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Is there a website where i could read/download math reviews appeared in the above Journal?

Of course, I guess all the reviews are available on ZBMATH https://zbmath.org/, which is not free for access. Besides, the reviews (before 1990s) on ZBMATH are uploaded as scanned files, not very clear and non-searchable.

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    $\begingroup$ Sorry, zbMATH is free. There are some restrictions for users (see zbmath.org/terms-conditions). $\endgroup$
    – user64494
    Mar 3, 2019 at 14:07
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    $\begingroup$ @user64494 "Free access is limited to 3 results, and filter functions are disabled. For full access subscription is required." $\endgroup$
    – student
    Mar 3, 2019 at 14:19
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    $\begingroup$ I see a certain contradiction between having it freely available without restrictions and improving the quality. $\endgroup$ Mar 4, 2019 at 7:16
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    $\begingroup$ It's indeed not free. Good news, it should be free from 2021 on $\endgroup$
    – YCor
    Feb 8, 2020 at 15:13

1 Answer 1

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  1. The site you mention is partially free. Without the subscription it gives you a reduced version. Basically, the reduction consists in giving you only 3 first items on any search you try to make. If you state your search parameters smartly, you can extract a lot of information using this reduced version. It also gives you author's profiles.

  2. Those reviews that they have in TeX are available in pdf. Those which were written before the spread of TeX are simply scanned. Your complain that they are poorly legible seems strange: how would you imagine old printed texts are converted to electronic formats? Only by scanning. Or do you think someone will hire great armies of qualified people to put them in TeX, and then distribute them for free?

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    $\begingroup$ @ Alexandre Eremenko: If the database is sold as "a product", then they could surely improve its quality, say, using more clear files. Some reviews are written by true experts and hence useful to other math workers. Simply uploading non-searchable scanned files greatly reduced its function. $\endgroup$
    – student
    Mar 3, 2019 at 14:28
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    $\begingroup$ @student: the ZblMath database is indeed a very useful product. And it was useful also 20 years ago when it existed on paper only, when the only "search feature" was a paper index. Converting old mathematical literature into searchable files will not justify expenses. $\endgroup$ Mar 3, 2019 at 14:34
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    $\begingroup$ @Alexandre Eremenko it is understandable that ZB simply scanned old stuff, but it is not inconceivable to retype old reviews in LaTeX. For example, MathSciNet has all of its past reviews back to 1940 in TeX format. I don't know if they hired "great armies" to accomplish that task, but obviously it was a substantial investment of time and resources. And ZB is less than 10 years older than Math Reviews. Maybe Ed Dunne will see this post and comment on the different approaches taken by MR and ZB to making old reviews electronically accessible (at least for those with subscriptions). $\endgroup$
    – KConrad
    Mar 3, 2019 at 14:43
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    $\begingroup$ "non-searchable" is a solved problem, though it is annoyingly hard to apply in practice (there are OCR libraries around, but no "one-click" solutions to my knowledge). $\endgroup$ Mar 3, 2019 at 18:15
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    $\begingroup$ I suppose everyone agrees that math papers are more important than their reviews. Can you give me a single math journal of pre-TeX era, which has been re-typed in TeX? All we have on Internet are scanneed copies, some are better, others worse. Even for books re-typing is extremelly rare. $\endgroup$ Mar 4, 2019 at 3:19

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