USENIX Update

Are you thinking about submitting a paper for WebApps ’12? If so, get on it. Submissions are due January 23, 2012, 11:59 p.m. PST (hard deadline, no extensions, no exceptions, so don’t ask).

In this interview, WebApps ’12 program chair Michael Maximilien (IBM Research—Watson) offers a sneak peek at what we can expect to see this summer in Boston:

RE: We have some topic ideas listed for WebApps ’12. Which particular topics, products, services, or themes are most interesting to you or stand out this year?

MM: I think topics related to cloud computing and platform as a service (PaaS) as it relates to WebApps and their management might be an interesting topic. Also, WebApps with mobile views and techniques to create such apps are important topic for this year.

RE: Would you like to have anything new or different in the schedule for 2012?

MM: Yes, indeed. One of the main changes this year is the addition of “demo” papers. These are short papers — about half the size of regular papers — but that have an accompanying built system, application, etc., or in other words, a demo. The demo papers are designed to encourage industry and open source participants who might have interesting technology but are not used to the rigorous writing and review process for USENIX, or who simply do not have the time to write a full paper.

RE: Any sneak peeks or teasers yet for what we can expect at WebApps ’12?

MM: Yes, we have two confirmed distinguished keynotes already. One is the create of JSON, Doug Crockford from Yahoo!, and the other is a superstar in the open source world with significant contributions to Ruby, Rails, Merb, jQuery, and many others. I am talking about Yehuda Katz. We might have one more keynote — a surprise.

Maybe you’ve heard about this little thing called the “cloud”? If so, you’ll be happy to know that LISA ’11 has plenty of cloud coverage: Join us on Friday, December 9th, for the CloudStack Build a Cloud Day.

The complete schedule and details are on the Cloudstack event page, but here are some highlights:

9:00 – 9:15: Welcome – Mark Hinkle, Director, Cloud Computing Community, Citrix

9:15 – 10:30:  Xen Cloud Platform – Todd Deshane, Xen.org

10:45 – 12:00:  Build Your Cloud -CloudStack – David Nalley, CloudStack Community Manager

12:45-1:45: Automating Your Cloud with Opscode Chef – Matt Ray and Aaron Peterson, Opscode

1:45 – 2:45: Automatic Configuration of Your Cloud with Puppet – Eric Shamow, PuppetLabs

3:00 – 4:00:  Unified, Scale-out Storage for the Cloud – John Mark Walker, Gluster

4:00 – 5:00: Monitoring the Cloud with Zenoss Core – Simon Jakesch,  Zenoss

The Call for Papers for 2nd USENIX Workshop on Hot Topics in Cloud Computing (HotCloud ’10) is now available.

HotCloud ’10 seeks to discuss challenges in the Cloud Computing paradigm including the design, implementation, and deployment of virtualized clouds.

Submissions are due March, 23, 2010.

More information and submission guidelines can be found here.

HotCloud ’10 will be part of USENIX Federated Conferences Week, which will take place June 21–25, 2010.