Some journals are ‘born digital’ in that they are solely published on the web and in a digital format, but most electronic journals originated as print journals, which subsequently evolved to have an electronic version, while still maintaining a print component.
As academic research habits have changed in line with the growth of the internet, the e-journal has come to dominate the journals world. An e-journal closely resembles a print journal in structure: there is a table of contents which lists the articles, and many electronic journals still use a volume/issue model, although some titles now publish on a continuous basis. Online journal articles are a specialized form of electronic document: they have the purpose of providing material for academic research and study, and they are formatted approximately like journal articles in traditional printed journals. Often a journal article will be available for download in two formats – as a PDF and in HTML format, although other electronic file types are often supported for supplementary material. Articles are indexed in bibliographic databases, as well as by search engines. E-journals allow new types on content to be included in journals, for example video material, or the data sets on which research has been based.
