Guide for Authors

Guide for Authors

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No Publication Fee!

The Journal of Soft Computing in Civil Engineering (SCCE) welcomes article submissions and does not charge a publication fee.

 

General

Submission of an article implies that it has not been published previously, or it is not under consideration for publication elsewhere, and that if accepted it will not be published elsewhere in the same form (in English or in any other language).

All articles should be written in English. All articles would be independently refereed. For more information about how the process is conducted for journal of soft computing in civil engineering, please take a look at the peer review policy statement.

 

Types of article

Research articles, review articles, case studies, and technical notes.

 

Submission Requirements

Please ensure that the following items are available:

One author has been designated as the corresponding author with contact details:

• E-mail address

• Full postal address

All necessary files to be uploaded:

Manuscript:

• Include keywords

• All figures (include relevant captions)

• All tables (including titles, description, footnotes)

• Ensure all figure and table citations in the text match the files provided

Supplemental files (where applicable)

Further considerations

• Manuscript has been 'spell checked' and 'grammar checked'

• All references mentioned in the Reference List are cited in the text, and vice versa

• Permission has been obtained for use of copyrighted material from other sources (including the Internet)

• A competing interests statement is provided, even if the authors have no competing interests to declare

• Journal policies detailed in this guide have been reviewed

• Referee suggestions and contact details provided, based on journal requirements

 

Ethics in publishing

Please see our information pages on Publication Ethics.

 

Declaration of interest

All authors must disclose any financial and personal relationships with other people or organizations that could inappropriately influence their work.

Examples of potential conflicts of interest include employment, consultancies, stock ownership, honoraria, paid expert testimony, patent applications/registrations, and grants or other funding.

Authors should complete the declaration of interest statement and upload to the submission system at the Attach/Upload Files step.

If there are no interests to declare, please choose: 'Declarations of interest: none' in the template.

 

Submission declaration and verification

Submission of an article implies that the work described has not been published previously (except in the form of an abstract, a published lecture or academic thesis), that it is not under consideration for publication elsewhere, that its publication is approved by all authors and tacitly or explicitly by the responsible authorities where the work was carried out, and that, if accepted, it will not be published elsewhere in the same form, in English or in any other language, including electronically without the written consent of the copyright-holder. To verify originality, your article may be checked by the Plagiarism Detection Software “iThenticate”.

 

Inclusive language

Inclusive language acknowledges diversity, conveys respect to all people, is sensitive to differences, and promotes equal opportunities. Articles should make no assumptions about the beliefs or commitments of any reader, should contain nothing which might imply that one individual is superior to another on the grounds of race, gender, culture or any other characteristic, and should use inclusive language throughout. Authors should ensure that writing is free from bias, for instance by using 'he or she', 'his/her' instead of 'he' or 'his', and by making use of job titles that are free of stereotyping (e.g. 'chairperson' instead of 'chairman').

 

Contributions of Authors

For transparency, we encourage authors to submit an author statement file outlining their individual contributions to the article using the relevant CRediT roles: Conceptualization; Data curation; Formal analysis; Funding acquisition; Investigation; Methodology; Project administration; Resources; Software; Supervision; Validation; Visualization; Roles/Writing - original draft; Writing - review & editing. Authorship statements should be formatted with the names of authors first and CRediT role(s) following.

 

Possible Changes to Authorship

Authors are expected to consider carefully the list and order of authors before submitting their manuscript and provide the definitive list of authors at the time of the original submission. Any addition, deletion or rearrangement of author names in the authorship list should be made only before the manuscript has been accepted and only if approved by the journal Editor. To request such a change, the Editor must receive the following from the corresponding author: (a) the reason for the change in author list and (b) written confirmation (e-mail, letter) from all authors that they agree with the addition, removal or rearrangement. In the case of addition or removal of authors, this includes confirmation from the author being added or removed.

Only in exceptional circumstances will the Editor consider the addition, deletion or rearrangement of authors after the manuscript has been accepted. While the Editor considers the request, publication of the manuscript will be suspended. If the manuscript has already been published in an online issue, any requests approved by the Editor will result in a corrigendum.

 

Article Transfer Service

Journal of soft computing in civil engineering is part of our Article Transfer Service. This means that if the Editor feels your article is more suitable in one of our other participating journals of Pouyan Press, then you may be asked to consider transferring the article to one of those. If you agree, please submit the article to the new journal with no need to reformat. Please note that your article will be reviewed again by the new journal.

 

Funding source

You are requested to identify who provided financial support for the conduct of the research and/or preparation of the article and to briefly describe the role of the sponsor(s), if any, in study design; in the collection, analysis and interpretation of data; in the writing of the report; and in the decision to submit the article for publication. If the funding source(s) had no such involvement then this should be stated.

 

Language

Please write your text in good English (American or British usage is accepted, but not a mixture of these).

 

Submission

Our online submission system guides you stepwise through the process of entering your article details and uploading your files. Editable files (Word) are required to typeset your article for final publication. All correspondence, including notification of the Editor's decision and requests for revision, is sent by e-mail.

 

Submit your article

Authors are invited to submit their article electronically via journal website after creating account (click here).

 

Referees

Please submit the names and institutional e-mail addresses of several potential referees. Please do not suggest referees from your country. Note that the editor retains the sole right to decide whether or not the suggested reviewers are used.

 

Peer review

Journal of soft computing in civil engineering operates a single blind review process. All contributions will be initially assessed by the editor for suitability for the journal. Papers deemed suitable are then typically sent to a minimum of two independent expert reviewers to assess the scientific quality of the paper. The Editor is responsible for the final decision regarding acceptance or rejection of articles.

 

Article structure

Introduction

State the objectives of the work and provide an adequate background, avoiding a detailed literature survey or a summary of the results.

Theory/calculation

A Theory section should extend, not repeat, the background to the article already dealt with in the Introduction and lay the foundation for further work. In contrast, a Calculation section represents a practical development from a theoretical basis.

Results

Results should be clear and concise.

Discussion

This should explore the significance of the results of the work, not repeat them. A combined Results and Discussion section is often appropriate. Avoid extensive citations and discussion of published literature.

Conclusions

The main conclusions of the study may be presented in a short Conclusions section, which may stand alone or form a subsection of a Discussion or Results and Discussion section.

Appendices

If there is more than one appendix, they should be identified as A, B, etc. Formulae and equations in appendices should be given separate numbering: Eq. (A.1), Eq. (A.2), etc.; in a subsequent appendix, Eq. (B.1) and so on. Similarly for tables and figures: Table A.1; Fig. A.1, etc.

Highlights

Highlights are optional yet highly encouraged for journal of soft computing in civil engineering, as they increase the discoverability of your article via search engines. They consist of a short collection of bullet points that capture the novel results of your research as well as new methods that were used during the study (if any).

Highlights should be submitted in a separate editable file in the online submission system. Please use 'Highlights' in the file name and include 3 to 5 bullet points (maximum 85 characters, including spaces, per bullet point).

 

Abstract

A concise and factual abstract is required. The abstract should state briefly the purpose of the research, the principal results and major conclusions. An abstract is often presented separately from the article, so it must be able to stand alone. For this reason, References should be avoided, but if essential, then cite the author(s) and year(s). Also, non-standard or uncommon abbreviations should be avoided, but if essential they must be defined at their first mention in the abstract itself.

The Abstract should be of about 150-250 words.

Acknowledgements

Collate acknowledgements in a separate section at the end of the article before the references and do not, therefore, include them on the title page, as a footnote to the title or otherwise. List here those individuals who provided help during the research (e.g., providing language help, writing assistance or proof reading the article, etc.).

Units

Follow internationally accepted rules and conventions: use the international system of units (SI). If other units are mentioned, please give their equivalent in SI. If, in certain instances, it is necessary to quote other units, these should be added in parentheses. Temperatures should be given in degrees Celsius. The unit 'billion'(109 in America, 1012 in Europe) is ambiguous and should not be used.

Nomenclature and units

Follow internationally accepted rules and conventions: use the international system of units (SI). If other quantities are mentioned, give their equivalent in SI.

Math formulae

Please submit math equations as editable text and not as images. Present simple formulae in line with normal text where possible and use the solidus (/) instead of a horizontal line for small fractional terms, e.g., X/Y. In principle, variables are to be presented in italics. Powers of e are often more conveniently denoted by exp. Number consecutively any equations that have to be displayed separately from the text (if referred to explicitly in the text).

Footnotes

Footnotes should be used sparingly. Number them consecutively throughout the article. Many word processors can build footnotes into the text, and this feature may be used. Otherwise, please indicate the position of footnotes in the text and list the footnotes themselves separately at the end of the article. Do not include footnotes in the Reference list.

Figure captions

Ensure that each illustration has a caption. Supply captions separately, not attached to the figure. A caption should comprise a brief title (not on the figure itself) and a description of the illustration. Keep text in the illustrations themselves to a minimum but explain all symbols and abbreviations used.

Tables

Please submit tables as editable text and not as images. Tables can be placed either next to the relevant text in the article, or on separate page(s) at the end. Number tables consecutively in accordance with their appearance in the text and place any table notes below the table body. Be sparing in the use of tables and ensure that the data presented in them do not duplicate results described elsewhere in the article. Please avoid using vertical rules and shading in table cells.

Web references

As a minimum, the full URL should be given and the date when the reference was last accessed. Any further information, if known (DOI, author names, dates, reference to a source publication, etc.), should also be given. Web references can be listed separately (e.g., after the reference list) under a different heading if desired, or can be included in the reference list.

Data references

Journal of soft computing in civil engineering encourages you to cite underlying or relevant datasets in your manuscript by citing them in your text and including a data reference in your Reference List. Data references should include the following elements: author name(s), dataset title, data repository, version (where available), year, and global persistent identifier. Add [dataset] immediately before the reference so we can properly identify it as a data reference. The [dataset] identifier will not appear in your published article.

Reference style

References to published literature should be quoted in the text in the order of occurrence by numbers in square brackets, [ ]. These references should be listed together at the end of the paper in numerical order. One and half spacing must be used throughout. It is recommended that the authors utilize Mendeley for entering the references (www.mendeley.com).

Journal references should be arranged as follow:

[1]       Naderpour H, Kheyroddin A, Ghodrati Amiri G. Prediction of FRP-confined compressive strength of concrete using artificial neural networks. Compos Struct 2010;92:2817–29. doi:10.1016/j.compstruct.2010.04.008.

Conference papers should be arranged as

[2]       Georgiou P, Plati C, Loizos A. Pavement Roughness Progression Modeling using Artificial Neural Networks and Multivariate Adaptive Regression Splines. Civil-Comp Proc, vol. 109, Civil-Comp Press; 2015. doi:10.4203/ccp.109.32.

Book/Guideline references are given as:

[3]       Bozorg-Haddad O, Solgi M, Loáiciga HA. Meta-Heuristic and Evolutionary Algorithms for Engineering Optimization. Hoboken, NJ, USA: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.; 2017. doi:10.1002/9781119387053.

  

Data statement

To foster transparency, authors are required to include a 'Data availability' section in their manuscript prior to their reference section. The intention of this section is to provide readers with information on where they can obtain the research data required to reproduce the work reported in the manuscript.

 

Online proof correction

To ensure a fast publication process of the article, we kindly ask authors to provide us with their proof corrections within two days. Corresponding authors will receive an e-mail with a link to our online proofing system, allowing annotation and correction of proofs online. The environment is similar to MS Word: in addition to editing text, you can also comment on figures/tables and answer questions from the Copy Editor. Web-based proofing provides a faster and less error-prone process by allowing you to directly type your corrections, eliminating the potential introduction of errors.

If preferred, you can still choose to annotate and upload your edits on the PDF version. All instructions for proofing will be given in the e-mail we send to authors, including alternative methods to the online version and PDF.

We will do everything possible to get your article published quickly and accurately. Please use this proof only for checking the typesetting, editing, completeness and correctness of the text, tables and figures. Significant changes to the article as accepted for publication will only be considered at this stage with permission from the Editor. It is important to ensure that all corrections are sent back to us in one communication. Please check carefully before replying, as inclusion of any subsequent corrections cannot be guaranteed. Proofreading is solely your responsibility.