Call for Papers

Supported by its strong community, the 17 previous editions of the VaMoS workshop successfully bootstrapped research on modelling and managing variability of software systems, as witnessed by the many related breakthroughs published in top-tier conferences and journals. Embracing its new status as a working conference, VaMoS more than ever aims to bring together researchers and practitioners to share ideas, results and experiences about their quest for mastering variability. As such, in addition to its usual call for technical research papers, VaMoS strongly supports the participation of aspiring young researchers as well as practitioners from industry.

Scope

Most of today's software is made variable to allow for more adaptability and economies of scale, while many development practices (DevOps, A/B testing, parameter tuning, continuous integration, ...) support this goal of engineering software variants. VaMoS is the ideal venue to explore the underlying problems (automation, traceability, combinatorial explosion, ...) and their solutions. Moreover, variability is prominent in many systems - not only in software. For these reasons, we welcome contributions from related areas (configuration, configurable systems, product lines, adaptive systems, generators, ...) as well as from new and emerging domains where techniques to manage complexity introduced by variability are applied (IoT systems, 3D printing, autonomous and deep learning systems, software-defined networks, security, generative art, games, research software, ...). Topics of interest include but are not limited to:
- Variability modelling and realisation
- Variability in emerging domains/technologies
- Automated reasoning on variability
- Variability in AI methods
- AI for variability
- Variability across the software lifecycle
- Variability in adaptive systems
- Test and verification of variable systems
- Configuration management
- Evolution of variability-intensive systems
- Runtime variability
- Variability mining
- Visualisation techniques for variability
- Reverse-engineering of variability
- Economic aspects of variability
- Variability and quality requirements
- Industrial development of variable systems
- Experience reports from managing variability in practice
As a working conference, VaMoS invites different contributions with the aim of expanding the community and further stimulating discussions:

Technical Papers

We welcome original and unpublished research ideas, methods, techniques, empirical studies and surveys related to the management of software variability. We particularly encourage the submission of research-in-progress and vision papers describing preliminary results, problem statements and open issues, especially in emerging domains where variability poses new challenges. Submissions should be up to 4 pages (+ 2 additional pages for references only) for short papers, or up to 8 pages (+ 2 additional pages for references only) for long papers. Each submission will be reviewed by 3 different reviewers following a double-anonymous review process in which the identity of authors will not be known to the program committee at any time during the process. The papers submitted must not reveal the authors' identities in any way.
- Authors should leave out author names and affiliations from the body
of their submission.
- Authors should ensure that any citation to related work by
themselves is written in the third person, that is, "the prior work
of XYZ" as opposed to "our prior work".
- Authors should avoid providing URLs to author-revealing sites
(tools, data sets). Any supplemental sites should be fully
anonymized. While open science is encouraged for all authors of all
papers, visiting such sites should not be needed to conduct reviews.
- Authors should anonymize author-revealing company names yet can
provide general characteristics of the organizations involved needed
to understand the context of the paper.
Authors having further questions on double-anonymous reviewing are encouraged to contact the Program Chairs by email. Papers that ignore the double-anonymous requirement and overtly reveal authorship will be desk-rejected.

Abstract submission: 19 October 2023 (AoE).
Paper submission: 26 October 2023 (AoE).

Variability-in-Practice Papers

We welcome contributions from practitioners, industry, and researchers describing real-world, variability-related problems or solutions, including methodologies, tool demonstration and experience reports. Submissions should be up to 4 pages (+ 2 additional pages for references only) and will be reviewed by 3 different reviewers. The review for variability-in-practice papers will follow a single-blind review process.
Deadlines for this track are the same as for the technical track:

Abstract submission: 19 October 2023 (AoE).
Paper submission: 26 October 2023 (AoE).

New and Controversial Ideas Papers

As last year, we are including a "New and Controversial Ideas" track.
This track is meant for authors to present short (lightning) talks on new (not yet highly evaluated) areas of research or to state positions (possibly controversial) on the directions or lack of directions, on any topic relevant to the VaMoS scientific community. The papers will be 2 pages (+1 for references) in the conference format. Authors' names and affiliations should be included in the submissions.
For this track, the deadline for submission is 5 November 2023
(AoE).
These papers will receive a lightweight review, but should not simply be a shortened version of an existing paper. Reviewers will evaluate these papers on how well they articulate a new idea and/or position by providing a compelling argument as to:
- why the topic is important for the VaMoS community,
- if the idea or position has potential to work, and
- the potential of the topic to foster interesting discussions at this
year's conference.

Format and Submission Site

All submissions must be written in English and follow the double-column ACM template (https://www.acm.org/publications/proceedings-template) with the options `sigconf`, `review`, and `anonymous` (for technical papers only): `documentclass[sigconf,review,anonymous]{acmart}`. At least one author is expected to attend the conference and present the accepted paper.
Submissions will be handled via EasyChair (https://easychair.org/conferences/?conf=vamos2024).
Accepted contributions will be published by ACM in the conference proceedings.

Ten-years Most Influential Paper

We are proud to celebrate VaMoS' own history and outstanding past publications. As such, we will continue the 10-year most influential paper award tradition and will reward papers from the earlier VaMoS editions that had the highest impact on the community and beyond.

Important Dates

Abstract/Paper Submission: 19/26 October 2023 (AoE).
New and Controversial Ideas Paper Submission: 5 November 2023 (AoE).
Notification: 23 November 2023 (AoE).
Final Version: 7 December 2023 (AoE).
Conference: 7-9 February 2024 (AoE).