OJS (Open Journal Systems): for publishing journals

OJS journals installation

Open Journal Systems (OJS) is an open source software application for managing and publishing scholarly journals. Originally developed and released by PKP in 2001 to improve access to research, it is the most widely used open source journal publishing platform in existence, with over 25,000 journals using it worldwide.

OJS: new installation

Siamo a disposizione per nuove istallazioni di OJS:

  • on your server;
  • on a new server or vm in the cloud;
  • on a server or vm to be reinstalled from scratch.

OJS: version update

Updating OJS from one version to another must be done with great care by first providing a secure backup of the database, software and uploaded files and then updating the software. In the case of major problems, you need to know how to restore the previous version using the backup. In the case of updates to versions with significant changes to the software, it is useful to test a copy of the site to verify in advance the changes and possible problems together with the customer.

  • Version update to 2.x;
  • version update to 3.x;
  • version update from 2.x to 3.x.

OJS: improvement or change of the graphic theme

Sometimes there is a need to change a bad translation or a sentence with another but you don’t know how to do it. You don’t like the graphic theme anymore or you want to make it similar to your main site but you don’t know how to do it. Some graphic aspect is not satisfactory or you would be eliminating something but you are not able to do it yourself.

  • change of graphic theme;
  • theme improvement;
  • change of some aspects of the CSS;
  • editing of incorrect translations or phrases.

Demo OJS: custom graphic theme on sidebar

  • Sidebar at the top as a slider;
  • sidebar at the bottom as a slider;
  • left sidebar;
  • sidebar on the right;
  • no sidebar.

Demo OJS: custom graphic theme

  • Logo animation and sticky menu;
  • gradients for background;
  • adding remote fonts;
  • sliders on the home page;
  • image as a header;
  • the list of magazines in several columns based on the screen resolution;
  • possibility of customization.

OJS: bugs and troubleshooting

Sometimes, compared to the installed version of OJS, many bugs have already been fixed or features have been added.

Sometimes, on the other hand, you would like to do things that the OJS back office does not provide but which would be very useful and you do not know how to proceed to help editors or reviewers.

  • there are bugs in your installed version and you would like to fix them;
  • an editor has created a new Round unintentionally and would like to go back;
  • an editor accepted a Submission or went to Copyediting but made a mistake and would like to go back;
  • a reviewer has given an opinion but would like to go back because he made a mistake or forgot about something;
  • an author has filed a submission but would like to correct some metadata or add an attachment but you don’t know how to do it;
  • you would like to change a translation;
  • you would like to ask to develop a feature not yet introduced in OJS but you don’t know how to do it or you don’t have the time to do it

Service and data Backup

For security reasons and to ensure the continuity of your services, it is necessary to have a backup system that allows you to restore the service to a given moment of time identified as stable and not corrupted.

The backup can be implemented in different ways based on the customer’s choice such as:

  • backup to local disk (but in this way we will be at operator risk and viruses or hardware problems);
  • backup to corporate or remote NAS;
  • remote backup via software such as NetBackup or similar;
  • on a cloud space such as Amazon S3 or Glacier or others.

System monitoring

To understand in advance a problem that could occur or in any case to be able to quickly intervene on a malfunction it is necessary to have a monitoring system.

In the simplest cases, monitoring could only be internal to the server while in all other cases it would be useful to provide for both internal and external monitoring that includes notifications to the manager.

  • monitoring via cron of the operating system;
  • preparation of internal monitoring scripts;
  • monitoring by external service such as Icinga;
  • timely intervention to restore the problem detected.

IT consulting as System Administrator

For any need relating to your server we are at your complete disposal with immediate IT assistance for:

  • new installation;
  • update;
  • internal and external monitoring;
  • system backup;
  • remote scheduled backup;
  • any other need.