A technical report (also: scientific report) is a document that describes the process, progress, and or results of technical or scientific research or the state of a technical or scientific research problem. It might also include recommendations and conclusion of the research. Unlike other scientific literature, such as scientific journals and the proceedings of some academic conferences, technical reports rarely undergo comprehensive independent peer review before publication. Where there is a review process, it is often limited to within the originating organization. Similarly, there are no formal publishing procedures for such reports, except where established locally.
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Description
Technical reports are today a major source of scientific and technical information. They are prepared for internal or wider distribution by many organizations, most of which lack the extensive editing and printing facilities of commercial publishers.
Technical reports are often prepared for sponsors of research projects. Another case where a technical report may be produced is when more information is produced for an academic paper than is acceptable or feasible to publish in a peer-reviewed publication; examples of this include in-depth experimental details, additional results, or the architecture of a computer model.
Production
The Grey Literature International Steering Committee (GLISC) established in 2006 published guidelines for the production of scientific and technical reports. These recommendations are adapted from the Uniform Requirements for Manuscripts Submitted to Biomedical Journals, produced by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) - better known as “Vancouver Style”.
The guidelines are available in English, French, German, Italian and Spanish on the GLISC website [1].
Publication
Technical reports are now commonly published electronically, whether on the internet or on the originating organization's intranet.
Many organizations collect their technical reports into a formal series. Reports are then assigned an identifier (report number, volume number) and share a common cover-page layout. The entire series might be uniquely identified by an ISSN.
A registration scheme for a globally unique International Standard Technical Report Number (ISRN) was standardized in 1994 (ISO 10444), but was never implemented in practice. It aimed to be an international extension of a report identifier scheme used by U.S. government agencies (ANSI/NISO Z39.23).
References
- International standard ISO 5966, Documentation — Presentation of scientific and technical reports (Withdrawn)
- International standard ISO 10444:1994, Information and documentation — International standard technical report number (ISRN)
- American standard ANSI/NISO Z.39.18-2005, Scientific and technical reports – Preparation, presentation and preservation
- American standard ANSI/NISO Z39.23, Standard technical report number format and creation
External links
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