Describe the problem you would like to solve
A journal should not accept a manuscript for consideration unless all required files have been submitted - e.g. Article Text, Data Set, etc.
These are identified as separate components, however OJS currently does not have a mechanism to designate a component as mandatory and prevent an author from completing the submission if that component is not uploaded.
As a result a large number of submissions are desk rejected for not having all the mandatory components uploaded.
Describe the solution you’d like
An option (checkbox) to designate an article component (file) as mandatory for submission. Submission cannot proceed if it is not uploaded.
These requirements will need to be configured differently for each section. An editorial or review may not require the same submission file components as an article.
Additional Details
This feature request has been accepted. The description has been updated and a development issue is filed here:
Click to see the original Post by @ajienoor
hello there,
problem : author can jump to step 3. Enter Metadata without file submission
request : is there a way , to make author must upload file submission first (Step 2), after that he/she can continue to the next step (Step 3)
We are rewriting the file upload wizard for release in OJS/OMP/OPS 3.3 (due this winter), and you should see something like what you’re proposing there.
Regards,
Alec Smecher
Public Knowledge Project Team
@asmecher It’s currently possible to make a submission with no files and I wasn’t planning on changing that. I suspect that we have some people using it that way – I believe Atla only asks for a book abstract with the initial submission and requests files once it’s been decided to send it for review.
Do you think we need an option that allows a journal/press to be configured to require a file?
Ah, I read this too quickly – I thought the issue was the file metadata rather than the entire file upload. I haven’t yet seen enough demand for a checkbox requiring or leaving optional a file upload during submission.
@alirezaaa, do you know why authors are attempting to upload submissions without files?
Regards,
Alec Smecher
Public Knowledge Project Team
In our case it is about submitting ALL required files and not submissions without files.
Authors are asked to submit more than just the manuscript file. For example, “cover letter”, “signed copyright form” and “title page” files are required in different journals.
Currently, the editor should check this after the a manuscript is submitted and either reject the article or ask for the missing files.
I’m not aware of any existing feature or plugin to restrict submissions based on what submission file components have been uploaded. It will probably require the development of a custom plugin.
Have you found any solution for making more than one files mandatory during submission phase. I mean author should be restricted to upload three files instead of one before going to next step. This is what I also need…
I am Editor-In-Chief of SCOPUS indexed journal and I can say it is common practice. Because authors does not read the instructions for authors, they are just trying to submit an article and hope we will review it or accept it without all requested files (English proofreading, Cover letter, Figures…). Consequently the Editor must ask authors for these missing files and must upload these files instead of authors. This is time consuming for every Editor. Almost 70% of all submission are without all submission files required. It was mentioned in this forum by several users. I really recommend that you introduce a simple checkbox that would mark the file as mandatory and without its insertion, the author would not be able to proceed to next step in the submission workflow. Example what we need (red text):
Consequently, it looks like a lot of submissions are unfinished and without the required files:
