This International Standard specifies the broad way in which scientific and technical reports should be presented and gives rules for those items where a uniform procedure will assist the
interchange of information either by aiding readers' understanding or facilitating the processing of the report in an information system. It does not consider matters of textual style or language, which must be guided at national or organizational levels.
Account has been taken throughout of the requirements laid on the producer of a scientific and technical report by the use of electronic or magnetic storage and retrieval, abstracting services and microform techniques in its eventual processing through information systems.