This question is related to the question asked here: .  Around 4 months ago, I submitted a paper to a Math journal for peer-review through an online submission system. The same day I received in my e-mail an acknowledgement message saying that the paper had been received.  The status of the paper on the online submission system is still "Manuscript submitted", and the paper has not been assigned to an editor yet.  One month ago, I sent a polite email asking for the status of the paper, but I got no response.  Should I send a second email in the regular way (that is to say, not using the journal's online system)?  Is it possible that things go slower during this time of the year (due to holidays or something)?
71670
Around 3 months ago, I submitted a paper to a Math journal for peer-review through an online submission system. The same day I received in my e-mail an acknowledgement saying that the paper had been received.  The problem is that the status of the paper on the online submission system is still "Manuscript submitted".  I think this means that the paper has not even been assigned to an editor yet (once this happens, the editor will probably start looking for reviewers), but as far as I know submissions are assigned to editors within a few weeks (I once submitted a paper to another journal and when an editor had been assigned, the status on the online system changed to "Editor handles" or something like that).  I know that publishing is a long and complicated process and I'm not trying to rush anybody, but sometimes manuscripts are lost in the system. In fact, this has once happened to me, so I just want to make sure that the paper was not lost in the system.  Should I send an e-mail asking for the status of the paper?  PS: I think that, at the time of submitting the paper, I didn't choose any specific editor to submit the paper to.
7956
I have submitted a paper to a journal 2 and a half months ago. Its status remains "With editor". From your experience, is this normal? If not, how should I deal with that?
102469
I submitted a manuscript to a journal, but due to some issue with that I asked the Editor-in-Chief and Associate Editor to withdraw the manuscript from further consideration. Despite several emails, they are not still responding me nor ended the process.  Now, what should I do? Can I submit the manuscript to another journal?
74892
I received a journal paper for a review. The paper suggests a solution to an important problem, but the solution is very complicated and has mediocre performance. While reading the paper, I thought of a different solution, which is much simpler and has better performance (to give some scale: their solution is 1 page to write and 5 pages to prove; my solution is 5 lines to write and half a page to prove).  What should I do now?  A. Write my solution in the review, hoping the authors will remember to "thank the anonymous reviewer"?  B. Recommend that the paper published as is, then write a paper of my own with my improved solution?  C. Something else?  EDIT: Before I found the superior solution, I thought of recommending "resubmit with major revision", with the reasons that I mentioned above: your solution is too complicated and its performance is too weak.  However, now I am not sure it is the good course of action. A major revision may take a long time. The authors might even decide to delay or stop working on the paper without telling the editor (or me). Meanwhile, I will have to postpone the publishing of the superior solution for an indefinite amount of time. What do you think?
86569
I think the title asks the question, but once again in more words:  Suppose you submit a paper to a journal and it is accepted by the journal.  By this I mean that the journal tells you that they have decided to publish your paper but you have not submitted or examined final proofs and -- especially -- not signed any paperwork allowing the journal to publish the paper.    I wonder how people feel about the ethics of deciding not to go through with the publication because you now feel that the paper could be published in a better journal?  This could happen either because of outside feedback you received in the meantime or because of feedback from the referees/editors of the journal itself.  (Added: In case this was not clear, I am assuming that upon submission one was seeking to publish in that journal conditional on not learning that one has "shot way too low".)    As far as I can see, it is absolutely legal to do this, so I am not interested in the legality of it, but rather its ethics and ramifications as an academic practice.  I also think I will get better answers if I do not telegraph my own feelings about this; I will be happy to document them later on.  Let me just say (i) this is a hypothetical question, but (ii) based on my own experience it is not ridiculous that it might be in the interest of the author to engage in this practice, if it happened to be kosher to all parties involved.  Note: I had previously asked a related question, at the time wondering whether it would be better asked separately.  Based on the way things have gone thus far, I now think it is better to post this followup question separately (not necessarily right away).
63916
While trying to select the journals I can submit my present work and future work, I realize the time between the date the authors send the article to the journal and when the revised article is submitted. Usually this is something between 6 months and more than 12 months.  Althought I am focusing on the Impact Factor (IF) to select journals, I think that 12 months to have a feedback that might include "add more variables analysis","this article will be more valuable if you test also model x,y and z", can have a huge impact on you work. It will make you stop what you are currently doing and possible spend up to 2 months making the changes. This might make a big mess on your work if you have deadlines to respect, however this happens to everyone in academia.  My question is, besides the IF journal based selection, how can we select a journal with enought quality with lower IF? What alternative criteria should one use to select the journal? Should we choose newly created Journals?
95436
I am currently applying to some graduate programs. The schools I am applying to have all required recommendation letters from 3 people, and for many of the schools, the application deadline was today. Two of my professors have submitted their recommendation letters on time, but the last one - not being the epitome of a very organized person, sadly - has failed to meet the deadline. (Changing this recommender does not come into question, because she is my advisor, and she happens to be more familiar with me and my work than any other professor. Also, I cannot really ask anyone else to write a recommendation letter for me within such a narrow timeframe.)   This raises two questions for me: First, is the electronic system for submitting recommendation letters kept open beyond the deadline so that late recommendation letters can be received? (I understand that different schools may have different policies, but it would be relieving for me to know that my professor still has a chance to submit her recommendation. So I'd appreciate it if someone could inform me what the norm is in such cases. Before you ask, yes, I will e-mail the graduate admissions offices of the schools in question, too. But I do not think I can get a quick reply, as they are usually inundated with e-mails during the application season.)   Secondly, and more importantly, would the lateness of this recommendation leave a bad impression on the admissions committee?
4573
The title pretty much says it all - what's the typical delay with which Google Scholar indexes newly published articles? (Note I'm not talking about citations, but about the article showing up at all.)  Edit: the article in question went for over six months after being published (in a well-regarded Springer journal with its own Wikipedia page) without appearing on Google Scholar, until it received a citation, at which point it was added to Google Scholar almost immediately. One more motivation to write papers that get cited. :)  Edit 2: Another article in an even more mainstream journal took a little over seven weeks.
94371
If you go on the  (now, 8th December 2020, 19:24 Italian time), there is for example the article &quot;Exploring the Usage of Online Food Delivery Data for Intra-Urban Job and Housing Mobility Detection and Characterization&quot;. This article is under the heading &quot;8 December&quot;. But if you , it was &quot;Submitted on 4 Dec 2020&quot;. Why there is a lag between submission time and the header under which it appears for recent publications? I guess the arXiv staff have to approve the article before is being published .... is my guessing correct?
81763
I had submitted a paper manuscript to JAMS (J. of Amer. Math Soc) and recieved the following email 2 months after the submission. Can you help me interpret this email, as to what the situation is and what would be the best way moving forward. Are there any positives/negatives that can be taken. I have not received any referee reports or any technical points on my work, which is what disappointing me. I would like to understand the circumstances/rationale behind this decision.  I am new to journal publishing. I want to know how i can take this decision moving forward, while choosing another journal for submitting. And also self evaluating my work from this. Is there anything to loose heart?  email : (names and references removed for privacy reasons)     Dear Professor XXXX,      This message concerns the manuscript       XXXXX    by XXXX      submitted to the Journal of the AMS.       We regret to inform you that we cannot accept this paper for   publication in JAMS. The reviewers who evaluated this submission did   not think that it meets the acceptance standards at JAMS.      JAMS is the premier journal of the AMS, with extremely selective   acceptance criteria. A paper must be truly exceptional to obtain the   unanimous approval from the editors, which is required for   publication. We publish fewer than 30 papers per year in all of   mathematics. As a result, less than 10% of submissions are accepted   for publication, and many excellent papers are rejected.      One reviewer suggested that the discussion in your paper should   include a comparison with the following reference:      XXX, XXXX, XXX. XXXX: XXX.XXXXX XXXXX XXXX, Journal of XXXXX.   5555;5(XXX):5555-4444.      Sincerely,      XXXXXX, Editorial Assistant Journal of the American Mathematical   Society      --- Sent via EditFlow by JAMS Editor  &lt;journal.american.math.society@gmail.co        Dear Professor XXXXX,      The reviews we received were intended for the editors' eyes only, so   we are unable to send them to you.       Apologies, XXXX
37216
I have sent  an email to a professor at a local university. The email asks for assistance with a fairly large science fair. I have done much of the work and the email was asking about how I could improve it.  After 4 days I have not received a response yet.  Usually people check their email on a fairly regular basis (Once a day, usually) and so I am naturally worried about it.   Is it possible the professor has not read the email yet or should I email other professors?
68905
This may be a question repeated many times, but I want to know your opinion.   I submitted a journal paper for an algorithm (Computer Science). Fearing that the review process take too long, I decided to submit a short-version conference paper, while the long version is under-review. I received the journal review comments, and re-sent the modifications to the journal. Meanwhile, the conference paper was accepted. But the camera-ready is not sent yet.   The problem is that both papers are about the same idea. There is also some copy-pasted parts in both papers. But:  1) the editor of the journal was not informed about the conference paper (I heard that I should tell the journal about any published papers - but note that the conference paper is not yet published - not even the camera ready is submitted),   2) the organization organizing the conference, is not the same that manage the journal. I have been told that there are conflicting copyrights.   The proposed solutions (that colleagues told me about):   a) submit both as is !   b) submit both (but with change in text).   c) do not submit the conference paper (but I heard this can be harmful)  d) tell the editor now (but honestly, the journal is way more important than the conference).
64168
Recently, our group is trying to reproduce the result reported by a paper whose authors are from an Ivy league university. We are unable to reproduce the results because there are several implementation details are not mentioned in the paper. Hence, we decide to write the first author, who is now already a faculty member in another university, an email.  At first, we asked for the code, which we consider is perfectly fine, as the paper has been published. We feel the code in a published paper is no longer a secret in this transparent research era where reproducibility is highly valued. However, he simply ignored our email (3+ weeks, no response).  Then, we thought, OK, seems that he is reluctant to share the code, so let's just ask him to clarify several implementation details so that we can implement the thing ourselves and hopefully, we can reproduce the result. So, we sent a second email which very clearly asks for clarifications. Again, he ignored the email (1.5 weeks+, no response).  We now feel angry and start suspecting the authenticity of their reported results. However, we cannot accuse them of anything, since we are not able to prove that they cheated, which would be a felony if they really did.  We always feel that upon the publication of a paper, its authors, or at least the correspondence author, hold responsible for any inquiries regarding the paper, especially when the authenticity is being doubted. What they chose to do - ignoring our email - is really irresponsible.  What can we do?  Disclaimer  Thanks for the answers and comments! It is interesting that many start besieging me on my "bad" attitude in the email.   Just to clarify,    I wrote perfectly polite emails to the correspondence author; I have NOT questioned his results or whatsoever.
113649
Many researchers list out their submitted manuscripts on their website. Some specify the journal name, like     Smith J, Oliver J (under review) My awesome paper. Nature.   while others don't, like     Smith J, Oliver J (under review) My awesome paper.   One reason I can think of as to why some don't mention the journal name is that they may get embarrassed in the case where the current journal rejects the paper. Then, the "circle" will know this paper gets rejected from Nature first and then ends up in an inferior journal.  Besides this, are there any other considerations preventing people from mentioning to which journal they submit a paper to?  P.S.: I am asking because my advisor is a researcher who only mentions accepted  papers on his webpage. As a student hunting jobs, I feel it is advantageous for me to mention my submitted papers on my webpage. I hesitate to do so, as I worry I may make my advisor unhappy by announcing in which journal our papers are currently under review.
114229
About a year ago I submitted a paper to a very good math journal.  After 10 months I asked the editor for its status,  and he said it is still with the referee, and that he will remind him about it.  Two more months have passed. Should/could I write the editor again? or am I risking annoying the editor/referee? How much time should I wait between such inquires?
6573
I have a paper submitted to a journal of Elsevier.  From "Manuscript Submitted" to "with editor" took one day; then it was  "with editor" for five days, and then "under review". One and a half months later, the status of the paper was still "under review", but the date of status has changed.  What can cause the date in the submission system to change in the absence of a change in status?
48906
I recently submitted an article to a math journal and got a response from a reviewer, with an attachment. In it, I have found some good  advice that could improve my article tremendously.  I am a bit suspicious of its accuracy since it could resolve what I have been working with for some months in a few  sentences.   But anyway, it was enough for me to ask the reviewer for coauthoring with me.   My question would be, does it often happen that an author asks a referee for coauthoring during the review process? Or could it even be possible?  I was given a month to revise my article, but the chance that I could revise successfully by myself seems to be fat.  I would be looking forward to any advice.  Thanks in advance.