Re: scientific publishing process (was Re: Cost and access)

On 10/06/2014 11:00 AM, Phillip Lord wrote:
> "Peter F. Patel-Schneider" <pfpschneider@gmail.com> writes:
>
>> On 10/06/2014 09:32 AM, Phillip Lord wrote:
>>> "Peter F. Patel-Schneider" <pfpschneider@gmail.com> writes:
>>>>> Who cares what the authors intend? I mean, they are not reading the
>>>>> paper, are they?
>>>>
>>>> For reviewing, what the authors intend is extremely important.  Having
>>>> different rendering of the paper interfere with the authors' message is
>>>> something that should be avoided at all costs.
>>>
>>> Really? So, for example, you think that a reviewer with impared vision
>>> should, for example, be forced to review a paper using the authors
>>> rendering, regardless of whether they can read it or not?
>>
>> No, but this is not what I was talking about. I was talking about
>> interfering with the authors' message via changes from the rendering
>> that the authors' set up.
>
> It *is* exactly what you are talking about. If I want to render your
> document to speech, then why should I not? What I am saying is that,
> you, the author, should not wish to constrain the rendering, only really
> the content. Effectively, if you are using latex, you are already doing
> this, since latex defines the layout and not you.
>
> But, I think we are talking in too abstract a term here. Should you be
> able to constrain indentation for code blocks? Yes, of course, you
> should. But, a quick look at the web shows that people do this all the
> time.

Sure, and htlatex appears to interfere with this indentation. At least it does 
in my ISWC paper.

>>>> Similarly for reading papers, if the rendering of the paper interferes
>>>> with the authors' message, that is a failure of the process.
>>>
>>> Yes, I agree. Which is why, I believe, that the rendering of a paper
>>> should be up to the reader
>>
>> As this is why I believe that the authors' should be able to specify the
>> rendering of their paper to the extent that they feel is needed to convey the
>> intent of the paper.
>
> For scientific papers, I think this really is not very far. I mean, a
> scientific paper is not a fashion store; it's a story designed to
> persuade with data.
>
> I would like to see papers which are in the hands of the reader as much
> as possible. Citation format should be for the reader. Math
> presentation. Graphs should be interactive and zoomable, with the data
> underneath as CSV.
>
> All of these are possible and routine with HTML now. I want to be free
> to choose the organisation of my papers so that I can convey what I
> want. At the moment, I cannot. The PDF is not reasonable for all, maybe
> not even most of this. But some.
>
> Phil

So, you believe that there is an excellent set of tools for preparing, 
reviewing, and reading scientific publishing.

Package them up and make them widely available.  If they are good, people will 
use them.

Convince those who run conferences.  If these people are convinced, then they 
will allow their use in conferences or maybe even require their use.

I'm not convinced by what I'm seeing right now, however.

peter

Received on Monday, 6 October 2014 18:38:35 UTC