ToMS indexed with Scopus and WoS
Six months after indexation in Scopus, Transactions on Maritime Science has now been indexed with Web of Science databases. ToMS is a scientific journal launched six years ago with the purpose of presenting research and scientific ideas in the area of maritime affairs and transport technologies. Its categorisation numbers allocated by the Croatian National and University Library are 1848–3305 (ISSN) and 1848-3313 (ISSNe). It is published in print twice a year and is available in electronic form at www.toms.com.hr.
Transactions on Maritime Science (ToMS) has been indexed with major national and international citation databases: Web of Science Emerging Sources Citation Index (WoS ESCI), Scopus , Inspec, Hrčak, Copernicus, TRID, BMT, UB Braunschweig, Google Scholar and Crossref. Since April 2017 (Vol. 6, No. 1) the journal has been included in Scopus database, while since October 2017 (Vol. 6, No. 2) it has been indexed with WoS ESCI database, owing to the excellence of papers and the quality of reviews and selection process. By entering the Scopus and WoS citation databases, ToMS has become even more visible and recognisable in the research world. The evaluation process at WoS ESCI lasted 18 months.
Decisions on further advancement of the journal might take place in 2018. WoS provides the metrics, i.e. the ranking of the journal’s citation impact based on the annual report of JRC (Journal Citation Reports).
Improved visibility of ToMS
The Emerging Sources Citation Index (ESCI) is a new scientific citation indexing service maintained by Clarivate Analytics (previously the Intellectual Property and Science business of Thomson Reuters), which was introduced in 2015. It is one of the essential citation databases on the WoS platform and represents the first step for the journals wishing to be indexed in one of the three WoS indexing databases: SCIE, SSCI and AHCI. They do not measure the impact factor of the journal but the citation frequency of the papers published in the journal. In addition, for journals indexed with ESCI, an overall metrics of the journal is measured and is allocated to the authors of the papers, i.e. an h-factor is calculated (the productivity and impact of citations of an individual researcher or scientist).
The advantage of the ESCI database is the improved visibility in the scientific community and the higher quality of the journal. The essential selection criteria for joining WoS databases are:
a) Basic publishing standards including: peer review of articles, clear publication ethics, journal publishing format (with an accent on xml and pdf formats), regularity, international editorial conventions, and texts written in English language,
b) thematically, the journal must be new, i.e. must deal with issues not discussed in WoS so far,
c) international diversity of editors and authors, whereby the journal reflects the global context in which scientific research takes place,
d) citation analytics.
A-category journal
According to the Regulation on the conditions for awarding scientific titles, Transactions on Maritime Science (ToMS) is listed as an A-category journal. Sadly, this Regulation uses double standards as it appreciates foreign A-category journals more and states that certain number of papers must be published in A-category abroad. Therefore the editors of ToMS and the management of the Faculty of Maritime Studies in Split wonder whether the quality of this journal would be higher if the publishing address was shifted a few miles away to a dislocated office, for instance, in Neum in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
