Call for Papers
Call for Papers has now closed
This page is here for reference only.
The organisers of linux.conf.au warmly invited you to submit a paper for one of the world's leading Linux community conferences.
Presentations should be primarily of a technical nature. Commercial advertisements or sales pitches are not appropriate for this conference. Reports on legal, educational, organizational or similar aspects of open source software are also welcome.
Papers on the following topics are encouraged:
- The Linux kernel, filesystems and networking
- Databases and storage
- Programming languages and tools
- Linux on the desktop: productivity, groupware and GUIs
- Multimedia, audio, video, music and games
- Security
- Linux deployments, practical experience and
war stories
- Linux on unusual platforms: embedded systems, virtual systems, handhelds and very large systems
- Distributions, management and standardization
- Other open source projects
We are open to a broader range of topics as well, even non-Linux based projects. Submit it to us anyway! However all presentations must be based on 'open source' software and projects.
We have two very different presentation formats: 150-minute interactive tutorials and 50-minute seminars. You might also want to participate in a BOF session, lightning talk, miniconf or to present a poster.
Tutorials (20 April)
Tutorials are interactive learning sessions for the audience. Tutorials should not be long monologues. Preferably the audience will work through examples on laptops or in computer labs.
Written materials for a tutorial should comprise a tutorial sheet, workbook, or reference for the software. The LCA organisers will print and distribute this material before the tutorial.
Seminars (21-23 April)
Seminars run for 50 minutes, including time for questions. Seminars should be accompanied by a paper describing the topic, of approximately 3-10 pages.
Key Dates
(Subject to change; check back.)
- 20 July 2004: CFP opens.
- 12 October 2004: Due date for abstracts/proposals.
- 16 November 2004: Notification to speakers; programme announced.
- 18 February 2005: Due date for full papers or tutorial materials.
- 18 April 2005: Conference begins.
Legal
Papers may be published by the conference on our web site, printed proceedings or on CD-ROM. Authors retain copyright in their paper but must grant a non-exclusive licence to LCA to publish and redistribute the paper, recording or video. LCA may make audio or video recordings of presentations and redistribute them.
We prefer papers that have not been previously published.
Papers covered by nondisclosure agreements cannot be considered.
We may withdraw invitations if deadlines are not met.
Papers are accepted at the absolute discretion of the LCA organisers.
Submitting an abstract indicates understanding of and consent to these conditions.
One person may submit any reasonable number of proposals.
Paper judging is independent of LCA sponsorship.
Technical Facilities
Presentations will be in lecture theatres with 1024×768 XGA data projectors. Tutorials may be in university computer labs with Linux desktops (to be confirmed.) Please contact us if you have other requirements.
Written Papers
Written papers or tutorial handouts should be submitted before the conference. Papers should be in an appropriate open format, such as HTML, DocBook or LaTeX.
Finance
Speakers will receive complimentary professional registration for the entire conference. Their partners are welcome to attend the Partners' Programme at no charge.
Some travel assistance may be available for worthy speakers not otherwise able to attend. If you require travel assistance you must indicate so on your submission. In general we do not provide full funding for international travel.
Academic Papers
For the first time, we are considering an elective peer-review process for papers. This is intended primarily for presenters working or studying at universities, who can gain funding credit by writing peer-reviewed papers that meet certain government criteria. In Australia these are the DEST Higher-Education criteria.
Presenters who wish to pass these criteria should submit the full text of their paper as soon as possible in the CFP, indicating their intention. The entire paper will be critically reviewed before being accepted or declined. Papers submitted for this process must not have been published before. These papers will be published on the LCA web site after the conference.
This will be more work for the presenter, because the entire paper must be prepared to a high standard by an earlier date. For this reason we will only apply this process to presenters who specifically request it.
If you think you would be interested in having your paper reviewed in this way or you have comments on the process please contact us as soon as possible.
Papers Committee
- Chair: Martin Pool
- Chris Yeoh
- Paul Russell
- Anthony Towns
- (tba)
Criteria
Proposals are assessed on the following criteria:
- Is the topic of interest to the LCA audience of Linux developers and users? We have a mix of users and developers; novices and experts; hobby, business and education users. We want people to go away feeling excited and enthused about using your project, and about free software in general.
- Technical coolness/novelty. Do we say "wow, I'd never thought of that" when we read it?
- Does the paper fit well with others? We try to get a good spread so there will be something interesting for everyone.
- Balance across technical and para-technical topics. (We don't want only kernel talks, or only Perl talks, ...)
- Is the person knowledgeable about the topic? Best of all are core developers for the project. We like to see a history of involvement. This also applies for para-technical topics, e.g. for legal issues we would prefer to hear from lawyers.
- Whether we expect the paper will be presented well. We try to work this out by reports of whether the speaker presented well at LCA or elsewhere, has experience in public speaking, and submitted a good proposal. We prefer not to get simple repeats of previous presentations. Best of all is to hear "This is a development of my Best of Show paper at FooCon 2002. Since that time I have quadrupled the frobnicator flux."
Submit!
Submissions have closed
Questions?
We are happy to answer questions on requirements or process. You can also look at last year's programme for guidance and the FAQ.
