Editorial: The publication of geoscientific model developments v1.1

Abstract

Version 1.0 of the editorial of the EGU (European Geosciences Union) journal, Geoscientific Model Development (GMD), was published in 2013. In that editorial an assessment was made of the progress the journal had made since it started, and some revisions to the editorial policy were introduced. After 2 years of experience with this revised editorial policy there are a few required updates, refinements and clarifications, so here we present version 1.1 of the editorial. The most significant amendments relate to the peer-review criteria as presented in the Framework for GMD manuscript types, which is published as an appendix to this paper and also available on the GMD manuscript types webpage. We also slightly refine and update the Publication guide and introduce a self-contained code and data policy. The changes are summarised as follows: - All manuscript types are now required to include code or data availability paragraphs, and model code must always be made available (in the case of copyright or other legal issues, to the editor at a minimum). - The role of evaluation in GMD papers is clarified, and a separate evaluation paper type is introduced. Model descriptions must already be published or in peer review when separate evaluation papers are submitted. - Observationally derived data should normally be published in a data journal rather than in GMD. Syntheses of data which were specifically designed for tasks such as model boundary conditions or direct evaluation of model output may, however, be published in GMD. - GMD publishes a broad range of different kinds of models, and this fact is now more explicitly acknowledged. - The main changes to the Publication guide are the addition of guidelines for editors when assessing papers at the initial review stage. Before sending papers for peer review, editors are required to make sure that papers comply with the Framework for GMD paper types and to carefully consider the topic of plagiarism. - A new appendix, the GMD code and data policy, is included. Version 1.1 of the manuscript types and Publication guide are included in the appendices with changed sentences marked in bold font.