[agents] [CFP] ACM-SAC 2009 APSLA Track: Agent-Oriented Programming, Systems, Languages, and Applications

[Eric Platon]

*** Apologies for multiple postings! ***

First Call-for-papers

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APSLA, Agent-Oriented Programming, Systems, Languages, and Applications
Track of the ACM Symposium on Applied Computing, 24th Edition
Honolulu, Hawaii, USA,
March 8 - 12, 2009
http://apsla.ex.nii.ac.jp/
===============================================

---
For organization updates, formatting and submission instructions:
Web site of ACM SAC 2009: http://www.acm.org/conferences/sac/sac2009/
---

APSLA aims at investigating how multi-agent technologies can  
contribute to the engineering of complex software systems. The  
inherent distribution of resources and processes, and the frequently  
changing operational conditions in the requirements of modern systems  
emphasize the need for decentralized control, and open and adaptive  
software, where multi-agent technologies provide suitable models and  
techniques.

This second edition of APSLA focuses on two topics of interest  
identified after the present state of research, the outcomes of the  
first edition, and related events in the agent community:
--- Theme 1: Engineering Self-Adaptive and Self-Organizing Systems.
This theme focuses on adaptive systems. Agent technologies are used  
increasingly to the purpose of self-adaptation and self-organization,  
as can be observed in Autonomic Computing. The aim of this theme is to  
gather research that discusses these two approaches in system  
engineering with multi-agent technologies. Papers of particular  
interest should report on engineering practice and experience.
--- Theme 2: "Pragmatic programming": Let's talk about debugging,  
testing, and validating agent systems.
This theme focuses explicitly on pragmatics in programming systems  
based on multi-agent technologies. The current state of the art shows  
a certain amount of work related to practice with multi-agent  
technologies, but also limited investigations in topics such as  
debugging, testing, and validation of multi-agent-based systems. Agile  
and formal methods are two aspects that are particularly relevant to  
this theme.

Papers may address any stage of software development that pertains to  
the two themes of this year edition, including requirement analysis,  
architectural design, detailed design, implementation, and testing.  
Papers may report on processes and methods in addition to tools and  
techniques. Of particular interest are papers with perspectives that  
cut across the traditional boundaries of languages, systems and  
applications in the development of complex distributed software systems.

Submissions will be considered as full-paper submissions in the review  
process (5 pages in ACM format, plus 3 purchasable extra pages). High  
quality submissions will be selected as full-papers and eligible for  
best paper award. Other submissions will be considered either as short  
papers (2 pages and poster), or rejected if they do not meet theme or  
quality requirements.

APSLA aims at a high quality event and the first edition featured an  
acceptance rate inferior to 18%. This second edition will pursue the  
same target, and the organizing team is considering about inviting the  
best papers of the track to a special issue of an international  
journal related to the two themes of this year edition.

--- Submission process and format ---
The submission process is double-blinded: Name and affiliation of the  
authors must NOT appear on the submissions. The process is supported  
by an eCMS paper management tool:
http://sac.cs.iupui.edu/SAC2009/

Submissions must represent original and previously unpublished work that
is not currently under review in any other conference or journal.
Submitted papers should meet the 5-page length in the ACM two-column
format, with the purchasable option for 8 pages in total.

Important note on the page number: If a paper submitted for reviews is  
more than 5 pages (and less than the strict maximum of 8 pages), the  
authors shall be aware that we reserve the right to reconsider the  
acceptance of the camera-ready version if it is reduced to 5 pages and  
the quality of the paper becomes unacceptable for publication.

Papers should be submitted in PDF format exclusively.

--- Important dates ---
Aug 16, 2008 : Submission of papers by authors (Blind review: The name  
of the authors must not appear on the submission).
Oct 11, 2008 : Notification of paper acceptance/rejection.
Oct 25, 2008 : Camera-ready copies of accepted papers.

--- Organizers ---
Eric Platon, NII, Japan
Alessandro Ricci, Università di Bologna, Italy
Fuyuki Ishikawa, Sokendai, Japan

--- Program Committee ---
Gul Agha
     University of Illinois at Urbana-Champain, USA
Olivier Boissier
     Ecole des Mines de Saint-Etienne, France
Rafael Bordini
     Durham University, UK
Jean-Pierre Briot
     Université Paris 6, France
Rubén Fuentes
     Universidad Computense Madrid, Spain
Alessandro Garcia
     Lancaster University, UK
Benjamin Hirsch
     TU Berlin, Germany
Jomi Fred Hübner
     Universidade Regional de Blumenau, Brazil
Fabien Michel
     Université de Reims, France
Hiroyuki Nakagawa
     University of Electro-Communications, Japan
Van Parunak
     NewVectors Inc., USA
Jean-François Perrot
     Université Paris 6, France
Jose Ghislain Quenum
     Makerere University, Uganda
Onn Shehory
     IBM, Israel
Kostas Stathis
     University of London, Royal Holloway, UK
Danny Weyns
     Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Belgium
Michael Winikoff
     RMIT University, Australia