Instructions

ALFA is a diamond/platinum open-access journal, which means that all content is freely available to the public and there are currently no Article Processing Charges (APCs).

Authors are also not paid for any of the stages of article submission, evaluation, or publication.

The journal operation is funded from the budget resources of the Faculty (subsidy from the Ministry). Free proofreading of the final accepted submissions is included.

All articles published in the journal are subject to unconditional compliance with international copyright laws and established rules of moral and ethical principles of publishing, which exclude any forms of plagiarism.

Since issue 1/2023, articles have been published under the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY 4.0) licence: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/deed.en. Different types of licensing were used throughout the history of the journal dating back to the year 1996.

Authors retain copyright while granting ALFA the right of first publication. Authors retain the following rights (as stated in the Open Access License): all copyrights, the right to use the substance of the article in future own works, including lectures and books, the right to reproduce the article for own purposes, provided the copies are not offered for sale, the right to self-archive the article.

For all articles published in this journal, copyright is retained by the authors, unless stated otherwise in older publications.

For previously published content, prior to submission, authors shall obtain permission to reproduce any published material (figures, tables, text, etc.) that does not fall into the public domain or on which they do not hold the copyright.

Permission is required for authors’ own work that has been published by another publisher and on which they did not retain copyright, for substantial extracts from the work of another author, for tables, graphs, charts, schemes, and artworks if they are unaltered or slightly modified, and for photographs on which the authors do not hold copyright.

Permission is not required for a reconstruction of an author’s own table with data that have already been published elsewhere (however, the data sources must be cited properly, e.g. “Data from…” or “Adapted from…”); short quotes, graphs, charts, schemes, and artwork that are completely redrawn by the authors and significantly changed beyond recognition do not require permission (however, authors need to check the copyright permissions of any underlying data).

The copyright holder may give authors instructions for the form of acknowledgement, in case they provide you with their permission. We recommend using the following statement: “Reproduced with permission from [author], [book/journal title]; published by [publisher], [year]”.

Submission Deadlines and Publishing Schedule

2026

31 January – ALFA 1 (published on 13 March)
25 April – ALFA 2 (published on 12 June)
6 June – ALFA 3 (published on 4 September)
26 September – ALFA 4 (published on 4 December)

General Information

The authors are required to acquaint themselves with the following documents and comply with all the provided information when submitting their manuscripts including all associated documents:

1. Peer Review Policy
2. Open Access License (needs to be signed by an author and returned electronically) – since issue 1/2021

• New contributions are accepted solely in English and in a formal scientific style.
• The editor will arrange for free spell- and grammar check, and stylistic revision of the accepted papers.
• All authors are required to send their submissions electronically via Editorial Manager (since 22 Aug 2022).
• All authors are required to provide their ORCID iD at submission (since 13 April 2026).
• The authors have the obligation to reveal any personal interest, financial benefit, or relationship that has the potential to be affected by the publication of the submitted manuscript. Sources of funding must be acknowledged in the manuscript. All authors must disclose any financial or personal relationships with other people or organisations that could inappropriately influence their work. All funding sources must be acknowledged (grant numbers and agency names), including the role of the funder in the study design or data collection. If the funder had no involvement in the research process or publication decision, this must be stated.
• If no conflicts of interest exist, the authors should state: “The authors declare no conflicts of interest.”
• Authors are recommended to provide CRediT Author Statement defining both the author and the contributor using the Contributor Roles Taxonomy (CRediT). For all multi-authored papers, a CRediT statement must be provided using the following roles: Conceptualization, Methodology, Software, Validation, Formal Analysis, Investigation, Resources, Data Curation, Writing – Original Draft, Writing – Review & Editing, Visualisation, Supervision, Project Administration, Funding Acquisition. The information may be specified in the Editorial Manager (from 7 April 2026), when submitting the manuscript and/or directly in the article template. This statement will be placed above the acknowledgement section of the published paper.
• As of 1 October 2025, authors must remove all information identifying them from the submitted manuscript for the review. Such information can include author names and affiliations, contact details, acknowledgment and funding sections, identifying phrases, or file properties and names. This information can be added to the manuscript just after the review. Authors should submit a separate title page that contains all the identifying information. This file will be kept by the journal’s editorial office and will not be sent to the reviewers.

Article Categories

To ensure a comprehensive exchange of ideas, the journal features a variety of content types (new since May 2026):

• Editorial – an invited paper presenting a new journal issue by a member of the Editorial Board or a guest editor of a special issue
• Research article – original research, or research by design as a rigorous mode of inquiry, with a clear methodology and new findings that advance the field, including the most recent and relevant references or design procedures
• Review – a comprehensive analysis of the existing literature with identification of present gaps/problems and recommendations for future research, no unpublished data referenced
• Short communication – concise research reports presenting groundbreaking preliminary results, significant observational studies, or impactful project outcomes with a conclusion and recommendations for future implications, strategies, and other project details
• Theory – critical investigation of the concepts, ideologies, methodologies, and histories that constitute the philosophical background of a field while presenting new intellectual argument(s) or re-evaluating existing paradigms through a rigorous scholarly inquiry

Recommended extent: Editorial 1-2 pages in the provided template, others 6,000 -10,000 words depending on the category. The total length of the document does not include tables, charts/graphs, captions/legends to figures, and references.

Text Layout and Arrangement

• Manuscripts must be submitted in the Word template (click to download), edited, without inserted figures. Authors are required to keep all the elements of the template format. Please note that using other programs than Microsoft Word, even its online or mobile versions, and copy-pasting texts from elsewhere may result in serious unexpected changes in the template document, which are sometimes impossible or very difficult to correct. If you are using Microsoft Word online, save the template document to your computer and continue editing it outside the online version. It is also recommended to type directly into the template to prevent any formatting issues that occur with the copying of the content from a different document. If you still decide to copy and paste any text to the template, automatic hyphenation must be turned off for the source text being copied. This is especially important to follow when using a different text editor, including a different version of the recommended non-online MS Word.
• Title of the paper captures the essence of the topic, it should be concise. The title must not include abbreviations; if the main title does not capture the entire scope of the topic, the author may add a subtitle.
• The template includes more specific information on how to write the paper and what to include.

Supplementary Texts

• Authors must supply each article (except Editorial) also with an extra summary in English that is 5,400 characters long and with keywords or key expressions (up to 7), as a separate document. Please note the length different from the abstract in the main paper.

Figures, Photographs, and Graphics

• The main author of the article shall be responsible for the copyright to graphical materials. Please allow enough time to carefully verify all copyrights related to all content used in your submission whether it is online, in print, or in person, be it graphics or text.
• Diagrams, schemes, drawings, and photographs must be good quality originals or digital copies. Bitmap graphics has to be supplied in formats such as .jpg, .png/.tif (if text is included), vector graphics in the .pdf format, tables and charts/graphs in the .doc, .docx or .xml format (tables are unsuitable provided as images).
• Photographs must be supplied in the maximum resolution and size possible, not optimized and not compressed. The minimal resolution of all graphic elements is 300 dpi.
• Every image (photograph, drawing and the like) must bear a caption/legend stating the legitimate author and source, including year.
• Submitted figures must not be part of the text document. Authors indicate their preferred placement in the article by e. g.: Fig. 1.
• Tables, charts/graphs, diagrams and schemes must be placed at the end of the text or in separate files, their placement must be indicated in the text, e. g.: Tab. 1.

Declaration of generative artificial intelligence (AI) in scientific writing

• The use of AI tools in the manuscript preparation process must be declared by adding a statement at the end of the manuscript when the paper is first submitted. The statement will appear in the published work and should be placed in a new section before the references list, see an example in the submission template (paragraph titled ‘Declaration of generative AI in manuscript preparation’). If authors have nothing to disclose, they do not need to add the statement.
• Copywriting (creating, drafting, or writing) any part of a submission using generative AI tools and technology to generate new material is not permitted. Authors are allowed to use generative AI and AI-assisted technologies in the writing process before submission solely to improve the language and readability of their paper and with the appropriate disclosure.
• Applying the technology should be done with human oversight and control, and authors should carefully review and edit the result, as AI can generate authoritative-sounding output that can be incorrect, incomplete, or biased.
• AI and AI-assisted technologies should not be listed as an author or co-author, or be cited as an author. Authorship implies responsibilities and tasks that can only be attributed to and performed by humans. Authors are ultimately responsible and accountable for the contents of the work.

Bibliography

• Authors take full responsibility for the accuracy of their references. Please add the DOI number or URL of a full-text version if it exists. The DOI of journal papers can be found on page http://www.crossref.org/SimpleTextQuery/ (you need to register first). DOIs must be given for conference papers too. Insert DOI as an active link in the following format (example): https://doi.org/[DOI].
• Author names are expected in the “Family, C.” format where “C” is the initial of the first name.
• Provide the complete title of the publication (the title of the paper, book, book chapter, standard, patent). Do not abbreviate journal or conference names, e.g. write “World Transactions on Engineering and Technology Education” instead of “World Trans. on Engng. and Technol. Educ.”.
• All items of the reference list must be directly cited in the body of the text using the Harvard in-text citation. Citations may be made directly (or parenthetically).
• Each citation in the text must be included in the reference list.
• Reference style (since 2024 – all citations in the text should refer to:
  • Single author: the author’s name (without initials, unless there is ambiguity) and the year of publication,
  • Two authors: both authors’ names and the year of publication,
  • Three or more authors: first author’s name followed by ‘et al.’ and the year of publication.
• Groups of references should be listed first alphabetically, then chronologically. References should be arranged first alphabetically and then further sorted chronologically if necessary.
• More than one reference from the same author(s) in the same year must be identified by the letters ‘a’, ‘b’, ‘c’, etc., placed after the year of publication. Examples: ‘as demonstrated (Allan, 2000a, 2000b, 1999; Allan and Jones, 1999). Kramer et al. (2010) have recently shown ….’

Sample Reference List

Journal articles:

• Author, A. and Author, B. (Year) “Title of article”, Complete Title of the Journal, Volume(Number), pp. xxx–xxx. https://doi.org/[DOI]

Journal articles without DOI (publically available on the internet):

• Author, A. et al. (Year) “Title of article”, Complete Title of the Journal, Volume(Number), pp. xxx–xxx. [online] Available at: URL [Accessed: date (day month year)]

Chapters of books:

• Author, A. B. (Year) “Title of a chapter in the book”, In: Title of the Published Book, Publisher, City of Publisher, Country, pp. xxx–xxx. https://doi.org/[DOI]

Chapters of edited books:

• Chapter author(s) (Year) “Title of a chapter in the book”, In: Book editor(s) with (ed. or eds.) Title of the Published Book, Publisher, City of Publisher, Country, pp. xxx–xxx. https://doi.org/[DOI]

Books:

• Author, A. B. (Year) “Title of the book”, Publisher, City of Publisher, Country. https://doi.org/[DOI]

Conference proceedings (published):

• Author, A. B. (Year) “Title of paper”, In: Name of Conference, City of Conference, Country, pp. xxx–xxx. https://doi.org/[DOI]

Papers presented at conferences (unpublished):

• Author, A. B. (Year) “Title of paper”, presented at Name of Conference, City of Conference, Country, Abbreviated Month, Day, Year.

Dissertations/Theses and e-version:

• Author, A. B. (Year) “Title of dissertation”, Level, Official name of the University.
• Author, A. B. (Year) “Title of dissertation”, Level, Official name of the University. Available at: URL [Accessed: date (day month year)]

Websites:

• Authorship or Source “Title of the web document or webpage”. [online] Available at: web address/URL [Accessed: date (day month year)]

Reports:

• Author, A. B. (Year) “Title of the report”, Name of the Corporation, City of the Corporation, Country, Rep. xxx.

Patents:

• Inventor name, Initials, Assignee (Year) “Title of the patent”, Place, Patent number (status, if an application).

Standards:

• Corporate author (Year of Publication) “Identifying letters and numbers and full title of Standard”, Publisher, Place of publication.

PDF documents (for example, a Government publication or similar which is freely available):

• Authorship “Title of document”, [pdf] Publisher, Place of publication (if known). Available at: web address or URL for the actual pdf [Accessed: date (day month year)]

Computer Program:

• Authorship/Organisation “Title of program, (Version)”, [computer program]. Available at: web address/URL [Accessed: date (day month year)]

European Union (EU) documents:

• The name of the Institution where the document originates (e.g. Commission), Form (e.g. Directive or Decision), Year/Legislation number/ Initials of Institution followed by the date it was passed if known, followed by the title.

Newspaper articles:

• Author, A. B. (Year) “Title of article or column header”, Full Title of Newspaper, Day and month before page numbers and column line.

Online newspaper articles:

• Author or corporate author (Year) “Title of document or page”, Name of newspaper, [online] additional date information. Available at: URL [Accessed: date (day month year)]

Archive material:

• Author, A. B. (Year) “Title of document”, [type of medium] Collection, Document number, Name of Library/Archive/Repository, Geographical Town/Place.

Cited papers not in English, give the title in the original language, then the translation to English, and a remark at the end: (in [Language]):

• Author, A. B. (Year) “Name of paper” (English translation), Complete Title of the Journal, Volume(Number), pp. xxx–xxx. (in [Language]) https://doi.org/[DOI]

Last update: 30 April 2026