SIMUTools 2010 conference report

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By L. Felipe Perrone (Bucknell University, USA) and Giovanni Stea (University of Pisa, Italy), General Chairs

We are happy to report that SIMUTools 2010, which met in Torremolinos, Spain, was a success. This was the third edition of the conference on simulation tools and techniques started in Marseille in 2008. The conference brought back SimulationWorks, the Industry Track that was part of SIMUTools first edition.

This year SIMUTools received a total of 132 submissions from 39 different countries. Of these, 39 papers were selected for publication and presentation (including 30 full-length papers and 9 short-length papers). In order to reach high standards in the peer-review process, a total of 325 reviews were conducted on the paper submissions, with papers receiving no less than three reviews. We also introduced a rebuttal phase in which authors were given the opportunity to respond to the reviewers concerns in order to achieve a more objective evaluation of the papers by the program committee.

As a result, we had a strong three-day program with 14 technical sessions of high-quality papers and presentations. The program included a poster session with 14 posters, each of which is represented in the proceedings by a two-page extended abstract, and two invited talks by George Riley (Georgia Tech, U.S.A.) and Ben Lauwens (R.M.A., Belgium). We had three excellent keynote addresses by Tracy Camp (Colorado School of Mines, U.S.A.), Luca Cardelli (Microsoft Research, U.K.) and Antonio Elizondo (Telefónica I+D, Spain), who talked in plenary sessions at the beginning of each conference day. A panel discussion entitled „What is a Scientific Contribution in Modeling and Simulation?” was be held on the afternoon of the second day – this open discussion welcomed the participation and the contribution of attendees to seek guidelines to improve the focus and review process of future editions of SIMUTools.

SimulationWorks 2010, our Industry Track focused on promoting results that have been applied or have a potential application in industrial fields. The papers presented topics of methodology, tools, applications, and practices and often bridged different areas. SimulationWorks brought Antonio Elizondo, who delivered a keynote speech for the larger conference audience on the role of the simulation for a network operator. It brought also an invited paper on the use of simulation in the analysis and design of hierarchical routing systems with support for quality of service and also a hands-on tutorial on the optimization of supply chains led by J. Chris White (ViaSim Solutions, U.S.A.) and Robert Sholtes (Chief Technology Officer of SimBLOX LLC, U.S.A.)

Although this year’s attendance was 30% lower than in 2009, in Rome, the conference counted on with a strong program and with three successful co-located workshops, described as follows. WNS3, the workshop on the ns-3 network simulator, has been a regular event since the first edition of SIMUTools, and has been the annual meeting venue for developers and users of ns-3. Although there are no published proceedings for WNS3, the workshop program was packed with interesting presentations and counted with 24 registrants, but more than actual 30 attendees. The International OMNeT++ Workshop (both meeting for the 3rd time), another staple at SIMUTools, has always attracted a good number of submissions and a large audience. Finally, DISIO, the new Workshop on Distributed SImulation & Online Gaming attracted a different, but complementary community to SIMUTools. The workshop organizers were pleased with the quality of the papers and the workshop had a good attendance.

The day to day events at SIMUTools 2010 happened as follows.

- The first day (Monday, March 14) was dedicated to two workshops: WNS3 and DISIO 2010. The actual SIMUTools conference program started on Tuesday, March 15, with an introduction by the General and Program co-Chairs, who welcomed the attendees and described briefly the making of the event and of the technical program. This was followed by Luca Cardelli’s keynote address, entitled “Algebras and Languages for Molecular Programming”. The conference went on along two parallel tracks, which were globally fairly well attended. In the afternoon of the first day, a poster session took place, where 13 presenters discussed their posters with the audience.

- The second day counted with three parallel tracks, two of which corresponded to the SIMUTools 2010 technical program and the third to SimulationWorks 2010, the Industry Track. The day started with the keynote by Antonio Elizondo, entitled “The role of the simulation for a network operator: a survey”, presented to all conference attendees. The IT went on for the whole day, and ended with a hands-on tutorial session on “Supply chain optimization”. The main track, continued for most of the afternoon with two parallel tracks. The audience was joined again at the end of the day for the panel discussion entitled “What is a Scientific Contribution in Modeling and Simulation?”. The panel lasted for more than one hour and a half, with a good attendance and a good level of interaction between the panelists and the audience. In the evening the conference banquet was held, and the three SIMUTools Awards (best paper, best student paper, and best industry track paper) were assigned. The banquet ended with a flamenco show from a local group, which was well appreciated by the attendees.

- The third day started with Tracy Camp’s keynote address entitled “MANET Simulation Studies: Reversing The Incredibles”. Two parallel tracks went on till late afternoon, when the General and Technical Program Chairs closed the conference with a short speech.

- The final day (Friday, March 19) was dedicated to the third workshop on OMNeT++. This year, the submissions were less numerous than the previous year, but the attendance was again very good (more than 30 participants).

If you want to find out more on this event, please visit it’s website.