The 56th ACM Symposium on Theory of Computing (STOC 2024), sponsored by the ACM Special Interest Group on Algorithms and Computation Theory (SIGACT), will be held in Vancouver, Canada from Monday, June 24 to Friday, June 28.
Papers presenting new and original research on the theory of computation are sought. Typical but not exclusive topics of interest include algorithms and data structures, computational complexity, randomness in computing, algorithmic graph theory and combinatorics, analysis of Boolean functions, approximation algorithms, cryptography, computational learning theory, continuous and discrete optimization, economics and computation, parallel and distributed algorithms, quantum computing, algorithmic coding theory, computational geometry and topology, computational applications of logic, algebraic computation, and computational and foundational aspects of areas such as machine learning, fairness, privacy, networks, data management, databases and computational biology. Papers that extend the reach of the theory of computing, or raise important problems that can benefit from theoretical investigation and analysis, are encouraged. The program committee will make every effort to consider a broad range of areas.
Submission format:
Submissions should start with a title page consisting of the title of the paper, no author information (see below),
and an abstract of a few paragraphs summarizing the paper's
contributions.
There is no page limit and authors are encouraged to use the "full
version" of their paper as the submission.
Each submission should contain within the initial ten pages
following the title page a clear presentation of the merits of the
paper, including a discussion of the paper's importance within the
context of prior work and a description of the key technical and
conceptual ideas used to achieve its main claims.
This part of the submission should be addressed to a broad
spectrum of theoretical computer science researchers, not solely to
experts in the subarea.
Proofs must be provided that can enable the main mathematical
claims of the paper to be fully verified.
Although there is no bound on the length of a submission, material
other than the abstract, table of contents, and the first ten pages
will be read at the committee's discretion. Authors are encouraged to
put the references at the very end of the submission.
The submission should be typeset using 11-point or larger fonts,
in a single-column, single-space (between lines) format with ample
spacing throughout and 1-inch margins all around, on letter-size (8 1/2 x
11 inch) paper. Submissions deviating significantly from these
guidelines risk rejection without consideration of their merits.
STOC 2024 will use double-blind reviewing, and as such,
submissions should not reveal the identity of the authors in any way.
In particular, authors' names, affiliations, and email addresses
should not appear at the beginning or in the body of the submission.
Authors should not include obvious references that reveal their
own identity, and should ensure that any references to their own related
work are in the third person (e.g., not "We build on our previous
work…" but rather "We build on the work of…").
The purpose of this double-blind process is to help PC members and
external reviewers come to an initial judgment about the paper without
bias, and not to make it impossible for them to discover who the authors
are if they were to try. (In particular, to manage Conflicts Of
Interests, author information will be available to the PC Chair, as well
as to a small set of COI-Management PC Members on an as-needed basis.)
Nothing should be done in the name of anonymity that weakens the
submission or makes the job of reviewing the paper more difficult.
In particular, important references should not be omitted or
anonymized.
In addition, authors should feel free to disseminate their ideas
or draft versions of their paper as they normally would.
For example, authors may post drafts of their papers on the web,
submit them to arXiv, and give talks on their research ideas.
All submissions will be treated as confidential, and will only be
disclosed to the committee and their chosen sub-referees.
In addition, the program committee may consult with journal
editors and program chairs of other conferences about controversial
issues such as parallel submissions.
PC Member Submissions: Submissions authored or coauthored by PC members (other than the PC chair) are allowed.
Recommended Best practices for References:
Authors are encouraged to include hyperlink cross-referencing
for bibliographic entries, theorems, sections, and so on, using for
example the hyperref, cleverref, or varioref packages.
If helpful, a table of contents may be added on a page
immediately following the title page; this will not count towards the
first ten pages.
Authors are asked to avoid "et al." in citations in favor of an
equal mention of all authors' surnames.
If the number of authors is large, consider writing "\cite{XYZ}
show..." instead of "X et al. show".
Bibliographic references should preferably be alphanumeric
(e.g., the first letters of the authors' surnames, or at least the first
three followed by +) followed by year of publication, instead of just a
numerical reference.
If using BibTeX, this can be accomplished by using
\bibliographystyle{alpha} or \bibliographystyle{alphaurl}.
Conflict of Interest Policy: The submission process will include declaration of conflicts of interest (COI), to help manage the double-blind review process. This declared COI information can only be seen by the program committee chair and thus cannot be used by the rest of the program committee to deanonymize authors. (Notwithstanding, the small set of COI-Management PC Members may see some of this information when assisting in managing COIs.) STOC 2024 will use the following Conflict of Interest Policy, which combines aspects suggested by SafeToC (see here) and the ACM Conflict of Interest policy. Authors should limit their COI declaration to the following categories:
Submission Instructions: Authors are required to submit their papers electronically, in PDF (without security restrictions on copying or printing).
The submission server is scheduled to open on Oct. 6, 2023.
It is expected that authors of accepted papers will make their full papers, with proofs, publicly available on arXiv, ECCC, or a similar preprint service by the camera-ready deadline.
ACM is moving to require ORCIDs for all authors. An ORCID is an identifier that uniquely identifies an author. It connects an author's work even if there are variations in the names used on different papers, ensuring that the author gets credit for all of their contributions. Using ORCIDs will help ACM administer the ACM OPEN program where universities get open-access publishing via a subscription, aid in identifying conflicts of interests, and support other publications processes. ORCIDs are easy to obtain; it takes less than a minute.Prior and Simultaneous Submissions: The conference will follow SIGACT's policy on prior publication and simultaneous submissions. Work that has been previously published in another conference proceedings or journal, or which is scheduled for publication prior to June 2024, will not be considered for acceptance at STOC 2024. The only exception to this policy are prior or simultaneous publications appearing in the Science and Nature journals. SIGACT policy does not allow simultaneous submissions of the same (or essentially the same) material to another conference with published proceedings. The program committee may consult with program chairs of other (past or future) conferences to find out about closely related submissions.
Presentation of Accepted Papers: One author of each accepted paper will be expected to register and present the work in the form of a talk at the conference. Authors are expected to contact the program chair before submission in case it is anticipated that a strong reason (e.g., international travel restrictions) would prevent all authors from attending the conference. Authors will also be asked to upload a recording of their talk in advance of the conference, to enable it to be viewed by people who cannot attend in person.
Short abstract and paper registration deadline: Friday, November 10, 2023, 4:59pm EST.
Paper submission deadline: Monday, November 13, 2023, 4:59pm EST.
Notification date: by email on or before February 11, 2024.
Camera-ready versions of accepted papers:
A camera-ready copy of each accepted paper is required by March 31, 2023.
The format of your paper must strictly adhere to the ACM Format,
and specifically the sigconf option. (LaTeX users, please use:
\documentclass[sigconf,screen]{acmart}). Additional instructions will
be sent directly to the authors of
accepted papers.
STOC talks: Monday morning June 24 to Friday afternoon June 28, 2024.
Publication date: AUTHORS TAKE NOTE: The official publication date is the date the proceedings are made available in the ACM Digital Library. This date may be up to two weeks prior to the first day of the conference. The official publication date affects the deadline for any patent filings related to published work. (For those rare conferences whose proceedings are published in the ACM Digital Library after the conference is over, the official publication date remains the first day of the conference.)
Best Paper Award: The program committee may designate up to three papers accepted to the conference as STOC Best Papers. All submissions are automatically eligible. In addition to the standard COI-avoidance, the final designation process will be conducted by the subset of PC Members with no submission to the conference. Rules for the award can be found at https://www.sigact.org/prizes/best_paper.html.
Danny Lewin Best Student Paper Award: A prize of $500 will be given to the author(s) of the best student-authored paper (or split between more than one paper if there is a tie). A paper is eligible if all of its authors are full-time students at the time of submission. To inform the program committee about a paper's eligibility, check the appropriate box in the web form on the submission server. The list of past winners can be found at https://www.sigact.org/prizes/student.html.
Access to Proceedings: The committee intends to provide registered attendees with internet access to the Proceedings on a password-protected site that will be available from about two weeks before the conference until the end of the conference. Authors can opt out of this online distribution by contacting the program committee chair by March 19, 2024.
Student Travel Awards: SIGACT provides travel awards to students without available support, and researchers from developing countries. More information on the award process will be posted later on.
|
Ainesh Bakshi, Massachusetts Institute of Technology |
Xin Li, Johns Hopkins University |
Local Arrangements Chairs: Bojan Mohar, Igor Shinkar, Simon Fraser University