VL/HCC 2024
Mon 2 - Fri 6 September 2024 Liverpool, United Kingdom

Call for Posters and Showpieces

The Posters and Showpieces track (called the “showpieces track” for short) offers an interactive and unique opportunity to discuss recent research, experiences, challenges, ideas, prototypes, and accomplishments with the VL/HCC community. Formerly called “posters and demonstrations”, the category now includes posters, videos, demos, downloadable apps, handouts, electronic devices, physical prototypes, or any other artifacts that facilitate meaningful interactions and discussions with other conference attendees.

Topics and Purpose of Showpieces

A broad range of topics are appropriate for showpieces:

  • Visual languages: Novel visual languages, Design, evaluation, and theory of visual languages and applications, Development of systems for manipulating and interacting with diagrammatic representations
  • Human aspects and psychology of software development and language design, such as supporting inclusion and diversity in programming
  • End-user development, adaptation and programming, Creation and evaluation of technologies and infrastructures for end-user development
  • Representations: Novel representations and user interfaces for expressing computation, Software, algorithm and data visualization
  • Modeling: Model-driven development, Domain-specific languages, including modeling languages, Visual modeling of human behavior and socio-technical systems
  • Thinking more deeply about code: Computational thinking and Computer Science education, Debugging and program understanding, Explainable ML/AI
  • Future of work with AI: Human-Centric AI-based tools, modeling end-user interactions with AI powered tools
  • Low Code/No Code paradigm: Approaches for creation and deployment of fully functional applications using visual abstractions and interfaces

The following non-exhaustive list illustrates the possibilities:

  • Current research in progress. This might include:
    • Original or innovative technologies or prototypes that may or may not be accompanied by an evaluation
    • Short qualitative or quantitative studies
  • Reflections, provocations, or proposals about theory or methods
  • Results presented in the main VL/HCC conference or already presented at another venues
  • Existing commercial products and/or services
  • Efforts aimed at integrating research into education
  • Efforts aimed at commercializing research

Showpieces can help accomplish many goals, such as:

  • Helping graduate student presenters to meet faculty from other universities
  • Building community interest in a novel way of approaching a research topic
  • Starting conversations that could lead to new collaborations
  • Demonstrating to industry sponsors that a specific line of research has practical applications
  • Showcasing products or services available for sale

Submitting a Showpiece

Each submission will consist solely of a PDF file describing the showpiece, its motivation, and its relation to the VL/HCC audience. Submissions should follow the standard IEEE Conference Proceedings format, which includes Word / LaTeX templates for the submission.

Submission should be performed via the EasyChair system.

The PDF may be 1-2 pages in length, plus up an additional 1-2 additional pages containing only acknowledgements and an appendix of only figures, plus additional unlimited pages for references. A submission must include the following content:

Title and Authors

A title and list of authors. (Note that, unlike research papers, posters/showpieces are single-blind reviewed so please include author names here.)

Abstract

An abstract summarizing the submission.

Body

The body of the document should clearly convey the following (though it is not recommended to explicitly structure the submission as such):

  • Content and claims: Describe the technical content of a showpiece, such as a research result, an effort to integrate research with education, an existing product, etc. Include any claims or conclusions which follow.
  • Relevance: Explain why this content will be of interest to the VL/HCC community, highlighting any novelty.
  • Presentation: Describe how the showpiece will be presented, for example, in a video, poster, demo, or device. Posters and software demos are particularly recommended this year, as they could make for an engaging presentation.
  • References: Not required, but may be included if doing so helps to communicate the topical content, claims, novelty, or relevance.

The Submission Is Not The Showpiece Itself

The submission is a description of the showpiece, and not the showpiece itself. The showpiece itself does not need to be submitted, nor does it need to exist when the PDF is submitted. For example, if the showpiece will be a video, then the video does not need to be submitted with the PDF. If the showpiece does not yet exist, the submission should simply explain what showpiece will be created to present the relevant content.

Reviewing Options

When submitting a showpiece, you may indicate whether you would like the showpiece to be published or not.

Non-publishable submissions will be reviewed based on two criteria:

  1. Relevance and interest to the VL/HCC community
  2. Intelligibility of the submission.

Submissions accepted as non-publishable submissions will not be included in the proceedings. Non-publishable submissions are not archival, i.e., their publication will not influence whether the same work may be considered for the papers track of VL/HCC in a following year.

The publishable showpieces category is a venue for peer-reviewed, archival quality papers. Specifically, publishable submissions will be reviewed based on the criteria above as well as the following:

  1. Novelty
  2. Significance
  3. Validity of any claims or conclusions stated.

Thus, publishable submissions should be at an appropriate standard to be included in the conference proceedings as archival papers. They should make standalone contributions that are intelligible even in the absence of the actual showpiece.

Submitters may opt to have publishable submissions omitted from the proceedings, in case they wish to avoid any possibility of a prior-publication issue with a future archival publication. If this is the case, please email the PC chairs.

If a submission fails to meet the criteria for publication, but could be accepted as a non-publishable submission, then we may suggest switching the submission to be non-publishable. For example, a submission presenting work that already will be appearing elsewhere in the main conference would be a reasonable non-publishable submission, but it might not meet the novelty criterion required for a publishable submission.

Publication and Presentation

Publishable submissions that are accepted to be included in the VL/HCC proceedings will appear on the IEEE Xplore Digital Library website, provided that at least one author registers for the conference and that the camera-ready copy is submitted by the deadline.

All authors of showpieces will present their work in a dedicated showpieces session during the main conference. We currently plan for physical presentation in a large room simultaneously, with each presenter allocated a specific assigned space for presenting a showpiece.

Adhering to IEEE Guidelines

Please be sure that your submission follows the IEEE requirements:

https://conferences.ieeeauthorcenter.ieee.org/author-ethics/guidelines-and-policies/submission-policies/

Especially around Human Subject approvals and use of Generative AI:

Research on Human and Animal Subjects

Excerpted from the IEEE Publication Services and Products Board (PSPB) Operations Manual, sections 8.1.1.E. Also see section 8.2.1.B.6: https://pspb.ieee.org/images/files/PSPB/opsmanual.pdf

Authors of articles reporting on research involving human subjects or animals, including but extending beyond medical research, shall include a statement in the article that the research was performed under the oversight of an institutional review board or equivalent local/regional body, including the official name of the IRB/ethics committee, or include an explanation as to why such a review was not conducted. For research involving human subjects, authors shall also report that consent from the human subjects in the research was obtained or explain why consent was not obtained.

Guidelines for Artificial Intelligence (AI)-Generated Text

The use of content generated by artificial intelligence (AI) in a paper (including but not limited to text, figures, images, and code) shall be disclosed in the acknowledgments section of any paper submitted to an IEEE publication. The AI system used shall be identified, and specific sections of the paper that use AI-generated content shall be identified and accompanied by a brief explanation regarding the level at which the AI system was used to generate the content.

The use of AI systems for editing and grammar enhancement is common practice and, as such, is generally outside the intent of the above policy. In this case, disclosure as noted above is recommended.

Important Dates

  • Submission deadline: June 25, 2024
  • Notifications: July 8, 2024
  • Camera-ready: July 16, 2024

All dealines are AoE.