The 13th ACM Workshop on Hot Topics in Storage and File Systems (HotStorage '21) will take place July 27-28, 2021 in cooperation with USENIX in association with the 2021 ACM International System and Storage Conference (SYSTOR ’21). The proceedings of HotStorage ‘21 will appear in the ACM Digital Library.

Important Dates:
Paper submissions due: Friday, April 30, 2021, AoE
Notification to authors: Tuesday, June 8, 2021
Final papers due: Tuesday, June 29, 2021

Workshop Organizers:
Program Chairs
Philip Shilane, Dell Technologies
Youjip Won, Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST)

Steering Committee:
Marcos Aguilera, VMware
Anirudh Badam, Microsoft
Angela Demke Brown, University of Toronto
Vijay Chidambaram, University of Texas at Austin and VMware Research
Ashvin Goel, University of Toronto
Sam H. Noh, UNIST (Ulsan National Institute of Science and Technology)
Daniel Peek, Facebook
Erik Riedel, ITRenew
Nisha Talagala, Pyxeda AI
Gala Yadgar, Technion—Israel Institute of Technology
Erez Zadok, Stony Brook University

General Chair:
Vasily Tarasov, IBM Research

Publication Chair:
Luna Xu Yamada, IBM Research

Publicity Chair:
Ali Anwar, IBM Research

Registration Chair:
Travis Janssen, IBM Research

Sponsorship Chair:
Umesh Deshpande, IBM Research

Virtual Workshop Chair:
Dimitris Skourtis, Vectorized Inc.

Web-site Chair:
Lukas Rupprecht, IBM Research

Overview:
The HotStorage workshop provides a forum for cutting-edge storage research, a place where researchers and industry practitioners can discuss new opportunities and challenges in storage technology. Submissions should propose new research directions, explore non-traditional approaches, or report on noteworthy or counterintuitive learnings and experience in emerging areas. Submissions will be judged on their originality, technical merit, topical relevance, and the likelihood of leading to insightful discussions that will influence future storage systems design and applications.

In keeping with the goals of the HotStorage workshop, the review process will favor submissions that are forward-looking and open-ended. If you are only a few months away from submitting to FAST, NSDI, EuroSys, VLDB, OSDI, SOSP, etc. you are probably already past the sweet spot for HotStorage. If you have a forward-looking or unorthodox idea or new research, and some evidence or early working system to support your view, but still have open questions, please consider bringing your work to HotStorage. The program committee will also welcome position papers that solicit discussion on controversial topics, introduce emerging methods and paradigms, or call out for new research directions.

Topics of Interest:
HotStorage '21 welcomes innovative submissions in the broad areas of storage, data management, data applications, and cross-disciplinary topics that relate to these. Specific areas are below but are not exhaustive.

Application-specific storage
Applications of machine learning and deep learning to storage
Archival storage
Blockchain storage
Caching, tiering, and replication
Cloud storage
Container and serverless storage
Distributed storage
Edge device (sensors, home, and IoT, etc.) storage
Energy-efficient storage
Erasure coding
File systems
Flash/SSD
Key-value and NoSQL stores
Memory-centric storage systems
Mobile storage
Next generation storage (DNA, glass)
Performance modeling and prediction for storage
Persistent memory
Programming models for data management
Quality of service for storage
Security and privacy of storage
Software-defined storage
Storage for analytics applications
Verified storage systems

What to Expect from the Workshop:
HotStorage '21 will be a two-day virtual workshop with video presentations of each paper followed by discussion. At least one author of each accepted paper must attend the virtual workshop to participate in discussions and answer questions; if you have any questions or concerns about attending the workshop as a presenting author, please contact the program co-chairs via chairs21@hotstorage.org to discuss. Presentation details and guidelines will be communicated to the authors of the accepted papers.
Paper presentations will each be 15 minutes plus Q&A. There will also be an online discussion for each paper, which will provide another forum for engagement.

Submission Instructions:
Submissions must be no longer than five (5) two-column pages excluding references and should be submitted electronically via the submission form at https://hotstorage21.hotcrp.com/.

Indicating Paper Type. Authors should indicate one of two paper types in both the submission and on HotCRP: Position or Regular. Paper titles should be prefixed by their type in the submission. For example, “Position: XYZ”. Position titles should explicitly state and argue for a position; the more interesting or forward-looking the position, the better the paper is a match for HotStorage. Position papers may also be used to put forward a vision for storage systems. Regular papers might contain a new and interesting result that is at an early stage and not yet ready for a conference submission.
Papers should be submitted electronically as a PDF. All text and figures must fit within a 7”x9” text block, centered on the page, using two columns with .33 inches of separation. The paper should be typeset using a 10-point font (Times New Roman or similar) with a 12-point (single-spaced) leading.

Please follow paper formatting instructions. The author kit, which contains the Latex style and template, is available here. Please ensure that your paper satisfies all the above requirements for content and formatting before submission; if you have a question about any of these issues, please email the program chairs chairs21@hotstorage.org.
Additional instructions regarding camera-ready versions of accepted papers will be sent directly to the corresponding authors and will appear online closer to the deadline.

Originality:
Submissions to HotStorage '21 may not be under consideration for any other venue. Simultaneous submission of the same work to multiple venues, submission of previously published work, or plagiarism constitutes dishonesty or fraud. HotStorage, like other scientific and technical conferences and journals, prohibits these practices and may take action against authors who have committed them. We are following the ACM Prior Publication and Simultaneous Submissions Policy. Questions? Contact the program chairs.

Anonymizing:
The review process is double-blind. Authors must not be identified in the submissions, either explicitly or by implication. When it is necessary to cite your own work, cite it as if it were written by a third party. Do not say "reference removed for blind review." Papers from industry may identify the company or the product. For example, it is acceptable to talk about Company X's Product Y (X and Y need not be blinded). Papers accompanied by nondisclosure agreement forms will not be considered. Accepted submissions will be treated as confidential prior to publication on the HotStorage '21 website; rejected submissions will be permanently treated as confidential.
All papers will be available online to registered attendees before the workshop. If your accepted paper should not be published prior to the event, please notify the chairs. The papers will be available online to everyone beginning on the first day of the workshop.

Declaring and Avoiding Conflicts:
When registering a submission, all its co-authors must provide information about conflicts with the HotStorage'21 program committee (PC) members. You are conflicted with a member if: (1) you are currently employed at the same institution, have been previously employed at the same institution within the past two years, or are going to begin employment at the same institution; (2) you have a past or present association as thesis advisor or advisee (no time limit); (3) you have collaborated on a project, publication, grant proposal, or editorship within the past two years; or (4) you have spouse or first-degree relative relations.

Do not declare a conflict if you discussed your submission with a PC member before the HotStorage '21 PC lists were publicized. Do not declare a conflict merely because you wish to avoid a review from a specific committee member; such unethical behaviour might result in immediate rejection. All conflicts will be reviewed to ensure the integrity of the reviewing process.

Authors and others are prohibited from directly or indirectly communicating with any HotStorage ’21 PC member about any potentially submitted paper. All requests should be made exclusively to chairs. Violations of these guidelines may seek remedies as stipulated by the ACM.

We look forward to receiving your submissions!

Philip Shilane (Dell Technologies) and Youjip Won (KAIST)
HotStorage '21 Program Chairs
chairs21@hotstorage.org