The deadline is 18 February

It always seems to me that there is always a long long time between the EuroPLoP submission deadline and the conference itself. In fact it always seems the deadline is way too early.

As Conference Chair this year I thought it would be my chance to fix this!

Then Till and I sat down (OK, he in Germany, me in England but Skype is a wonderful tool) and Planned Backward (a pattern, by the way, from Mark Prince.)

We knew when the conference was and we looked at all the things that needed to be done between submission and conference. These are:

• Collect submissions
  
• Review submissions
  
• Allocate shepherds
  
• Shepherding, post review 2
  
• Review shepherded papers
  
• Shepherding, pre review 2
  
• Confirm acceptance
  
• Decide workshop groupings
  
• Collect final papers
  
• Print draft proceedings
  

Confirm acceptance is actually more important than it looks. For those who work in Universities and other academic institutions it is this acceptance that brings their funding to attend the conference. So they need acceptance as early as possible to get the funding sorted out and get their tickets booked while they are still cheap.

Then there are those people coming from outside Europe who need to get a Schengen visa to attend the conference in Germany. In some countries (e.g. the UK) it can take six weeks and a personal visit to get a visa from the German embassy. So these people need time too.

(Yes I know UK nationals don’t need a visa to go to Germany – hurray for Europe! – but if you are a non-EU citizen living in the UK you probably do. Anyway, its the only German embassy I have experience of and as far I know they are all like this, but I digress.)

When you put it all together the submission deadline needs to be that early. Strange but true.

Still, Till and I did our best to set the deadline as late as possible. However this does mean we have to break a EuroPLoP tradition. The deadline won’t be moving this year.

In past years the submission deadline has slipped back a week or two, this year we don’t have the time to do that.

Time to submit your paper...

Michael, our web chair, has opened the submission page yesterday. This means that you can send us your paper. Please go to http://hillside.net/europlop/.

The artistic side of EuroPLoP

EuroPLoP is to a large extent about creativity. This is why we will have George Platts with us again in 2008. He is the artist in residence of EuroPLoP and does a great job in freeing the participants' minds for new ideas.

In 2007, Osorio Abath Neto filmed some of these activities. His video is postetd at YouTube.

BTW: George has a large affinity to the patterns community and is also making artistic sessions at OOPSLA .

Have fun!

PLoP on Wikipedia

Regular EuroPLoP attendees might be interested in contributing to the PLoP article on Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pattern_Languages_of_Programming

Dirk Riehle has started to push this article forward. Now it is your job to bring in the European touch in this article ;-).

Thematic Tracks for EuroPLoP 2007

First of all: Happy new year!

This year, we have introduced thematic tracks to extend the common themes of EuroPLoP. Thematic track organizers will work hard on bringing together experts with an interest in the thematic track to push pattern research forward in this specific area. Besides the traditional themes of EuroPLoP (e.g., Software development, Software design and architecture, Software management and development processes, Human computer interaction, or Business and organizational questions) we will now host the following three thematic tracks:

"Pragmatic and systematic approaches in applying patterns"
Organized by Paris Avgeriou (University of Groningen, The Netherlands), Neil B. Harrison (Utah Valley University, USA), and Uwe Zdun (Vienna University of Technology, Austria)
Contact: Paris Avgeriou, paris@cs.rug.nl

The application of the different types of patterns in practice has not met the expectations of the patterns community. Most practitioners are aware of the GoF patterns and some idioms in specific programming languages or platforms, but few of them work systematically with patters for architecture, analysis, process etc. The discipline of software engineering is significantly lacking in incorporating patterns in standardized and well-proven processes, methods, techniques and tools. This thematic track aims at studying the application of patterns in practice and enforcing the links between the patterns community and the practitioners. It envisions papers that present not only patterns but also their practical applications in real industrial projects, as well as papers on systematizing the application of patterns. It aims at stimulating a general discussion on how to disseminate the patterns literature more in the higher education and training. It hopes to provide visibility to research attempts for integrating patterns in software engineering industrial practices.

Patterns for Collaboration Technology and Processes
Organized by Stephan Lukosch (FernUniversität in Hagen, Germany), Gwendolyn L. Kolfschoten (Delft University of Technology, the Netherlands), Gert-Jan de Vreede (Institute for Collaboration Science, University of Nebraska at Omaha, USA) and Robert O. Briggs (Institute for Collaboration Science, University of Nebraska at Omaha, USA)
Contact: Stephan Lukosch, Stephan.Lukosch@Fernuni-Hagen.de

Designing collaboration technology and processes is a challenging task that often is poorly understood by practitioners. In particular, the design of collaboration technology and processes heavily depends on human factors. As such it is highly non-deterministic and complex as it has to consider the mutual understanding of the group members. The key challenge in these settings is twofold: a) how to design productive group processes for collaboration, and b) how to model, embed, or implement these group processes in computer technology and in the organization. Over the past years, various pattern based approaches have been developed to support the design of collaboration technology and processes. Early patterns for groupware development focussed on low-level issues, e.g., on infrastructures required to implement groupware. More recently, there is a growing interest in the definition and use of high-level patterns describing HCI issues in the context of groupware systems as well as patterns that focus on the design and facilitation of group processes, e.g. thinkLets. In this thematic track, we want to explore the characteristics and challenges of both high-level and low-level patterns for collaboration technology and processes.

Patterns for Tools and Pedagogies for Higher Education
Organized by Symeon Retalis (University of Piraeus, Greece) and Christian Kohls (KMRC – Knowledge Media Research Center, Tübingen, Gemany)
Contact: Symeon Retalis, retal@unipi.gr

Design patterns are about educating novices so that they can act as experts. Naturally, they can also educate educators so that they improve their teaching. This can mean that patterns describe innovative best practice of teaching but it can also mean that patterns describe tools that support the interaction between teacher, learner, and the subject that should be learned.

This thematic track will bring together experts from two areas of pattern research. Professional educators are invited to submit patterns for designing and structuring courses and other learning episodes. Designers of learning tools (E-Learning, CSCL) and multimedia content can contribute their knowledge on how to support good pedagogy with technology.

The submission procedure for thematic tracks is the same as for general submissions. The submission deadline is February 18. Please contact the organizers of the thematic tracks for more details.