The International Journal of Performability Engineering (IJPE) adopts the best practices on ethical matters, errors, and retractions. Especially, IJPE follows the Core Practices defined by the Committee of Publication Ethics (COPE). Conformance to standards of ethical behavior is expected of all parties involved: Authors, Editors, Reviewers, and the Publisher. Any kind of unethical behavior will not be accepted. Below are some important highlights for the IJPE community.

Authors 

• ● When authors submit their manuscripts to IJPE, they also affirm that the contents are original with no fraudulent data. Furthermore, they warrant that their manuscripts have neither been published elsewhere in any language fully or partly, nor are they under review for publication anywhere else. In addition, authors will sign a copyright agreement with IJPE.
• ● Authors should avoid using subjective, possibly misleading, and non-justified wording to describe their research. They should provide enough details without potential ambiguities to allow others to replicate the experiments.
• ● IJPE does not tolerate plagiarism in any form. This journal uses iThenticate’s Crossref Similarity Check software to detect instances of overlap and similar text in submitted manuscripts. The overlap between a submission and other articles, including the authors’ own publications, should be less than 35%. Authors should not copy and paste paragraphs from other papers, including their own publications.
• ● Authors need to make sure that they have no conflicts of interest of any kind with IJPE. They should also check that all co-authors meet criteria for authorship and ensure appropriate acknowledgements are made in the manuscripts.
• ● The corresponding author should ensure that there is a full consensus of all co-authors in approving the final version of the paper and its submission for publication.
• ● After papers are published, authors should inform IJPE if they subsequently find any errors in their research.

Editors

• ● The Editor-in-Chief makes the final decision based on associate editors’ recommendations to accept, reject, or request modifications to submitted manuscripts. Each review should be conducted in a fair and an impartial manner. It should be exclusively on the basis of the manuscript’s academic merit including originality, contribution, soundness, presentation, and relatedness.
• ● Editors shall not have any conflict of interest with respect to the manuscript under review. They should take appropriate actions if any misconduct is suspected and ensure the integrity of the academic record. Anonymity of reviewers shall be maintained during the review process.
• ● Editors must not use unpublished information in the editor's own research without the expressed written consent of the authors.
• ● Editors should take reasonable responsive measures when ethical complaints have been presented concerning a submitted manuscript or published paper.

Reviewers

• ● Any manuscripts received for review must be treated as confidential documents. Privileged information or ideas obtained through peer review must be kept confidential and not used for personal advantage.
• ● Reviews should be conducted objectively, and observations should be formulated clearly with supporting arguments, so that authors can use them to improve the paper. Reviewers should avoid using biased words in their comments.
• ● Reviewers should point out relevant published work that is not yet cited. Reviewers must ensure that authors have fully referenced and cited all relevant sources of information used in their research. However, reviewers should not suggest authors to cite their own work. Under specific conditions, reviewers may ask the handling editors if they allow recommending specific self-citations with justification. The decision will be made on a case by case basis.
• ● Any selected reviewer who feels unqualified to review the research reported in a manuscript or knows that its prompt review will be impossible should notify the editor and excuse himself/herself from the review process.
• ● Reviewers should not evaluate manuscripts in which they have conflicts of interest resulting from competitive, collaborative, or other relationships or connections with any of the authors, companies, or institutions connected to the papers.