H-Net Reviews Management

Welcome to H-Net Reviews!

Below, you will find instructions for working with the Reviews Management System (RMS). You can also download and print the full instructions (without screenshots) here. If you have any questions about the RMS or the review editing process, please contact the Managing Editor of H-Net Reviews, Yelena Kalinsky, at yelena@mail.h-net.org. If you have a book-related question, please e-mail revhelp@mail.h-net.org.

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Step 1. Logging In

The Reviews Management System (RMS) homepage can be found at:

https://www.h-net.org/revmgt/home.php

The first time you log in, you will be asked to accept or decline the terms of the Creative Commons license. Reviews published on H-Net are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License. Once you accept the license, you will not be shown this screen again. If you decline, you will not be able to use the RMS or review for H-Net Reviews.

Step 2. Overview of the Review Process

The review process has two phases, Inventory Management and Reviews Management. All of the tools that you need to manage your book inventory and reviews can be found in the Reviews Management System. On the left sidebar, you will find the tools grouped under three menus: Inventory, Reviews, and Information.

You will use the Inventory tools to find and order books for review on your network, and you will use the Reviews tools to assign, edit, and publish reviews. The Information section contains instructions and other useful information.

You can see an overview of the entire review process in the following chart. Below, you will find detailed instructions for each step of the process. (Click the image to download a PDF version of the chart.)

The Review Process flow chart illustrates both phases of the review process. The Inventory phase is indicated by the yellow square on the left. The Reviews Management phase is indicated by the purple bars on the right, which show each of the different review statuses that a review passes through during the review process. The different colors of the action boxes indicate who is responsible for each step in the process. For example, the reviewer (green) is responsible for logging into the RMS and entering the review into the text editor. The review editor (blue) then edits the review for content and passes it on to the copyeditor (pink). If changes are required, the review may pass back through an earlier status to allow the reviewer or review editor to address them. Once both content and copyediting are complete, the copyeditor (pink) will change the review status to 'Prepublication' and the review editor (blue) will publish the review.

Step 3. Inventory

When a review editor decides to assign a review, s/he will need to check whether the book is (a) in stock and (b) available for review. (See the yellow box labeled 'Inventory' in the Review Process flowchart above.)

To search for a book in the inventory:

Go to Inventory > Search Records in the left sidebar.
The drop-down menu allows you to search for books using any of the following parameters: identifier (ISBN), title, author, publisher, LoC call number, or LoC subject.
If the book appears in the search results, click on the title to pull up its item record.
The item record (not to be confused with the review record) contains the book's inventory information, including the title, author, publisher, ISBN, subject(s), network(s) for which it has been recommended, any reviews of that book published by other networks, and the item status of any copies that have been requested or processed by the H-Net clerks.
Each line under Item Status refers to a different copy of the book. If a book is in stock and available for review, its item status will be marked Unreserved or Recommended. (See below for how to reserve a book marked Unreserved or Recommended.)
If a book is in stock but reserved for another network, it will be marked Reserved, and another copy will have to be requested. Likewise, if a book is marked Purged, there are no copies available on the shelves, and another copy will have to be ordered. (See below for how to request a copy of a book marked Reserved or Purged.)

To reserve a book marked Unreserved or Recommended:

Find the item record as described above (using Inventory > Search Records).
Under Item Status, find a copy of the book marked Unreserved or Recommended.
Click 'edit' to the right of the status line; this will bring up that particular copy's Item History.
Use the left drop-down menu below the item history to change the item status to Reserved. This will reserve that copy of the book for your network.
If you have lined up a reviewer and s/he has a profile in the RMS, you can assign the reviewer at this time by changing the item status to Assigned and choosing the reviewer's name in the drop-down menu.
Click 'Update Status' at the bottom of the screen to save changes.
You are now ready to move on to the Reviews Management portion of the review process.

To request a copy of a book marked Purged or Reserved for another network:

Find the item record as described above (using Inventory > Search Records).
If there are no copies marked Unreserved or Recommended under Item Status, click 'request another copy' at the bottom of the item record.
A drop-down menu with your network name will appear. Choose the correct network (if you edit reviews for more than one network), and click 'Request Item.'
A new line will appear under Item Status showing that a copy of the book has been requested for your network.
If you have lined up a reviewer and s/he has a profile in the RMS, you can assign the reviewer at this time by changing the status to Assigned and choosing the reviewer in the drop-down menu.
Click 'Update Status' at the bottom of the screen to save changes.
You are now ready to move on to the Reviews Management portion of the review process.

To request a book not found in the inventory:

If a search using Inventory > Search Records yields no item record for the book you wish to assign, you can request it using Inventory > Request Book in the left sidebar.
Fill out the book request form, making sure to indicate the correct network in the drop-down menu. If you have lined up a reviewer and s/he has a profile in the RMS, you can use the Reviewer drop-down menu to assign the reviewer at this time.
Click the 'Request Book' button at the bottom of the screen. The H-Net clerks will then order a review copy from the publisher, and you will receive an e-mail notifying you once it arrives. If you have selected a reviewer, the book will be automatically mailed to him or her once it arrives. You will receive an e-mail notification at that time.
Please wait to receive notification that the request has been fulfilled before moving on to the Reviews Management portion of the review process, as the publisher may not respond to the request.

Reviewing non-print media:

One of the advantages of H-Net Reviews is the ability to quickly publish reviews not only of traditional print books, but also of other kinds of materials and media, including conferences, museum exhibitions, journal articles, grey literature, websites and CD-ROMs, films, performances-anything that a network may deem relevant and review-worthy. These items will not appear when using the browse library function (Inventory > Browse Library), but they can be found by searching the inventory (Inventory > Search Records).

To add a new record for a non-print item, such as a website or exhibition, go to Inventory > Add Record in the left sidebar.
Choose the media type from the drop-down menu (Audio, Conference, etc.).
Fill in as much information as possible, including the ISBN and subjects, if available. (Some review items will not have certain identifiers; these can be left blank.)
Click the 'Add Record' button at the bottom of the page, and a new page with the new item record will appear.
You are now ready to move on to the Reviews Management portion of the review process.

Managing your book inventory:

The easiest way to keep track of books is by using the browse library function to see all the books associated with your network.

Go to Inventory > Browse Library.
Use the drop-down menus at the top of the page to filter the inventory by list (if you edit reviews for more than one network) and item status. You can choose Unreserved to see all the books currently available for review; or another item status to see a list of books recommended, reserved, requested, ordered, assigned, or mailed for your specific network. (See below for a list of possible item statuses.)
Clicking on a book's title in the results will bring up its item record.
Each line under Item Status refers to a different copy of the book.
Click 'edit' to the right of the status line to reserve a copy of the book for your network or to assign a reviewer.
If there are no available copies (i.e., if all the copies are marked Reserved or Purged), click 'request another copy' at the bottom of the item record to order a copy from the publisher.
Click 'Update Status' at the bottom of the screen to save changes.
You are now ready to move on to the Reviews Management portion of the review process.

Item Status:

The following are the possible item statuses you may encounter in the inventory:

Unreserved - the book is available for review.
Recommended - the book has been recommended for your network and is available for review; this does not automatically reserve the book for your network, as books may be recommended to multiple networks. If you would like to reserve a recommended book, you will need to do this manually. (See above for how to reserve a book marked Recommended.)
Reserved - a book that is at the H-Net office and has been reserved for a network by a review editor; reserving a book makes it unavailable to other networks. Please be mindful of other networks, the publishers who provide review copies, and the authors who await reviews of their work, and refrain from reserving a book indefinitely without assigning a reviewer. If for whatever reason you cannot assign a reviewer for a reserved book, please be sure to change its status to Unreserved to make it available for other networks.
Requested - a book that is not at the H-Net office, has been requested, and is waiting to be processed by the clerks.
Ordered - the book has been ordered for your network by the clerks, but has not yet arrived at the H-Net office. If a book you ordered does not arrive within 3 months, please alert the clerks by sending an e-mail to revhelp@mail.h-net.org.
Assigned - the book has been assigned to a reviewer.
Mailed - the book has been mailed to the reviewer by the clerks.
Purged - the book was at the H-Net office for over a year and has been removed from the shelves. (See above for how to request a new copy of a purged book.)

Finding books for review:

As a scholar, you already have many ways of learning about new books in your field. Recommendations from colleagues and browsing publishers' catalogues are two common methods. The RMS has two other ways of helping you discover new books for review: recommendations included in your weekly status report and the browse library function.

Go to Inventory > Browse Library to see all of the books that have been processed by the H-Net clerks, including those recommended for your network. These may be books that have been requested by your network, requested by another network, or unsolicited review copies sent by publishers.
Use the drop-down menus at the top of the page to filter the results by list (if you edit reviews for more than one network) and item status. Choosing your network and the 'Recommended' status will bring up a list of books that have been recommended for your network.
If you see a book that you wish to assign for review, click 'reserve this item' below its listing to reserve a copy, or 'assign this item' if you have a reviewer lined up to whom a copy should be sent.
You will then be taken to the book's item record where a status line under Item Status will indicate that you have requested or assigned a copy of the book for review.
As long as the book has not yet been ordered, you can cancel the request by clicking 'edit' to the right of this status line, where you can use the drop-down menus under Item History to reserve or assign the book.
Be sure to click the 'Update Status' button to save changes
You are now ready to move on to the Reviews Management portion of the review process.

Step 4. Reviews Management

Once you have reserved, requested, and/or assigned an item for review in the inventory, you are not done. The next step is to create a new review in TinyMCE, the text editor H-Net Reviews uses to edit reviews.

This section will provide instructions for the second part of the review process, Reviews Management. Please refer to the Review Process flowchart for an overview of the steps

Registering a new reviewer:

When you assign a review to a new reviewer, you will first have to register him or her on your network. From the RMS homepage, go to Reviews > Add Reviewer.
This will take you to H-Net's People section. (You can always get back to this section by clicking 'people' at the top of the H-Net header.) Choose your network from the drop-down menu and enter the reviewer's name and e-mail into the form and click 'Continue.'
The system will search for any existing People profiles associated with this reviewer. If this person is a reviewer for another network, s/he may already have a People profile.
If the search results bring up an existing profile for the person you are trying to add, you can click 'add to your network' to the right of his or her name to add your network to the existing profile.
If none of the search results is associated with your reviewer, simply click the 'Continue' button to be taken to a new reviewer form where you can add your reviewer's affiliation and contact details.
If you edit reviews for more than one network, be sure to choose the correct network from the drop-down menu. Fill out the reviewer's contact information and click the 'Create Profile' button at the bottom of the form.
You can always find and edit reviewer profiles later by going to Reviews > Browse Reviewers in the RMS, and using the drop-down menus to find and edit reviewers on your network.

Creating a new review:

Once you have reserved a review copy and assigned the reviewer, you will need to create a new review record and link it to the existing item record in the inventory. You can always find existing reviews by going to Reviews > My Reviews in in the RMS.

To create a new review, go to Reviews > New Review on the left sidebar.
When you create a new review, you will be asked to provide a title. The title that the reviewer or review editor inserts into this field will be the title published with the review. You may give a descriptive title, but it is not required. Otherwise, the title field may be left blank.
Click the 'Create New Review' button to continue.
A new review record for the review will appear.
A review record looks much like an item record in the inventory, but the two should not be confused. While an item record details the information of a book (or any other item under review) in the inventory, a review record lists the status of a review within the review editing process. Each line under the Item History section of an item record refers to a different copy of the book (and lists its item status), while each line under the Review History section of a review record refers to a different step in the review process (and lists its review status).
Once you create a new review, you should link it to the item record of the item under review. To do this, find the Records section directly under the review's title in the review record and click 'add.'
Find the title of the book in the pull-down menu. If the title does not appear in the menu, click 'manual' and enter the item record number in the box. Then click the 'Add Record' button at the bottom of the screen.
Next, add your reviewer(s) to the review record by clicking 'edit reviewers' under the Reviewers section.
Find the correct name(s) in the menu and click the 'Update Reviewers' button at the bottom of the screen. Your reviewer(s) will receive a notification e-mail letting them know that a new review has been created.
You are now ready to move on to the next step in the review editing process: editing the review. You can always find your reviews by going to Reviews > My Reviews in the RMS and using the drop-down menus to filter by network and review status.

Editing a review in TinyMCE:

In order to help reviewers, review editors, and copyeditors to communicate during the review process, the RMS uses the TinyMCE text editor with the ICE plugin for track changes. You may wish to read the TinyMCE/ICE before beginning work in the RMS. If you encounter any technical problems with these programs, please e-mail H-Net Reviews at revhelp@mail.h-net.org.

Once you have created a new review record in the RMS, each step of the review process will appear as a separate line under the Review History section of the new review record. While you may view the different versions of the review using the 'view' link to the right of each status line, you can only edit the latest version, whose status line will contain an 'edit' link. (For the definitions of different review statuses, see the Review Status section below.)
To enter the text of the review, the reviewer will find the review record in the RMS and click 'edit' to the right of the first status line, which will be listed as 'Under Review.' This will bring up the TinyMCE text editor where s/he can either type or copy and paste the text of the review into the RMS before clicking the 'Save Changes' button at the bottom of the screen. The track changes function will highlight any new text in pink.
Once the text is entered and the reviewer has clicked the 'Save Changes' button, s/he will need to update the review status from 'Under Review' to 'Review Editing' using the drop-down menu at the bottom of the review record. This will generate a new line in the review history and alert you, the review editor, that a review is ready for the first round of edits.
To edit a review, you, the review editor, will log into the RMS, find the appropriate review record, and click the 'edit' link to the right of the latest status line (marked 'Review Editing'). This will again bring up the TinyMCE text editor, where any necessary changes can be entered.
If the text of the review is highlighted in pink, you will need to first accept the reviewer's changes by clicking the green check mark in the toolbar above the text box. This will remove the pink highlighting, allowing you to make new changes to the text of the review. Any new text will again be highlighted in pink, while deleted text will be struck out and highlighted in grey.
Once you complete the first round of content editing, click the 'Save Changes' button at the bottom of the screen.
Unlike in Word, the track changes function in TinyMCE does not allow users to introduce separate comment bubbles alongside the text. Lengthy or numerous comments can be inserted in all caps in the body of the review with a note in the Comments section in the review record itself. Brief comments can also be communicated using the Comments section. Simply click the 'edit' link under the 'Comments' section to bring up a text box and enter comments. Click the 'Update Comments' button at the bottom of the screen.
Once all content edits and comments have been entered, pass the review to the next step in the review process by changing the review status using the drop-down menu at the bottom of the review record. If you have requested changes from the reviewer, the review status should be set to 'Under Review' to allow the reviewer to respond to the requests. If no changes from the reviewer are necessary, change the status to 'Copy Editing' to move the review to the copyediting phase of the review process.
The copyeditor will then take a pass at the review, noting any required changes in the comments section or in all caps within the body of the review. If changes are required, the review status will be set to 'Review Editing,' allowing the review editor to respond or communicate with the reviewer. Once copyediting is complete and no more changes are required, the copyeditor will set the review status to 'Prepublication.'
You, the review editor, can now publish the review by changing the review status to 'Published.' At this point, if any other tracked changes remain in the review, they will be automatically accepted once you publish the review. If you, the review editor, request additional changes once the review is in 'Prepublication' status, you will need to change the status to 'Review Editing,' make and save your changes, and then change the status back to 'Copyediting.'
Once the review is published, it will appear on your network, as well as on the front page of H-Net Reviews under the Reviews tab on the Commons and on any networks that repost the review. A full citation, permanent link to a pdf of the review, and a link to the discussion network will be found at the bottom of the published review.
If, for whatever reason, the reviewer cannot complete a review or the review editor decides that the review is unsuitable for publication, the review editor should cancel the review by changing the review status to 'Cancelled.' If possible, the review copy should be returned to H-Net and its item status set to 'Unreserved.'

Review Status and Workflow:

The status of a review can be found under the Review History section of the review record and indicates where the review is in the review process. The status of a review is set by different individuals as the review works its way through the system. The ability to set a particular status is reserved to specific individuals, as follows:

Under Review – The item has been assigned to a reviewer by a review editor and the reviewer is in the process of writing the review. This status is available to reviewers and review editors. Occasionally, a reviewer will send his or her review as a Word file, and the review editor may enter it into TinyMCE.
Review Editing – A draft of the review has been submitted by the reviewer and is awaiting content editing by the review editor. This review status is only available to review editors. Copyeditors may return copyedited reviews back to ‘Review Editing’ status with questions or requested changes.
Copy Editing – The review has gone through content editing by the review editor and is now awaiting H-Net copyediting. This review status is only available to H-Net copyeditors.
Prepublication – The copyeditor has returned the review to the review editor for publication with no further changes necessary. Only copyeditors can set a review to ‘Prepublication’ status. This is the last step before publication.
Published – The review has been published to the network and to H-Net Reviews. Only review editors can change a review status from ‘Prepublication’ to ‘Published.’
Cancelled – The review was not completed or judged unsuitable for publication and cancelled by the review editor.