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Let's suppose you write a paper and you post it on arXiv. If a paper is sent to a journal for peer-review, should you always include this information in the paper comments (including the name of the journal where the paper was sent)?

If the paper is accepted, is it necessary to include in the comments that the paper has been accepted for publication in... (and include the name of the journal)? Or it is better to wait until the paper is published and then include in the comments "Published in... [name of the journal]."?

I understand that it may take some for a paper to be published once accepted.

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My practice is to replace the initial preprint with the postprint as soon as it is accepted. After it is published (electronically), I go back and add the DOI and such. The reason for this is that the paper is often significantly improved during the refereeing process, and I'd rather have people reading the improved (postprint) than the original preprint.

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    To other people reading this answer: before you upload the postprint, check here if you have the rights to do so --- journal policies may vary a lot in different areas.
    – Federico Poloni
    Commented Mar 15, 2013 at 7:41
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    @FedericoPoloni Anyway, one always can (and should) place DOI reference. And, when it is not possible to put final version, it is good to mention it explicitly in the comments (e.g. "differs from the published version" or "as close to the published version as legally possible").
    – Piotr Migdal
    Commented Mar 16, 2013 at 13:18
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I believe you should never include "Submitted to Journal of Blah"; it conveys no information and it's tacky. (And just because Terry Tao does it doesn't make it okay.)

I won't post a new version of a paper just because it has been accepted. However, if I do upload a newer version, I'll include in the comments "Final version, to appear in Journal of Blah" (here is an example from one of my papers).

Once the paper is published, with page numbers and everything (which can often be years -- my paper above was accepted in April 2010, published January 2013), there is a form you can use to add the journal reference and DOI to the arXiv page. Conveniently, this does not generate a new version, so there's no reason not to (you can see this on my paper above -- the reference and DOI were added last week, but no new version of the paper was generated).

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  • Thank you for your comments. What about if one doesn't update the preprint and include something like "The results in this paper will appear in..." in the comments anyway? I believe this would be OK as long as referees didn't point out any errors in the paper, otherwise one should update the preprint in order to correct them.
    – Juan
    Commented Mar 15, 2013 at 5:53
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    @Juan: even if the referees found no errors, if they suggested small changes (or you made other changes yourself) it is best to update the arXiv version to include them, as suggested by David Ketcheson.
    – Anonymous Mathematician
    Commented Mar 15, 2013 at 12:50
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    I want to disagree with the first paragraph: "Submitted to Journal of Blah" does convey information, namely, it conveys information about what you think about the paper, in the form of where you thought it appropriate to submit. (My CV used to omit that information, and I was advised to include it, for precisely this reason.)
    – Henry
    Commented Mar 15, 2013 at 14:43
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    I agree with @Henry. Especially if you are on the job market or up for tenure.
    – JeffE
    Commented Mar 15, 2013 at 15:18
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    I think Tom Church is right that it can come across as tacky, but if you are on the job market or up for tenure, then tackiness is a risk worth taking.
    – Anonymous Mathematician
    Commented Mar 15, 2013 at 15:29

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