SoCG 2005 - Scoring instructions

21st Annual Symposium on Computational Geometry (SoCG 2005) June 6-8, 2005, Pisa, Italy

Scope of the conference (from the call for papers)

We invite submissions based on research into geometric algorithms and data structures, into their implementation, into the supporting mathematics, and into applications in computer graphics, geometry processing, computer-aided design and manufacturing, computational biology, geographic information systems, medicine, robotics, sensor networks, database systems, and other areas.

In particular, we encourage submissions of theoretical, applied, or experimental nature to the conference. Topics of a theoretical nature include, but are not limited to,

Topics of an applied and experimental nature include, but are not limited to,

Criteria:

When grading a paper, I ask you to address the following (interrelated) issues. A paper with high grade should score high on several of the parameters below.

Relevance

In what respect is the paper relevant to computational geometry? Is it directly relevant for the design, use, or analysis of geometric algorithms? Or may it have indirect implications for the development or the theory of algorithms?

Foundational/conceptual contribution

Note things like a new model, new notion, new definition, new approach, novel implementation. Note the significance and reasons for this novelty (and note the absence of such a novelty!).

Technical development

Does the paper make an

Relation to open problems:

Does the paper solve completely/partially an open question? How important is this question? (central/important/interesting/legitimate/stupid). How much effort has been invested in solving it and by whom?

Social interest in paper:

Is it potentially interesting to the whole community of computational geometry, to a major field (e.g. motion planning), to everyone in a restricted area (e.g. pseudotriangulations), or interesting only to the authors?

How will it contribute?

fertilization, satisfy curiosity, who knows?

Paper type:

Is it a Is the paper

Writing a review

I ask you to evaluate the paper and send me a short written report by e-mail, including a short summary. If you wish, you may also suggest an overall grade between 0.01 and 9.0 [9=excellent, 1=poor] and a confidence level of your judgement on a scale between 1 and 3, as indicated below. You may also break down you evaluation by giving a score in each of the following categories:
Technical Strength:
 This summarizes the technical contributions, as well as any issues about correctness.
Originality: Does the paper introduce a novel viewpoint or some new technique of general interest, or is it only an application of standard tools?
Presentation: How clearly is the paper written? (And does it promise to make a good talk?)
Appropriateness: How interesting is the paper to the community? Is it within the scope of the conference?

You can write comments for the authors about mistakes or suggestions that would help them to improve their paper. Please indicate which part of your review you wish to share only with the Program Committee.

Score ratings

Grade Interpretation
8.0-9.0
 An enthusiastic yes. An excellent paper - advances the field in an important way - well written and makes it easy to understand what the significance of their result is. Everyone should definitely attend the talk. This should be among the top 10% of the papers accepted to the conference. I would fight strongly for this paper.
7.0-7.99 A solid contribution. I feel I learned something worthwhile from this paper. I would want to go to the talk. This paper should be in the top third of the papers in the conference.
6.0-6.99 This will be in the middle third of the papers at the conference. Not a stellar result, but clearly worth accepting.
5.0-5.99 A weak vote for acceptance. A reasonable contribution to an interesting problem - or maybe the contribution is good but the authors don't seem to understand what it is and/or express it well - or maybe it's a good paper, but the subject area is marginal for the conference.
4.0-4.99 Ambivalent. Probably publishable as a journal paper in a medium journal, but a bit too specialized or too incremental for SoCG'05. Or perhaps it has nice ideas but is too preliminary, or too poorly written.
3.0-3.99
 A competent paper, but not of sufficient interest/depth for SoCG'05. A weak to moderate vote for rejection, but I concede that other people see some merits in the paper.
2.0-2.99
 Too preliminary / badly-written / making-such-a-minor-improvement-on-such-an-esoteric-topic. I would fight to have this paper rejected from the conference.
1.0-1.99
 A poor paper, unsuitable for any journal.
0.01-0.99
 Absolute reject. Trivial and/or non-novel and/or incorrect and/or out of scope.
0
 The paper contains a fatal error; or it is completely out of scope.

Confidence ratings: Range 1-3

  1. I am not an expert. My evaluation is that of an informed outsider. I have some idea of what this paper is about, but I'm not all that confident of my judgment on it.
  2. I am fairly familiar with the area of this paper, and have read the paper closely enough to be reasonably confident of my judgment.
  3. Consider me an "expert" on this paper.  I understand it in detail. I know the field, and I am perfectly sure about my judgement; I have checked and understood all proofs.

Ethical Issues

Submitted papers are confidential. We are not supposed to distribute them, or use them for our research. Similarly, your grades and the deliberations of the committee will be kept confidential. Submissions should be judged solely on the basis of the submitted extended abstract. You may have a personal bias on some papers. The reasons are many - personal/professional ties to authors, your student is just working on the same problem, etc. only you can judge such a bias, and decide if you don't feel comfortable grading the paper.