ACM SAC 2023 Track Chair Guidelines(Revised July 5, 2022)

Table of Content
I.
Executive Summary ________________________________________________ Page 1
II. Deadlines and Important Dates ________________________________________ Page 2
III. Message to Track Chairs_____________________________________________ Page 2
IV. TC Group Formation________________________________________________ Page 3
V. Essential Rules ____________________________________________________ Page 3
VI. Attracting Papers___________________________________________________ Page 4
VII. Reviewing Process _________________________________________________ Page 5
VIII. Accepted Papers and Posters and Session Preparation _______________________ Page 6
Abbreviations
Abbreviations
ACM
CFP
PC
SAC
SRC
TC
TPC

Full Name
Association of Computing Machinery
Call for Papers
Program Chair
Symposium for Applied Computing
Student Research Competition for graduate students
Track Chair
Track Program Committee

I. Executive Summary
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TCs are responsible for finding reviewers for their tracks.
Each paper must be reviewed double-blind by at least three reviewers; this is an ACM requirement
as SAC is a Refereed Conference.
Each Track must have a TPC of valuable scientific level in the track area, published on the track
website.
TCs should avoid submitting their work to their own tracks. As such, the TC must contact thePCs with their intention to submit to their own track. The PC will ensure proper handling ofsubmission.
TCs cannot submit more than one submission to their own track.
A TC cannot nominate his/her own paper for the best paper award.
TCs prepare their own "Track CFP" in conjunction with the general SAC 2023 CFP after having
been notified of the successful review of their track proposal.
The goal for a track is to receive around 32 submissions, which guarantee 2 sessions (8 papers). A
track that receives less than 13 submissions will be canceled or merged with another related
track. Authors of these papers will be notified and encouraged to submit their papers to othertracks. All cancellations (if necessary) will be made before the review process starts.
The Track CFP, Track webpage, and acceptance letters must state the following: Paper registrationis required, allowing the inclusion of the paper/poster in the conference proceedings. An author ora proxy attending SAC MUST present the paper. This is a requirement for the paper/poster to be
included in the ACM digital library. No-show of registered papers and posters will result in
excluding them from the ACM digital library.
TCs are expected to receive papers within the official deadline. No extensions unless authorized by
the PCs will be given. This is to ensure meeting subsequent deadlines such as proceedings printing

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and shipping to the SAC venue on time.
TCs are responsible for the reviews, and reviews must contain justification. Reviews withscores only are not acceptable. If reviewers fail to review the paper, it is the TCs responsibility
to find alternative reviewers. We recommend that each paper should be assigned to at least fivereviewers.
Before notifying the authors, TCs submit to the PCs the listing of submitted papers, with the final
outcome (acceptance/rejection) and the reviewers' markings. Based on this information, the PCs will
allocate a maximum number of papers that each track may accept.
As a general rule of thumb, the average acceptance rate per track should be under 25%.
TCs are required to coordinate with the Posters Chair before author rejection notifications
are sent out, allowing the Posters Chair ample time to solicit/invite paper submissions to beconsidered for the Posters Program.
Each Track has the opportunity to participate in the SRC program by reviewing Student
Research Abstracts submitted to the track.
For a track to make it to the SAC 2023 Final Program, it must contain at least four fully
accepted papers, forming one technical session.
The paper length is 8 pages + 2 pages at an extra charge (max of 10 pages).
The poster length is 3 pages + 1 page at an extra charge (max of 4 pages).
TCs are expected to participate in SAC and look after their sessions.
A track receives one or more free registrations depending on the number of sessions.
The free registrations are intended to support TCs attending the conference to manage their track
sessions. A free registration cannot be used to cover a publication unless the authoring TC
is attending the conference.
TCs are encouraged to organize Special Issues in journals related to the themes of their track, witha collection of the best papers accepted in their track.
TCs must report no-show papers to the PCs as soon as the session is concluded in order to keep
track of no-show presenters and remove no-show papers/posters from the ACM digital library.
Any proposed changes in the management structure of a track should be immediately communicatedwith the SAC Organizing Committee and the PCs.
The SAC Organizing Committee and the PCs reserve the right to cancel a track at any stage if
its TCs do not comply with these guidelines or iteratively fail to communicate with the PCs.

Details of these guidelines are given below.
II. Deadlines and Important Dates
July 15, 2022
July 29, 2022
August 5, 2022
August 10, 2022
October 1, 2022
October 10, 2022
November 10, 2022
November 14, 2022
November 19, 2022
December 6, 2022
December 6, 2022
January 7, 2023
January 20, 2023
January 20, 2023

Submission of track proposals
Notification of acceptance/rejection of track proposals
Submission of track CFPs to the Program Chairs
Dissemination of the first CFP and website for each track
Submission of regular papers and SRC abstracts
Submission of Tutorial Proposals
Notification of Tutorials Acceptance
Submission of review outcomes to the Program Chairs
Notification of papers and posters and SRC acceptance/rejection
Camera-ready copies of accepted papers
Author registration due date
TC free registration deadline
Preparation of sessions (order of papers and session chairs)
Nomination for the best paper candidate for each track

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III. Message to Track Chairs
What follows is a description of the responsibilities of Track Chairs (TCs) and a presentation of some relevant
guidelines. These responsibilities are dictated by the rules of the senior organizing body ACM and SAC itself.
The associated guidelines below are the product of thirty-five years of experience in running the SAC, and wehope you will appreciate the need to enforce them. However, the SAC Steering and Organizing committees
are always open to any suggestions, and indeed criticism, for improving the management of this conference.
Please do not hesitate at any moment to offer us your feedback. Please note that these responsibilities may be
updated, and new responsibilities may emerge as we work with the Track Chairs on improving the quality andmanagement of SAC Tracks.
The following sections highlight the guidelines that all TCs are expected to adhere to for SAC 2023. These
guidelines are evolving and are subject to change.
IV. TC Group Formation
Track Chairs must be experts with established experience in their field of applied computing andhold a Ph.D. degree. Graduate students cannot be listed as TCs. The TC group for a track should,
throughout the year of organization, engage in the following activities:
1. Provide scientific visibility and attract papers (hence some TC is expected to be a well-known
researcher in the field)
2. Promptly execute tasks as required by the Program Chairs (PCs) (hence some TC should always bereading emails and providing timely communications)
3. Organize allocation of reviews, disseminate CFPs, prepare a Website (hence some TC should bedesignated as the Lead TC and ready to do the track leadership work)
4. Attend the conference (hence at least one TC should use the track Free Registration (see section VIII,
item #5 below) and be available to attend SAC 2023.
Although there is no constraint on the number of TCs, it is unlikely that only one person can execute all theabove tasks in a successful way; hence a group of 2-3 carefully selected scholars is suggested.
V. Essential Rules
1. TCs are responsible for finding reviewers. It is recommended that TCs contact their reviewers and get
their commitment to review for the track before sending papers out for reviews. Authors may be used
as reviewers for the track (using peer-review), but of course, not their own papers. Each paper must be
reviewed double-blind by at least three reviewers; this is an ACM requirement as SAC is a
"Refereed Conference." Please adhere to this requirement: double-blind means that the author of a paper
does not know the reviewers of his/her paper, and reviewers do not know the authors of the papers they
reviewed. To ensure having at least three meaningful and constructive reviews (as per ACM
requirement), many TCs in the past have used five reviews per paper: as a rule of thumb, be sure toprepare a reviewers' group able to provide five reviews per paper.
2. TCs are responsible for forming their TPC of valuable scientific level in the track area. The committee
members must be published on the track website. The committee should be appointed after the track
is approved and publicized with the track call for papers.
3. The TCs should avoid submitting their work to their own tracks. Even though this rarely

Page 3happens in SAC, the TC(s) can be an author(s) of at most one submission. TCs submissions go
through the double-blind review process like all the other papers in the track. To protect the TCs
credibility and to ensure the integrity of the ACM-required peer-review process, the TCs must inform thePCs of their submissions. At such time, the PCs handle and manage the TCs submissions, including
assignment of reviewers, communication with reviewers, handling review results, processing scores,
informing TCs of the outcomes, etc. Whenever possible, we encourage TCs to consider submitting theirpapers to other related tracks. The widely acceptable ethical rules found in other respectable conferences
also apply to SAC. Lead TC is responsible for disseminating this requirement across all TC groups of aparticular track.
4. TCs have the option to nominate a paper for consideration for the Best Paper Award in the theme towhich the track belongs. To keep this process professional, TCs cannot nominate their own paper fromtheir own track for the best paper award.
VI. Attracting Papers
1. TCs prepare their own "Track CFP" in conjunction with the general SAC 2023 CFP. (Note that the latter
CFP has already been prepared by the Program Chairs and will be distributed to other international forums
and publicity websites.) A CFP for a particular track should NOT be merely a carbon copy of thegeneral CFP. Instead, it should contain information regarding the particular track, i.e., aims and scope ofthe track, topics to be covered, contact information of its TCs, etc. Note that the CFP for this track should
mention the official title of the conference, respect the general conference deadlines and rules, report thegeneral SAC paper submission site, etc. Upon request, the PCs will provide an example of the Track CFPthat a track can use to prepare their own Track CFP, but we encourage TCs to look for similar events in thearea of the track for a better idea of what a specific track CFP should contain.
2. TCs must prepare the CFP for the track after having been notified of the successful review of their track
proposal (see Section II). TCs then submit it to the PCs for approval. Once TCs get the go-ahead, they are
responsible for distributing the CFP for the track as widely as possible within the international forums
related to the themes of the track. We recommend that the Track CFP is published three times("Preliminary CFP," "CFP," and "Last CFP") before the expiration of the deadline for accepting
submissions. Furthermore, TCs should set up a website for the track and link it to the conference's main
website. TCs are invited to examine websites of past tracks available at https://www.sigapp.org/sac.
3. Other than sending the CFP, we urge TCs to explicitly invite colleagues and other well-known
researchers in the field to submit good papers to the track. While doing this, the SAC location can also
be an important factor for consideration. For instance, SAC 2023 has the potential to attract many papers
from Europe, Asia, South, and North America. Personal networking is often a key to a successful track.
Note that, given the average acceptance ratio and session size (see item #4 below), a goal for TCs is toreceive around 32 submissions, which guarantees a track of reasonable size (2 sessions, 8 papers).
4. A track that receives less than 13 submissions will be canceled. Authors of papers in that track
will be notified and encouraged to submit their papers to other tracks. All track cancellations (ifnecessary) will be made before the review process starts. A minimum of one session per Track isrequired (4 accepted papers) and will strictly be enforced for SAC 2023. In general, the average
acceptance rate per track should be under 25%.
5. The Track CFP, Track webpage, and acceptance letters must state the following: Paper registration isrequired, allowing the inclusion of the paper/poster in the conference proceedings. An author or a proxyattending SAC MUST present the paper. This is a requirement for the paper/poster to be included in the
ACM digital library. No-show of registered papers and posters will result in excluding them fromPage 4the ACM digital library. This requirement must be explicitly mentioned on the Track webpage andin the acceptance letters sent to the authors.
VII. Paper Reviewing Process
1. TCs are expected to receive papers within the official deadline: it is forbidden to extend the deadline
unless this is a decision taken by the PCs (in which case this will be promptly communicated to TCs).
As the deadline expires, TCs should screen each paper to make sure it has been submitted to the correct
track. If a paper does NOT fit your track, please contact the PCs. After that, be sure to properly allocate
papers to reviewers, according to their expertise or to their bid.
2. TCs are responsible for the reviews. If reviewers fail to review the paper, it is the TCs responsibility tofind an alternative reviewer or, in the worst case, even review the papers themselves. Given that thedeadlines are fixed, we recommend TCs send a reminder one week before the reviews are due.
Moreover, TCs are also responsible for the quality of reviews: a review with scores only is not
acceptable; it should not be considered and must hence be replaced by a proper one. TCs are expectedto safeguard the impartial and accurate review of the papers submitted to their track. Common rules oflogic apply here as in any other conference event (e.g., reviews with thorough written comments or withhigh confidence should be valued more). The online discussion about the reviews is strongly
encouraged among the TC and reviewers using the START system. We also strongly recommend thateach paper is assigned to at least five reviewers.
3. As the deadline for reviewers is due, and before notifying the authors, TCs submit to the PCs thelisting of submitted papers, with the final outcome (acceptance/rejection) and the reviewers' markings.
The PCs reserve the right to argue about the decision to be taken regarding some paper(s) and ask forfurther justification of the TCs decisions or further reviews to be sought. Based on the information
provided by the TCs, the PCs will allocate a maximum number of papers that each track may accept.
This decision is based on the number of papers submitted to the track, criteria related to the capacity of
the conference, overall acceptance rate, and conference facilities (number of sessions and number ofrooms).
4. SAC has grown to be a large and very competitive conference. Therefore, it is understandable that not
all acceptable papers (according to the reviewers) may actually be accepted for publishing. As a generalrule of thumb, the average acceptance rate per track should be under 25%.
5. Poster Sessions: Papers that received high reviews (that is acceptable by reviewer standards) but were
not accepted due to space limitation can be invited for the poster session. The number of posters per
track may depend on the track size. Since poster invitations are sent before author notifications(rejections), this requires TCs to coordinate their effort with the Posters Chairs. Please contact the
Posters Chair for potential posters in your track before you send out the rejection letters. This
gives the Posters Chair ample time to solicit submissions to the Posters Program.
6. It is the responsibility of the TCs to make sure that the final version of an accepted paper is properly
revised based on the reviewers' comments and suggestions. The TCs are also responsible for all formal
communication with the authors of papers submitted to their track (the TCs are effectively thecommunication interface between authors of submitted papers and SAC). That includes acknowledging asubmission, notifying authors of acceptance or rejection, and dispersing other information to authors fromthe PCs and Conference Chairs, taking care that authors submit the camera-ready version of their papers,
including the checking of formatting issues and submission of ACM copyright forms by the deadline.
Again, the acceptance letter must include the following statement: Paper registration is required,

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allowing the inclusion of the paper/poster in the conference proceedings. An author or a proxy attending
SAC MUST present the paper. This is a requirement for the paper/poster to be included in the ACM
digital library. No-show of scheduled papers and posters will result in excluding them from the ACM
digital library.
7. Student Research Competition (SRC) Program: Students are invited to submit research abstracts(maximum of 4 pages in ACM camera-ready format) following the instructions published at the SAC
2023 website. Submission of the same abstract to multiple tracks is not allowed. All research abstract
submissions will be reviewed by researchers and practitioners with expertise in the track focus area towhich they are submitted. TCs are responsible for assigning SRC submissions to their reviewers andgenerate at least three reviews for each SRC abstract submitted to their track. TCs must NOT notify SRC
authors. The SRC Chair will handle the selection and invitations of SRC submissions.
Authors of selected abstracts (up to 18 students) will have the opportunity to give poster and oralpresentations of their work and compete for three top-winning places. The SRC committee will evaluate
and select First, Second, and Third place winners. The winners will receive medals and cash awards.
Winners will be announced during the conference banquet. Invited students receive SRC travel support(US$500) and are eligible to apply to the SIGAPP Student Travel Award Program (STAP) for additional
travel support.
VIII. Accepted Papers and Posters and Session Preparation
1. For a track to make it to the SAC 2023 Final Program, it must contain at least four fully accepted papers,
forming one technical session.
2. The length of the paper is 8 page (included in the registration) + 2 pages (at extra charge) = 10 pages
maximum.
3. The length of the poster is 3 pages (included in the registration) + 1 page (at extra charge) = 4 pages
maximum.
4. The length of the SRC abstract is 4 pages maximum.
5. TCs are expected to take an active role in the preparation of the conference’s technical program,
especially with respect to issues related to their track. This includes forming the technical sessions (listand order of the papers in each session), appointing session chairs, attending the conference, andparticipating in any committee meetings that will take place in the conference. TCs are encouraged to
examine the possibility of organizing Special Issues in journals related to the themes of their track, witha collection of the best papers accepted in their track after the conference.
6. Each track receives one to three Free Full-Conference registrations as CREDIT equivalent to the early"Author Member" registration rate depending on the number of sessions allocated for the track. Please
note, 3 free registrations for 5-sessions tracks, 2 free registrations for 3-sessions and 4-sessions tracks, and1 free registration for 1-session and 2-sessions tracks. Each session must have at least 4 to 5 papers.
TCs are strongly encouraged to be ACM members. Free registrations are non-transferable to non-TCs. It
is the TCs responsibility to designate the recipient of the free registration and communicate that to theConference Registrar by the deadline provided to them. Free registrations expire after such a date. The
free registration can be used to cover an accepted publication authored/co-authored by the receiving TC,
and the receiving TC must attend the conference. In such a case, the TC receiving the free registration asan "Author Member" must follow directions that the Conference Registrar will provide in order to credit

Page 6his/her registration account with the proper credit. If the registration account carries a balance, theregistered TC is responsible for the outstanding balance.
7. TCs must obtain a "Session report" for each session, from the session chairs to track no-show papers.
This report MUST be submitted to the PCs as soon as the session is concluded in order to keep track of
no-show presenters and remove no-show papers and posters from the ACM digital library.
Any proposed change in the management structure of a track (e.g., involvement of a new TC or withdrawal
of a TC or nomination of a co-TC) should be immediately communicated with the SAC Organizing
Committee and the PCs who reserve the right to refuse to ratify such a change and, if necessary, cancel a
track. If, at any stage, a TC is unsure as to how he/she must proceed, he/she should contact the PCs
immediately and ask for any clarifications. The SAC Organizing Committee and the PCs reserve the rightto cancel a track at any stage if the TCs do not comply with the above guidelines or iteratively fail tocommunicate with the PCs.
SAC2023 Conference Chair:
SAC2023 Conference Vice Chair:
SAC2023 Program Chairs:

Jiman Hong
TBD
Juw Won Park and Tomas Cerny

SAC2023 Posters Chair:
SAC2023 SRC Program Chair:

Lenuta Alboaie
Davide Taibi

Please contact the SAC Steering Committee and PCs for any questions or additional information. Your
participation in SAC 2023 is greatly appreciated. With your help, we look forward to another successful
and exciting edition of SAC.
ACM SAC Steering Committee
July 5, 2022

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