Welcome to CASCON 2008 --- the 18th Annual International Conference hosted by the IBM Centers for Advanced Studies.
The CASCON "Meeting of Minds" conference series provides computer science and software engineering academics and professionals the opportunity to explore some of the exciting research that is underway in Canada and around the world.
This year we had many interesting submissions that describe innovative approaches and fresh perspectives. CASCON 2008 attracted 73 submissions of papers from a wide variety of places. Of the 208 authors who were listed on the submitted papers, 128 (62%) came from Canada, 28 (13%) from Europe, 27 (13%) from Asia, 18 (9%) from the US, and 7 (3%) from South America. Measuring by institutions, 158 (76%) of the authors were from academic or government research institutes and 50 (24%) from industry.
We followed a rigorous process to ensure that accepted papers met a standard of high quality. Each paper was reviewed by at least three members of our Program Committee, followed by a three-week on-line discussion period. Ultimately, we accepted 23 papers (32% acceptance rate) and recommended to authors of 14 papers to submit their work to the Posters track. The resulting program features three sessions on Software Engineering, two sessions on Systems, and a session each on Web Applications, Databases and Compilers. We hope you will take the opportunity to attend the Papers sessions following the morning keynotes.