Tuwhera News - April 2026

In the past, we have hosted each journal on its own instance (one self -contained copy of OJS per journal). However, due to the increased number of journals and the requirements of the updated system, we are going to change this to a multiple journal installation where one copy of OJS hosts multiple journals. There will potentially be three different instances hosting the journals. This won’t make much difference for editors, but it will help our IT support team keep the system functioning and secure. Don’t worry, you won’t be able to log into the other journals, just your own.

One difference will be a shared central user list. You won’t be able to see the other journals users, but if you try to add someone already on the list to your journal the system will inform you that they’re already a user. Then you can just add them with all their details prefilled!

With the move to the new server, each journal will be updated to OJS 3.4. Most Tuwhera journals are still running on OJS 3.1.

Why the upgrade?

  • PKP the developers of OJS no longer provide support for 3.1.
  • Improved security
  • Many common bugs are fixed

Benefits

  • Clearer workflows
  • DOIs are more automated
  • Easier to customise emails (and friendlier default emails)
  • A clearer workflow
  • Better reporting of statistics
  • You can add your own images!
  • Orcid Linking

We’ve already started updating journals. It’s best when you are not in the middle of publishing an issue. Let us know when suits otherwise we’ll contact you to find a suitable time.

With OJS 3.4 there are two display options for your journal. We will ask you which you prefer.

Default

This theme is practically identical to the theme most journals have in OJS 3.1 with information blocks along the right side of the page. The issue’s contents are displayed as a list.

Example: Pacific Media

Classic

No information blocks along the right. The issue’s contents are displayed as blocks rather than a list. Great for editors that like images and colour.

Harvest is the open-access, interdisciplinary journal of AUT’s Centre for Critical Food Studies. The journal will showcase student research alongside contributions from scholars, practitioners, activists, and writers.

We have a few more exciting titles coming our way, so keep an eye out in the next update.

This is year marks ten years of Tuwhera. The site was launched in October 2016 with just two journals! Stay tuned for party plans.

We’ve been informed that if your journal is indexed by Scopus, the company actually gets a lot of the information from the article PDF, including author affiliation. With TREF (new PBRF) coming up, it’s really important to have author affiliation available on Scopus, so we suggest that when you add the author's name to the PDF, you include their affiliation as well.

With the rapid growth of generative AI it is vital for journals to have an AI policy. If you haven’t got such a policy yet – it’s something to discuss with your team. These policies aren’t just for authors - reviewers and editors also need to follow ethical guidelines when dealing with article submissions. You are free to pick and choose from the below list of policy statements and contact the Tuwhera team if you have any questions.

Checklist of statements for AI policies (only AUT account holders have access. Contact Tuwhera if you would like this shared with you).

We have made a list of all New Zealand’s Diamond journals. Diamond journals are peer-reviewed, open-access scholarly journals that are free to publish in and free to read. They are often community-driven, published by academics, scholarly societies, and associations. Tuwhera journals are Diamond journals. Access the list here.

We’ve included a filter to check whether a journal is indexed on the Directory of Open Access Journals. Being indexed in DOAJ is a good marker of journal credibility and assists greatly with discoverability – for example, DOAJ journals are included in AUT Library searches. If you’d like your journal indexed on DOAJ – contact the Tuwhera team.

Changing editorial team? Just let us know so we can update the journal and make sure we communicate with the correct people. If you’re new to a journal, please feel free to get in touch with us so we can answer any questions and provide training in using the system.

Get in Touch!

Need to chat about your journal? The best address to contact us is tuwhera@aut.ac.nz