Aims and Scope:  The World Wide Web and its associated technologies have become a major implementation and delivery platform for a large variety of applications, ranging from simple institutional information Web sites to sophisticated supply-chain management systems, financial applications, e-government, distance learning, and entertainment, among others. Such applications, in addition to their intrinsic functionality, also exhibit the more complex behavior of distributed applications.

Recently, there have been some advances towards re-framing the development - both design and implementation - of Web applications as a disciplined and systematic endeavor. However, the vast majority of existing applications have been developed in an ad-hoc way, leading to problems of maintainability, quality and reliability. Web applications are software artifacts, and as such can benefit by making use of established practices stemming from several related disciplines such as Software Engineering, Hypermedia, Information Systems, Human-Computer Interaction and Organizational Science, enabling creation, management and reuse of structures of the information space as well as enhancing the end-user experience. In addition, it has its own characteristics which must be addressed, such as a varied user population, very short development turnaround times, diverse runtime environments, accessibility through multiple devices, etc.

Web Engineering is the scientific discipline that studies the theory and practice of constructing Web-based systems and applications. This includes theoretical principles and systematic, disciplined and quantifiable approaches towards the cost-effective development and evolution of high-quality, ubiquitously usable Web-based systems and applications. It fundamentally concerns the technology which enables the construction of Web applications. Web Engineering, while rooted in Computer Science and Engineering, draws from a diverse range of  other disciplines, such as information science, information systems, management and business, among others.

Web Engineering encompasses, but is not restricted to:
* Web application development methods and processes
* Web application development tools and environments
* Modeling and model-based design and development
* Component-based Web application development
* Navigation and hypermedia
* Content retrieval and search
* Human-computer interaction and user modeling
* Web application usability
* Adaptive Web applications and personalization
* Web application deployment
* Web application quality, metrics and measurement
* Web application evaluation, verification and validation
* Testing automation, methods and tools for Web applications
* Performance modeling, monitoring and evaluation
* Federated and cross-organizational Web applications
* Service-oriented Web application approaches 
* Implementation Architectures
* Use and integration of meta-data in Web applications
* Application of Semantic Web technology in Web applications
* Web design patterns and pattern mining
* Web Engineering education

The Journal of Web Engineering (JWE) aims to provide a forum for advancing the scientific state of knowledge in all areas of Web Engineering. Original articles, survey articles, reviews, tutorials, perspectives, and general correspondence are all welcome. Appropriate submissions should address significant issues and problems, and potential solutions, and will be reviewed in accordance with peer review conventions.

Besides the regular paper submission and reviewing process, JWE also publishes special issues. These special issues are typically theme-based. This means that they have a coherent focus on a given theme and the set of papers contained in the issue together deepen the understanding of the Web Engineering discipline or explore the bounds of the discipline. As such, the special issue is different from a regular issue that contains a number of papers within the journal's scope, by its focus on one theme relevant for the discipline. Proposals for special issues are welcome and need to specify and motivate the theme and the composition of the set of papers to be included. The papers in a special issue will go through a regular process of reviewing.