Journal Paper Submission Workflow

Reusable LaTeX workflow for Sustainable Cities and Society / Elsevier submission packages.

Requirements

• latexmk
• pdflatex
• bibtex

Canonical Commands

Run all commands from the repository root.

./submit.sh full
./submit.sh blind
./submit.sh titlepage
./submit.sh highlights
./submit.sh all
./submit.sh export
./submit.sh clean

Windows wrappers are also available:

submit.bat all
submit_all.bat
submit_full.bat
submit_blind.bat
submit_titlepage.bat
submit_highlights.bat
submit_graphicalabstract.bat
submit_export.bat
clean.bat

Matching macOS/Linux wrappers are available with the same names and .sh extensions:

./submit_all.sh
./submit_full.sh
./submit_blind.sh
./submit_titlepage.sh
./submit_highlights.sh
./submit_graphicalabstract.sh
./submit_export.sh
./clean.sh

The same wrapper set is also available inside sub_1/ for users who prefer to launch commands from the manuscript folder.

Script Targets

• submit.sh: canonical dispatcher; runs the target passed as its first argument
• submit.bat: Windows launcher for submit.sh via bash, Git Bash, or WSL
• submit_full.*: builds only dist/pdf/paper_full.pdf
• submit_all.*: builds the full local PDF set: paper_full.pdf, paper_blind.pdf, titlepage.pdf, highlights.pdf, and graphical_abstract.pdf when an asset exists
• submit_blind.*: builds dist/pdf/paper_blind.pdf and sanitizes blind PDF metadata
• submit_titlepage.*: builds dist/pdf/titlepage.pdf
• submit_highlights.*: builds dist/pdf/highlights.pdf
• submit_graphicalabstract.*: builds dist/pdf/graphical_abstract.pdf when an asset exists
• submit_export.*: builds the submission artifacts and writes the flattened Elsevier upload bundle to dist/export/
• clean.*: removes generated build and distribution files
• sub_1/*.sh and sub_1/*.bat: run the same root-level targets from inside sub_1/

Common Cases

• Use submit_full.* when you only want the author-named manuscript PDF for review.
• Use submit_all.* when you want every local companion PDF regenerated in one pass.
• Use submit_export.* when you want the upload-ready Elsevier package in dist/export/.

Repo Layout

• sub_1/paper.tex: canonical cas-sc manuscript source for the full paper build
• sub_1/paper_blind.tex: blind wrapper that reuses the canonical manuscript source
• sub_1/titlepage.tex: standalone title-page artifact with author details
• sub_1/highlights.tex: standalone highlights wrapper; pulls bullets from highlights_content.tex
• sub_1/graphical_abstract.tex: standalone graphical-abstract wrapper; pulls the image asset if present
• sub_1/abstract.tex: abstract text inserted into the manuscript build
• sub_1/keywords.tex: keyword list inserted into the manuscript build
• sub_1/highlights_content.tex: 3 to 5 highlight bullets used by highlights.tex
• sub_1/authors.tex: author, affiliation, and corresponding-author macros reused by manuscript and title page
• sub_1/content.tex: main manuscript sections inserted into paper.tex
• sub_1/metadata.tex: shared title, short title, journal, and companion-title metadata
• sub_1/settings.tex: shared package and formatting setup for the manuscript build
• sub_1/bib.bib: bibliography database used by BibTeX

Validation

submit.sh validates the source before submission builds. It fails when it finds:

• placeholder tokens such as TITLE, KEYWORD, HIGHLIGHT, Author2, or example-image
• active draft markers such as \todo, \todoo, or \rewrite
• an abstract longer than 250 words
• fewer than 1 or more than 7 keywords
• fewer than 3 or more than 5 highlights
• a highlight longer than 85 characters
• an empty bibliography
• no citation command in the manuscript source

Outputs

• dist/pdf/paper_full.pdf
• dist/pdf/paper_blind.pdf
• dist/pdf/titlepage.pdf
• dist/pdf/highlights.pdf
• dist/pdf/graphical_abstract.pdf when a sub_1/graphical_abstract.(pdf|png|jpg|jpeg) asset exists
• dist/export/ flattened upload package for Editorial Manager

Notes

• The export step keeps all upload files at one directory level to match Elsevier LaTeX upload guidance.
• The manuscript is tuned to the current Sustainable Cities and Society guidance as verified on March 9, 2026, and now uses Elsevier's cas-sc class.