[seqfan] Re: Broadening involvement

Charles Greathouse charles.greathouse at case.edu
Sat Jun 9 17:52:11 CEST 2012


> First thing is to enter these sequences in the OEIS by ourselves: anyone
> looking up these sequences may find them along with the original article.

Yes, absolutely.  The example I gave is A005646.

> If you are knowledgeable in an under-represented subject in the OEIS,
> any fresh publication (article, blog, ...) from you mentioning the
> OEIS with links and description can help.

Yes.  Any sort of publicity in those under-represented subjects is
good.  And of course adding new sequences -- or adding information
about the applicability of existing sequences to those subjects -- is
also useful.

Charles Greathouse
Analyst/Programmer
Case Western Reserve University

On Fri, Jun 8, 2012 at 7:46 PM, Olivier Gerard <olivier.gerard at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Sat, Jun 9, 2012 at 1:17 AM, Charles Greathouse <
> charles.greathouse at case.edu> wrote:
>
>> Sequence fans, I've been pondering ways to increase the representation of
>> fields in the OEIS.
>>
>> Combinatorics, number theory, recreational math, and computer science are
>> well-represented, as are a few others. But other fields of math have much
>> less, and outside of math (biology, chemistry, economics, physics, ...)
>> there is very little. Perhaps well-defined integer sequences are simply
>> hard to find outside of these few fields. But the thesis is dubious -- I've
>> seen at least two papers devoted exclusively to an integer sequence
>> published in anthropology journals, and I recall an ornithology paper about
>> combinatorial syntax of songbirds.  More likely, I think, is that people in
>> other fields are unaware (or less-aware) of the OEIS.
>>
>>
> First thing is to enter these sequences in the OEIS by ourselves: anyone
> looking up these sequences may find them along with the original article.
>
>
>
>> Probably this is self-reinforcing: if there were more such sequences others
>> would find the OEIS more useful and be more likely to read it -- and
>> contribute to it -- in the future.  So how can we get from here to there?
>>
>>
> The second thing seems to contact the author of these articles on behalf
> of the OEIS, and invite them (and propose your help) to submit other
> sequences
> they might have, especially if they are planning new articles on related
> subjects.
> I have found out that several authors of articles I contacted did know
> and use the OEIS to check whether their sequence was known but did not
> bother to enter them if it wasn't, or stumbled on a small user interface
> difficulty
> when doing so, did not make any reference to the encyclopedia or did not
> insist it was
> kept when a journal editor suggested otherwise.
> Of course, if they didn't know about the OEIS, they might be grateful or
> indifferent.
>
> Another (more difficult or more specific) strategy would be to publish
> something in the same
> journals and insist that sequences in your article be referenced by the
> OEIS. If you
> are knowledgeable in an under-represented subject in the OEIS, any fresh
> publication
> (article, blog, ...) from you mentioning the OEIS with links and
> description can help.
>
> Olivier
>
> _______________________________________________
>
> Seqfan Mailing list - http://list.seqfan.eu/



More information about the SeqFan mailing list