The ADSA Board of Directors has approved a pilot program for an online only option for the Genetics and Breeding section of the Journal of Dairy Science. The online only articles will be listed at the end of the table of contents of the printed journal, and abstracts only of those papers will be printed. The entire online article may be accessed from the home page by anyone with an ADSA membership or institutional subscription to the journal. The first issue to contain such an article will be January 1999, but submissions to the section may begin immediately.

Authors submitting papers to the section should be aware that the burden for technical compatibility is on the authors and that requirements are subject to change during the initial year of the project. Current requirements will be posted on the home page and should be consulted prior to submitting an article to this section. Authors who cannot meet the listed requirements must choose the traditional printed journal for publication.

The final output will be an HTML document provided by the authors. Instructions will be provided to assist you. Most current software packages have the option to produce such a document, but authors can also perform the HTML coding themselves. Accepted manuscripts that are not HTML coded will be returned to authors for coding.

Submission requirements. To submit a paper, fax (217/398-4119) a copy of the signed manuscript submission form and a cover letter addressed to ADSA Technical Editors. The cover must explicitly state the intent to submit to the online only option. An accurate e-mail address must be provided. The technical editor will contact the author by phone or e-mail with a manuscript number, a site location, and instructions for submitting the manuscript. At this point, the manuscript may be transmitted as a WordPerfect or Word file either electronically or on disk. Each table, each figure, and complicated mathematical expressions should be transmitted as a separate gif or tif file.

Review procedures. The editor will contact reviewers to determine their willingness to review electronically and will communicate reviewer names to the technical editor. Information to access the online site location of the manuscript will then be communicated to the editor and reviewers, who will retrieve the manuscript. The reviews and edits will be sent electronically to the editor who will communicate suggested revisions and final disposition of the manuscript to the author.

Accepted manuscript. Upon acceptance, specific instructions concerning the technical requirements for the final version of the accepted manuscript will be communicated to the author by the Savoy staff. Once the manuscript is received and posted, the author will have the opportunity to approve the integrity of the material, and the article will then be displayed as part of the most recent issue of the journal. The online article may precede the posting of the rest of the journal.

Cost. During the pilot program, the cost to produce the article will be based on labor hours plus a charge for overhead. Total cost to the author is expected to be noticeably less than that to produce an equivalent length paper article but certainly should not exceed it.

Reprints. No reprints will be provided. Authors and other users may download a few copies under the fair use provision of the current copyright law. Permission from the Editor-in-Chief should be sought for other uses of online articles.