AMS Log In
Completing the Web Review Submission form
Review text
References in review text
Remarks
LaTeX comments and special characters
Review submission
Making changes
Reference lists in MathSciNet
Automated confirmation of receipt of review
Updating your reviewer information

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AMS Log In
The log in to the Reviewer Home is the AMS Log In. You need to have an AMS log in Account with your Mathematical Reviews/MathSciNet Reviewer Number in the Profile. If you have not previously set up your AMS Account, go to www.ams.org. If you have previously set up an AMS Account, but did not add your Reviewer Number to your Profile, you may add it from within your AMS Profile.

After log in, you will be taken to the "View Reviewer Information" page. (See below regarding Updating.) There you can examine your reviewer information and choose an item to review from a list of all the review items that are presently out to you. Click on the "Review" button next to the item for which you want to submit a review and you will be taken to the Web Review Submission page to complete the review information. On that page, all your personal reviewer information will already be filled in: name, email, postal address.

Normally, the item you are reviewing will be on the list. If it is not, simply fill in the MR Number in the box with the box labeled Enter an MR Number. If the item is not on the list, it is helpful if you put a comment in the Remarks portion of the page. For example, the item might have been passed to you by a colleague, to whom it was assigned for review.

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Completing the Web Review Submission form
Following is a list of the fields on the Web Review Submission form. Each field is described in detail within this help file.

TeX type
MSC primary
MSC secondary(s)
Review text
Remarks

TeX type
All review text should be prepared using some version of TeX/LaTeX. At the top of the Web Review Submission form you are asked to select the type of TeX to be used in processing your review. The four choices are: TeX, AMS-TeX, LaTeX, and AMS-LaTeX. Choose the type that you feel most comfortable using. If your review only contains roman text—no math symbols or other alphabets—none of the formatting features of TeX are needed. In this case, it doesn't matter which type you choose. Following is some information on each type:

TeX
This type is sometimes called plain TeX. If you normally use plain TeX and need to use the AMS math or symbol fonts, select AMS-TeX. (For example, \Bbb uses the AMS Font package.)

AMS-TeX
This type of TeX is the closest to what is used internally at Mathematical Reviews and externally on MathSciNet for presentation of reviews. The AMS Font package (which includes blackboard bold) is loaded when this type is selected.

LaTeX
This type is the standard LaTeX distribution. If you need to use the AMS math or symbol fonts, select AMS-LaTeX. (For example, \mathbb uses the AMS Font package.)

AMS-LaTeX (recommended)
This type of TeX is the standard LaTeX distribution with the AMS packages loaded. It is the default selection. The great majority of reviewers (over 95%) will want to leave this setting as is.

Scientific Word/Workplace (choose AMS-LaTeX)
The output of SW/SWP can be viewed as a special form of AMS-LaTeX. Prepare your review text in SW/SWP, save as a Portable LaTeX document, then use the "Upload Review Text" option to upload the Portable LaTeX file that you saved.

Mathematics Subject Classification (MSC)
The Mathematical Reviews Web Review Submission page asks for suggestions for the 5-digit classifications of the item being reviewed. You will find the recommendations of the editors at the top of the Web Review Submission page. You are not required to enter data in the MSC primary and secondary fields, but we encourage you to recommend a unique primary classification and, if desired, one or more secondary classifications. Classifications must be entered without internal spaces, e.g., "11D45", not "11 D 45". Multiple secondary classifications should be separated by a space in the input box. If you agree with the suggested classifications, you do not need to fill in these boxes. [Browse the MSC]

Review text
Review text should be composed using a LaTeX processor. We ask that you do not use your own LaTeX definitions (\def or \newcommand) or LaTeX macros. Because of the nature of the review data in the Mathematical Reviews Database, all your definitions and macros will have to be removed. This part of the editing process may introduce errors and may delay the publication of your review. Please do not use any \input, \usepackage, or \include commands, as external packages cannot be used in review text, and including these commands may prevent the creation of a PDF preview of your review. Note that currently the only diagramming package in MathSciNet is the CD package of AMS-TeX and AMS-LaTeX. No graphic images can be part of a review in MathSciNet. You may use plain TeX, AMS-TeX, LaTeX or AMS-LaTeX (the recommended format). The TeX Users Group (TUG) has a wealth of information about using LaTeX.

Your completed review text in LaTeX can be uploaded to the submission page. After clicking "Upload Review Text", use the "Browse" button to locate and open the LaTeX file to be uploaded. After selection, your review should appear in the "Review text" box.  If the wrong file has been uploaded, you may upload a new file, which will replace the old one.

Your review text can also be copied and pasted from your LaTeX environment; in this case select only the review text proper, leaving out the preamble and postamble material, as the submission page supplies all the necessary LaTeX formatting. The review text can also be typed directly into the review text box, although this method is not recommended.

Please do not upload a PDF file or Word file into the "Review text" box. Neither of these formats can be used in our editing process. Note that a review consisting of prose only, without any mathematical notation, can be composed in any standard text application. But the review text should be copied and pasted into the "Review text" box. The text application file cannot be uploaded.

References in review text
References in review text are checked for accuracy and formatted to MR style during the editing process. If you choose to include references with your review text, provide as much information as possible, including full author name, year of publication, journal name (or book or video title), title of the cited item, volume and paging. Include the MR Number, if there is one, as well. For references found in MathSciNet, the procedure that is recommended is simply to copy the bibliographic data of the MathSciNet item, beginning with the MR Number, and paste into the appropriate part of the review text, surrounded by square brackets, [...]. References in the right format, including the MR Number, can often be found by using MRef, which is a free service of the AMS. For references having MR Numbers, in principle the MR Number by itself ought to be sufficient, but in practice this provides little or no basis for checking accuracy. A similar caveat applies to references tied to the original reference list, such as "[2]".

Remarks
Use the Remarks box to add any comments about the review item that you are submitting that will be helpful to the editors at Mathematical Reviews as they edit your review. Do not use this box for any material that you intend to be part of the published review. This box can also be used if there is an error in the bibliographic information or title translation. Do not use this box for comments about other reviews or for regular correspondence. Regular correspondence, including a request that the review item be transferred to another reviewer, should be sent by email to mathrev@ams.org.

LaTeX comments and special characters
The percent (%) character has a special meaning in LaTeX, signaling a comment which is not viewed as part of the text. It is assumed during editing that commented out material is not part of the review text. To avoid confusion, it is better to simply remove commented out material from your review text. If a percent character is actually needed in review text, use \%.

Note that "#" and "&" have special meanings in LaTeX. If you need to use those characters in the text of your review, remember to use "\#" and "\&" instead.

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Review submission
Once you have entered all of the required information on the Web Review Submission form, click the "Submit" button at the bottom of the page. You will receive a confirmation screen that your review has been submitted to Mathematical Reviews. Also at this time the LaTeX processor is applied to your review text. There will be a link to view a PDF preview of your review, which can be printed or saved. A submission that is free of LaTeX errors will produce the most satisfactory PDF preview. Here are some suggestions:

If you have access to a LaTeX processor on your local system, it is recommended that you first process your review on your local system, to make sure that it is free of errors.

If you need AMS fonts (for example, the Euler fonts and bold math fonts), be sure to select either AMS-TeX or AMS-LaTeX.

Inclusion of external macro packages (\input or \usepackage, for example) not in standard TeX/LaTeX distributions is not allowed. These commands will be ignored by the LaTeX processor that produces the PDF preview. All macros invoked from such packages will have to be removed during the editing process, so please avoid using external packages. All user-defined macros also must be removed during the editing process. The replacement of user-defined macros with their expansions during editing can lead to errors.

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Making changes
You are free to make changes after you click the "Submit" button. Once you get the confirming Review Submitted screen, you may select the "Edit Review" button to go back to the "Review text" box. Make any desired changes and click "Submit" again. You may do this as many times as needed. If the preview of the PDF file is not as you expected, please make a note in the "Remarks" box to indicate your intentions.

If you submit an amended review in the same day (U.S. Eastern time), the new review simply writes over the old review and only the amended review will be entered in the editing system. If you submit an amendment on a later day, place a note in the "Remarks" box that your amended review is intended to replace the original submission.

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Reference lists in MathSciNet
Selected journals covered in MathSciNet have the reference lists from the individual papers included with the MathSciNet Full Item information. These reference lists are keyed and processed independently of review text. No action on your part is needed to include these reference lists. These reference lists do not replace the valuable references that you may add in your review text; they supplement that information.

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Automated confirmation of receipt of review
The receipt of your review is confirmed by an automated email system. These automated confirmations are sent out once per day.

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Updating your reviewer information
The View My Reviewer Info link takes you to a page with your reviewer information. Please check your list of classes and interests from time to time. These lists will determine the items that editors send you for review. At the top of the page you will find a link to change this information. While you will not see a change instantly take effect, your request will be sent to Mathematical Reviews for manual database updating. You may also use this page to send us updates to your name, email, or postal address. Note that changes to postal address are especially important when you are away from your usual location for an extended period of time. While the great majority of review items are sent out electronically, many, particularly monographs, are sent out in paper form.

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