Nevertheless most publishers find it well worthwhile trying to get their authors to hand over a disc as well as the hard copy generated by the word processor and some publishers insist on it. The advantage for the authors is that it may be possible to avoid re-keying and thus unnecessary alteration of what they have written. It is sensible to offer a template or style sheets particularly for a journal and make it available on a website. If instructions have to be given in hard copy form it is the systems of headings and the reference system which are most important to specify, other than the handling of illustrations which is touched on below. The publisher should specify the nature of the discs that they can handle including the version of the software.
Word files are the most likely deliverables which most can manage.
Many mathematicians and those disciplines using a lot of mathematics use varieties of TeX, most commonly LaTeX. Chemists often favour Macintosh software. The format requested should be what the community concerned uses most frequently. Whatever is decided, a decision should be made with regard to the way in which both the refereeing and the copy-editing are to be handled. The use of abstracts Abstracts are required at the head of all journal articles, because secondary publishers that facilitate retrieval of the article need them. They also feature at the start of many book chapters.