Journal First Track

ICPE invites several journals to incorporate journal-first papers into the ICPE program. Through this initiative, authors of journal-first papers accepted in the partnering journals will be invited to present their work at ICPE, allowing the authors to engage directly with the community and offering the ICPE attendees an additional dimension to the research track program.

The journals that support the journal-first model as partners with ICPE are:

  • Journal of Systems Research (JSys)
  • Journal of Software: Evolution and Process (JSEP)
  • Performance Evaluation (PEVA)
  • Journal of Systems and Software (JSS)
  • Science of Computer Programming (SCP)
  • Automated Software Engineering Journal (ASEJ)
  • ACM Transactions on Modeling and Performance Evaluation of Computing Systems (ACM ToMPECS)

Scope

A submission to the ICPE 2026 call for journal-first paper presentations must adhere to the following criteria:

  • The associated journal paper needs to have been accepted to a journal from the above list no earlier than January 1st, 2024.
  • The paper is in the scope of the conference.
  • The paper does not exclusively report a secondary study, e.g., systematic reviews, mapping studies, surveys.
  • Report on new research results that are not an extension of a previous conference publication. That is, journal versions extending prior conference publications with additional empirical results, proofs, algorithms, or other such details are out of scope of this track.
  • The paper has not been presented at, and is not under consideration for, journal-first programs of other conferences.
  • Self-nomination: Authors of relevant papers that fit all criteria above but are from a not listed top journal can submit their paper, and the committee will evaluate it for fit.

How to Submit

Authors of manuscripts that fulfill the above criteria are invited to submit a presentation proposal via HotCRP.

The proposal should consist of:

  • the paper title;
  • names of all authors;
  • an extended abstract (1 page) by using the standard ACM format for conference proceedings.
  • a short statement on how the work satisfies the journal-first criteria;
  • a pointer to the original journal paper.

Please list all authors of the original journal paper as authors of your submission in HotCRP.

Submission site: HotCRP

Evaluation and Selection

Authors will be invited to present their paper at ICPE 2026 after a check by the co-chairs that the paper satisfies the listed criteria. As the manuscripts have already been reviewed and accepted by journals, they will not be reviewed again for technical correctness but rather be checked for fitness.

Publication

The journal-first papers will be listed in the conference program and the proceedings will only contain the abstract and a pointer to the journal publication.

Conference Attendance Expectation

If a submission is accepted for the journal-first program, at least one author of each accepted journal-first submission must register and attend the conference to present the paper. Authors already registered for an accepted paper in the research track of ICPE 2026 are excluded from this obligation. The journal-first manuscripts are published through the journals and will not be part of the ICPE proceedings. The journal-first papers will be listed in the conference program.

Journal First Track Important Dates

  • Paper submission: Jan 26, 2026(AoE)
  • Notification: Feb 09, 2026(AoE)

Journal-First Co-Chairs

  • Vasilios Andrikopoulos, University of Groningen, The Netherlands
  • Helena Rodrigues, University of Minho, Portugal