it will be sent to our production team for copyediting and composition. You will receive an email notification when your proof is ready for review. When this notification arrives, please read the instructions carefully before making your changes.
Promoting your article
Although we try to promote as many articles as possible as widely as we can, you as the author are often the best placed to ensure your article is seen by the most relevant audience. The true value and impact of your paper can be greatly enhanced by promotion.
This is what we recommend that you do to help your paper to be found, read and cited by your peers:
- Email people you have referenced in your paper, and other key colleagues in your field, with a link to your paper;
- Use social media to tell people about your work through blogging or through other outlets such as Twitter or Facebook
- Update your profile on professional and academic networking sites with a link to your published article (please do not post the actual published article);
- Update your institutional/departmental homepage and research group website with a link to your paper;
- Mention your publication at conferences when giving presentations, and have copies to hand out to colleagues;
- Check major abstracting and indexing services (e.g. Web of Science and Scopus) to make sure that your published paper is listed with correct details.