Indexing: Another way for authors to communicate

In submitting articles to some journals and bulletins, authors are responsible for indexing their own works. Indexing consists of identifying concepts and translating those concepts into indexing terms appropriate to the discipline and to indexing constraints. The constraints help an author/indexer decide how to determine the number and specificity of terms. In some systems indexing vocabulary is controlled by a thesaurus, which helps in selecting terms and considering alternatives. Authors as indexers should pursue the goal of all indexing — to match indexing assignments to the terms most likely to be chosen by prospective readers.