[TYPES/announce] CALL FOR PAPERS - FM-RAIL-BOK WORKSHOP 2013

[Markus Roggenbach]

CALL FOR PAPERS

  FM-RAIL-BOK WORKSHOP 2013 

  -- Workshop on a 
  -- Formal Methods Body of Knowledge for 
  -- Railway Control and Safety Systems

  23-24 September 2013, 2013, Madrid, Spain
  http://ssfmgroup.wordpress.com

  A workshop in SEFM'13
  September 25-27, 2013, Madrid, Spain
  http://antares.sip.ucm.es/sefm2013/

MOTIVATION AND SCIENCE-PHILOSOPHICAL BACKGROUND

  Formal methods in software science and software engineering have
  existed at least as long as the term “software engineering” (NATO
  Science Conference, Garmisch, 1968) itself. In many
  engineering-based application areas, such as in the railway domain,
  formal methods have reached a level of maturity that already enables
  the compilation of a so-called body of knowledge (abbreviated as
  “BOK”). Its various methods and techniques include algebraic
  specification, process-algebraic modelling and verification, Petri
  nets, fuzzy logics, etc. For example, the B-method has been used
  successfully to verify the most relevant parts of a model of the
  Metro underground railway system of the city of Paris
  (France). Software tool support is already available for a number of
  those formal methods; for example in the form of various model
  checker or SAT solver programs.

  In this context, our workshop shall bring together scientists,
  researchers and practitioners, from academia, the industry,
  professional guildes and engineering associations, national or
  international standardisation committees, as well as governmental or
  administrative regulators to re-collect and discuss the “state of
  the art” in the application of formal methods within the railway
  domain (including inner-city tram lines, urban mono-rail systems,
  etc., too). Thereby we shall adopt a methodological viewpoint based
  on Vincenti’s book "What Engineers know and how they know it:
  Analytical Studies from Aeronautical History, John Hopkins
  University Press, 1990". This book contains a science-historical and
  science-philosophical analysis of what it is that constitutes
  engineering knowledge (and the related practice) specifically, in
  other words: an epistemology of engineering. The development of the
  above-mentioned handbooks as an explicit recording of such knowledge
  is part of Vincenti’s epistemology.

SUBMISSION

  Our workshop calls for short position papers with strong emphasis on
  methodologically sound “BOK” contents and case-based “best practice”
  knowledge in the spirit of classical engineering handbooks.

  Such papers, which will be reviewed and moderated by the workshop’s
  programme committee, must not exceed 6 pages in the IEEE
  double-column conference format

    http://www.ieee.org/conferences_events/conferences/publishing/templates.html

  and must be submitted via our EasyChair Submission Website

    http://www.easychair.org/account/signin.cgi?conf=fmrailbok2013

  no later than the stipulated submission deadline.  Submissions which
  do not meet these requirements will be rejected without review.

IMPORTANT DATES:

  Paper submission deadline: 14 June 2013  
  Author notification: 5 July 2013
  Re-submission of revised accepted papers: 16 August 2013
  Distribution of revised papers amongst registered participants: 2 September 2013
  Workshop in Madrid: 23-24 September 2013
  Thereafter: post-discussions and further work towards the planned book release

WORKSHOP CO-CHAIRS

  Anne Haxthausen, Technical University of Denmark 
  Markus Roggenbach, University of Swansea, Great Britain
  Stefan Gruner, University of Pretoria, South Africa
  Tom Maibaum, McMaster University, Canada

PROGRAMME COMMITTEE (confirmation status: 21 March 2013)

  Martin Brennan, British Rail Safety Standards Board
  Simon Chadwick, Invensys Rail, Great Britain
  Lars-Henrik Eriksson, Uppsala University, Sweden
  Alessandro Fantechi, University of Firenze, Italy
  Michaela Huhn, Technical University of Clausthal, Germany
  Hoang Nga Nguyen, University of Swansea, Great Britain
  Jan Peleska, University of Bremen, Germany
  Holger Schlingloff, Humboldt-University of Berlin, Germany
  Kenji Taguchi, AIST, Japan
  Helen Treharne, University of Surrey, Great Britain
  Laurent Voisin, Systerel, France
  Kirsten Winter, University of Queensland, Australia

WORKSHOP FORMAT

  Our workshop is planned as a workshop in the proper sense of the
  word, i.e.: it will be work-oriented, not
  presentation-oriented. During the workshop, smaller sub-groups will
  work on various sub-topics, whereas plenum sessions will bring the
  sub-groups and their sub-results together again.

  For the sake of effective working during the event, all accepted
  papers will be distributed amongst the registered participants
  already before the event. Participants are expected to study these
  papers before the workshop, such that the discussions and sub-groups
  can commence effectively from the first hour of the meeting onwards.

  Soon after the workshop, its work results (proceedings) shall be
  published first in the form of an institutional technical
  report. Thereafter the technical report shall be further “polished”
  and consolidated, with the goal of publishing an authoritative BOK
  book on the chosen topic, with a reputable publisher, in the
  not-too-far future.

  In case of good success, similar BOK preparation workshops are
  planned for the future on other (yet similar) topics, for example:
  formal methods for aviation software, or formal methods for
  automobile applications, etc. In the long term, this could lead to a
  multi-volume series of such BOK books on various topics.

PUBLICATION

  According to our workshop’s goal and format we follow a 3-phase
  publication plan with informal distribution of accepted papers
  amongst registered workshop participants before the workshop,
  official release of an institutional technical report soon after the
  workshop, publication of a refined and consolidated BOK book in the
  not-too-far future, after the technical report, with a reputable
  scientific publisher.