[fg-arc] QoSA 2015: Call for Papers

[Heiko Koziolek]

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QoSA 2015
11th International ACM Sigsoft Conference 
on the Quality of Software Architectures
Montreal, Canada, May 4 - 8, 2015
http://qosa.ipd.kit.edu/qosa_2015/

part of CompArch 2015
http://comparch2015.org
collocated with
WICSA 2015 - 12th Working IEEE / IFIP Conference  on Software Architecture
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GOALS and SCOPE
The goal of QoSA (Quality of Software Architectures) is to address the quality aspects of software architecture, focusing broadly on its quality characteristics and how these relate to the design of software architectures. Specific issues of interest are defining and modeling quality measures, evaluating and managing architecture quality, linking architecture to requirements and implementation, and preserving architecture quality throughout the system lifetime.  QoSA is the premier forum for the presentation of new results in the area of software architecture quality. It brings together researchers, practitioners and students who are concerned with software architecture quality in a holistic way. As a working conference QoSA has a strong practical bias, encompassing research papers, industrial reports and invited talks from renowned speakers.

This year the main theme of QoSA is Software Architecture for the 4th Industrial Revolution. After mechanization, mass production, and electronics, the Internet is about to enable a new level of productivity in manufacturing. This shall be enabled by smart cyber-physical systems connected to cloud computing services and communicating using standardized semantics. In the near future, industrial big data analytics on monitored sensor data shall improve the efficiency and individualization of production facilities. The IT systems for this 4th Industrial Revolution will be partially self-adaptive and may require novel approaches for software architecting.  In this year's QoSA we particularly solicit contributions that explore the various implications of this upcoming industrial revolution on software architecture. This includes reference architectures, software architectures adapting at run time, architecture styles and patterns for cyber-physical and distributed systems, as well as approaches exploring critical quality properties, such as performance, reliability, security, safety, maintainability, and usability. At the same time, submissions related to the general topic of the conference are welcome.
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TOPICS
Topics of interest for the conference include (but are not limited to) the following themes:

Architecture Design and Implementation
- design alternatives, trade-offs, and their influence on the quality of software architecture
- adapting software architectures to address changes in software and its environment
- architectural refactorings and their implications for quality
- architectural standards and reference architectures
- model-driven methods and tools for architecture design and implementation
- architecture patterns and styles improving various quality attributes
Architecture Evaluation
- empirical validation, testing, prototyping and simulation for assessing architecture quality
- performance, reliability, maintainability, security and other quality attribute evaluations
- methods and processes for evaluating architecture quality (also in presence of the change)
- model-driven evaluation of software architecture quality
- evaluating the effects of architectural adaptations at run-time
- lessons learned and empirical validation of theories and frameworks on architecture quality
- quality assessment of legacy systems and third party applications
Architecture in the 4th Industrial Revolution
- architectures for self-adapting embedded and physical systems
- architectures exploiting semantic web technologies for manufacturing
- reference architectures for internet-of-things applications
- architectures supporting decentralized, self-organizing cyber-physical systems
Architecture Management
- assessment and enforcement of architectural conformance throughout the software lifecycle
- traceability of software architecture to requirements and implementation
- models and tools for coping with software architecture evolution
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IMPORTANT DATES
Abstracts due: December 21, 2014
Full papers due: January 9, 2015
Notification of acceptance: February 9, 2015
Camera-ready due: February 23, 2015
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TYPES of SUBMISSIONS
We solicit two types of submissions: regular papers and position papers.
- Regular papers should describe original and significant results of theoretical, empirical, conceptual, or experimental research or of experience from industrial practice. Reflecting the practical emphasis of QoSA, papers showcasing applications along with a sound conceptual contribution are welcome. Regular papers are limited to 10 pages.
- Position papers describe novel ideas or innovative proposals whose aim is to stimulate discussion related to experiences and ideas, rather than to present mature results. Position papers are limited to 6 pages.

Papers should follow the standard ACM format for conference proceedings (alternate style) and submitted online via the EasyChair Conference Management System:
https://easychair.org/conferences/?conf=qosa2015
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ORGANIZING COMMITTEE
Program Chairs
Ipek Ozkaya (Carnegie Mellon Software Engineering Institute, USA)
Heiko Koziolek, (ABB Corporate Research, Germany)

Comparch 2015 General Chair 
Philippe Kruchten (University British Columbia)
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PROGRAM COMMITTEE
Aldeida Aleti, Monash University, Australia
Muhammad Ali Babar, IT University of Copenhagen, Denmark
Paris Avgeriou, University of Groningen, Netherlands
Jan Bosch, Chalmers University of Technology, Sweden
Barbora Buhnova, Masaryk University, Czech Republic
Tomas Bures, Charles University Prague, Czech Republic
Yuangfang Cai, Drexel University, USA
Radu Calinescu, University of York, UK
Amine Chigani, GE Software Excellence Center, USA
Vittorio Cortellessa, Universita dell'Aquila, Italy
Ivica Crnkovic, Mälardalen University, Sweden
Antinisca Di Marco, Universita' dell'Aquila, Italy
Vincenzo Grassi, Universita' di Roma "Tor Vergata", Italy
Lars Grunske, Universität Stuttgart, Germany
Clemente Izurieta, Montana State University, USA
Samuel Kounev, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, Germany
Anne Koziolek, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, Germany
Marin Litoiu, York University, Canada
John D. McGregor, Clemson University, USA
José Merseguer, Universidad de Zaragoza, Spain
Raffaela Mirandola, Politecnico di Milano, Italy
Rob Nord, Software Engineering Institute, USA
Dorina Petriu, Carleton University, Canada
Paul Pettersson, Mälardalen University, Sweden
Ralf Reussner, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, Germany
Jose-Raul Romero, University of Cordoba, Spain
Roshanak Roshandel, Seattle University, USA
Antonino Sabetta, SAP Research Sophia-Antipolis, France
Klaus Schmid, University of Hildesheim, Germany
Heinz Schmidt, RMIT University, Australia
Mike Smit, Dalhousie University, Canada
Judith Stafford, University of Colorado Boulder, USA
Girish Suryanarayana, Siemens Corporate Research, India
Clemens Szyperski, Microsoft Research, USA
Bedir Tekinerdogan, Bilkent University, Turkey
Catia Trubiani, Gran Sasso Science Institute, Italy
Petr Tuma, Charles University, Czech Republic
Olaf Zimmermann, Hochschule für Technik Rapperswil, Switzerland
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