This WWW service provides interactive access to several preprint databases. Papers are submitted to the databases via e-mail, and can also be accessed that way. These are the instructions for subscribing, submitting papers, etc. to the mail-based system.
Available commands are
All commands may be abbreviated by any truncation that includes at least the first three letters (e.g. rep, sub, can, dis, lis, com, ...).
Do not make multiple requests for the same paper. If you receive nothing (or if the response is slow) it means there is a problem at your end.
anonymous ftp for getting files is enabled on xxx.lanl.gov. use login: anonymous password: yourusername , the relevant directories are listings and papers (the latter has subdirectories 9210, 9211, ... ). if you are not already familiar with anonymous ftp, this is not a good place to practice. anonymous ftp for putting files will be enabled at a later date.
for european users, this database is duplicated as nucl-th@babbage.sissa.it, which allows access both via the above e-mail requests and via anonymous ftp.
Papers should be submitted with extra copy of title, authors, #pages, report# and abstract appended at beginning in the following format: --------------------------------------------------------------- To: nucl-th@xxx.lanl.gov Subject: put \\ Title, authors, #pages, report# \\ Abstract (or other short description, title/author/abs must be shorter than 24 lines or they will be automatically truncated -- avoid unnecessary blank lines). the report# above is your local preprint# (e.g. LA-UR-92-2001). \\ entire .tex paper, including any non-standard tex or latex macros, and instructions (at beginning) for stripping off any figures appended as postscript files. ---------------------------------------------------------------
The information at the beginning delineated by the \\'s will be stripped off for use in notifications of papers received and listings. Papers longer than 100kb (195 blocks) will automatically be split into smaller pieces to accommodate certain capricious mail routers and to speed bitnet transmission. (Statistical analysis shows that "replaced" papers are rarely rerequested, so if it is your intent to communicate correct research it is in your interest to avoid premature submissions and submit only a final version.)
If you wish to include the 7 digit papernumber directly in submitted files (typically to appear on the title page), `put' will translate any occurrence of the sequence: nucl-th/yymmnnn (must be exactly as above) to nucl-th/paperno (e.g. nucl-th/9201075) in the stored version of the paper. this particular sequence (note 2 y's for year, 2 m's for month, 3 n's for number) does not ordinarily occur in tex (or even postscript) files so there should be no danger of unwanted replaced text.
Any `standard' macro package may be submitted as a comment for permanent archiving. Macro packages currently available (via `get') include harvmac.tex (and the template file harvsamp.tex), psfig.tex, ... . For a complete list, use `list macros'. Information on additional software and utilities available for use in conjunction with this system is also available via `list macros'.
Authors submitting papers should be careful that no lines are longer than 80 characters since many mailers will automatically linewrap with carriage returns which could cause problems (for example, if inserted in the middle of a macro name). A c program that can be used to reformat papers before mailing to nucl-th (with carriage returns inserted only at suitably chosen spaces) is available as reform.c .
Authors should also be careful to avoid certain curiosities of Unix mailers. For example, any line beginning with the word From will automatically be converted to >From (resulting in an upside down question mark in the texed paper). This can be avoided either by adding a space or using {}From. Similarly a ~ at the beginning of a line (for authors who curiously prefer inserting multiple ~'s instead of \quad's or \qquad's for spacing) is interpreted as an escape sequence by Unix mailers and will confuse them. Solution again is to insert space or use {}~. A line that begins with a period and is otherwise blank is interpreted as an EndOfFile by Unix mailers and should also be avoided (it is not obvious why this would ever happen in tex papers, but it has).
It would be helpful if authors burdened with IBM's that still use non-standard conventions for symbols such as {,},|,~,^ = left/right curly brackets, vertical bar, tilde, caret could make the necessary translation before submitting.
There is a minor problem with large files. while storage is not an issue, most unsuspecting requestors do not wish to be bombarded with 2Mb of inefficiently generated postscript in 20 separate files, or 1Mb of tables of calabi-yau intersection numbers (yes, these things happen). moreover there are many vax vms and ibm vm systems that will reject most of this mail due to unsuspecting requestor's insufficent disk allocation. eventually, user interfaces will be standardized and allow greater flexibility. in the meantime, submissions should be limited to under 300kb (600 blocks) (as has already been the case for over 99% of submissions anyway), with a note explaining how to obtain any additional figure files, etc. via mail, anonymous ftp, or other). postscript figure files should be tar-compressed and uuencoded (a unix csh script for producing such a file that unpacks itself is available via `get uufiles'). in addition, if you are not using a unix workstation you should get one for yourself or your group (it will be many times more powerful than whatever you are currently using and is available at a fraction of the cost), and get it connected to internet.
some other bulletin boards running the same software:
alg-geom@publications.math.duke.edu (algebraic geometry) astro-ph@babbage.sissa.it (astrophysics) cond-mat@babbage.sissa.it (condensed matter) e-mail@xxx.lanl.gov (e-mail address database) funct-an@babbage.sissa.it (functional analysis) gr-qc@xxx.lanl.gov (general relativity / quantum cosmology) hep-lat@ftp.scri.fsu.edu (computational and lattice physics) hep-ph@xxx.lanl.gov (high energy physics phenomenological) hep-th@xxx.lanl.gov (high energy physics formal) nucl-th@xxx.lanl.gov (nuclear theory)
Disclaimer: Problems printing a paper should be directed to its authors. Papers will be entered in the listings in order of receipt on an impartial basis and appearance of a paper is not intended in any way to convey tacit approval of its assumptions, methods, or conclusions by any agent (electronic, mechanical, or other). This bulletin board should not be used to distribute non-technical information (such as news or information about political causes of potential special interest to the scientific community).