Third European Conference on Pattern Languages of Programming and Computing Shepherding Explained

We have sent the following letter to all shepherds to forward it to their authors. It explains the process of shepherding and acceptance in detail:

Dear EuroPLoP Submitter:

Thank you for taking the risk of submitting your work to EuroPLoP. We hope that your experience of having your paper reviewed for EuroPLoP will be different from your experience with other conferences or publications. I have been assigned to your paper as a "shepherd". I have two primary responsibilities:

1. Helping you improve your submission
2. Voting whether your submission meets EuroPLoP's criteria for being workshoped on the conference

Both activities go hand in hand. We're going to have several iterations over your paper where my job is to suggest you changes for improvement. Of course, it's your own decision, whether you'd like to incorporate the changes or not. However, experience shows that most remarks lead to some changes in the document - future readers will have more benefit from a clarification in the document than I will have if you explain the topic to me only. We have eigth weeks to work on the paper. We should use this time as good as we can.

During this shepherding I collaborate with a member of the program committee. His job is to support me if I feel the need for a second vote. Please CC him on every mail you send to me.

Please make sure, that the email connection works. We're going to have a lot of traffic and a broken email connection is about the worst things that can happen during this project.

After this eight week phase (before May, 4th) I'm going to send the latest version of your paper (the 'version for voting') to the programm committee together with my vote. I have three choices:

• Accept the paper for a Writer's Workshop: I'll recommend this if I have the warm feeling that your paper meets the standard of most other pattern submissions. The majority of papers usually get this recommendation
• Accept the paper for a Pattern Writing Workshop: I'll recommend this if I think, the paper still needs more improvement than a usual Writer's Workshop can offer. During a Writing Workshop you'll have the chance to work in a peer-to-peer setting with an experienced pattern author at the conference site. We're going to have all technical facilities there you need to improve the paper on-site. You'll still have the opportunity to join the Writer's Workshop as audience.
• And of course we have to reserve the right to reject a paper, though we try to avoid this. The most common reason for rejection is lack of collaboration during the shepherding period.

However, my vote is not the only one. A second member of the programm committee will vote on the version for vote independently from my vote. Depending on both votes the chairs will finally decide for acceptance. You'll get the notification before May 18th. If your paper is accepted you have time until June 2nd to prepare the version that is going to be workshoped at the conference.

This may seem quite complicated but I'll support you to track the dates and take care that you don't miss any deadline.

If your pattern is reviewed at EuroPLoP as part of a Writer's Workshop, it will be included in the proceedings. The proceedings will be published by the "Universitäts Verlag Konstanz", a German publisher. Copies of the proceedings are included in the conference fee. However, to give you the chance to incorporate the suggestions you got at your Writer's Workshop, you have time until Sep 21st to submit the final version. We'll announce the details at the conference.

As you see, the processes are quite different form traditional conferences and so is EuroPLoP itself. So let's start working...