This is the one week deadline for submissions. We're expecting an exciting conference with keynotes from Satoshi Matsuoko and two other world-renowned speakers, three workshops (distributed programming abstractions, economic models for distributed systems, and grid enabling applications), three tutorials, and of course, a trip to New Orleans for an afternoon/evening of Mardi Gras parades. Mardi Gras Conference 2008 - http://www.mardigrasconference.org/ The Center for Computation & Technology at LSU, in cooperation with ACM SIGAPP, is hosting the 15th Mardi Gras Conference, 31 January - 2 February 2008, in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. The Mardi Gras conferences take place annually, concentrating each year on a different computational theme of current relevance. This Year's Theme: From lightweight mash-ups to lambda grids: Understanding the spectrum of distributed computing requirements, applications, tools, infrastructures, interoperability, and the incremental adoption of key capabilities. Description: The field of distributed computing has been recognized for decades but only in the last few years has there been a vast expansion of distributed computing approaches and tools that are gaining serious, wide-spread use. This wide-spread use goes far beyond computational science and engineering, to include business, government, art, and popular culture. While the fundamental requirements of distributed computing are generally understood, the ubiquitous availability of networks and servers has enabled the development of many different tools to suit the needs of different communities. Besides what have become traditional grids, there is growing use of lambda grids, enterprise service buses, service-oriented architectures, and Web 2.0. All of these approaches enable the sharing of resources in "virtual organizations" but with widely differing support for discoverability, reliability, security, management, quality-of-service, etc. In all cases, interoperability at the infrastructure level and at the application domain level is a critical issue. While network connectivity has become ubiquitous, and has enabled the creation of virtual organizations, it is still an open issue how tightly coupled these organizations can be. Bandwidth and latency determine how interactive and collaborative distributed participants can work together. Hence, advanced networks such as lambda networks (dedicated optical networks) have the potential for enhancing interactiveness on a large-scale, and actually being an enabling technology for application domains that require tight coupling. The goal of Mardi Gras 2008 is to improve our understanding of the drivers for all of these technologies, how they relate to one another, and how user communities can transition from simpler approaches, like Web 2.0 mash-ups, to more full-service grids, when better discovery, reliability, security, etc., are needed -- while achieving sufficient interoperability -- and how tightly coupled virtual organizations can be. To this end, we are seeking the best, most insightful papers on all of these technologies, and the application domains that are driving their requirements and development. Topics include, but are not limited to: Application case studies in all areas, e.g., geospatial, disaster response/management, science, engineering, commerce, finance, art, etc. Innovative and advanced scenarios, e.g., dynamic data-driven, interactive, collaborative, tele-immersive, adaptive, etc. Tools for developing and deploying applications, e.g., middleware, toolkits, portals, problem solving environments, production environments, virtual organizations, etc. Application APIs and programming models High speed and optical networks Distributed algorithms Workflow management Resource management and scheduling Education Paper Submission: We invite authors to submit original and unpublished work (also not submitted elsewhere for review) reporting solid and innovative results and positions on any of the conference topics. Papers should not exceed 8 single-spaced pages of text using 10-point size type on 8.5 x 11 inch paper (see ACM author instructions, a LaTeX style sheet and Word format is available, too.) All bibliographical references, tables, and figures must be included in these 8 pages. Submissions that exceed the 8-page limit will not be reviewed. Authors should submit a PDF file that will print on a PostScript printer. Electronic submission is required. The site for submissions will be announced on the main conference website at least 4 weeks before the submission date. Submission implies the willingness of at least one of the authors to register and present the paper if it is accepted. Proceedings: All submissions will be peer-reviewed, and accepted papers will appear in the conference proceedings. The proceedings will be distributed on CD at the conference. The copyrights for the proceedings papers will be held by ACM, and the proceedings will be hosted in the ACM Digital Library. General Chair: Daniel S. Katz, LSU, USA Deputy General Chair: Shantenu Jha, LSU, USA Program Chair: Craig Lee, Aerospace Corporation, USA Program Vice-Chairs: Emerging Technologies: Geoffrey Fox, Indiana University, USA Data-Intensive Applications: Liping Di, George Mason University, USA Network-Intensive Applications: Bill St. Arnaud, CANARIE, Canada Middleware and Distributed Infrastructures: Franck Cappello, INRIA, France Publicity Chair: Matei Ripeanu, University of British Columbia, Canada Proceedings Chair: Omer Rana, Cardiff University, UK Poster Chair: Tevfik Kosar, LSU, USA Tutorials Chair: Douglas Thain, University of Notre Dame, USA Program Committee: Cosimo Anglano, Universita' del Piemonte Orientale "A. Avogadro", Italy Malcolm Atkinson, National e-Science Centre, UK Rosa Badia, Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya, Spain Alessandro Bassi, Hitachi, France Pete Beckman, Argonne National Laboratory, USA Bruce Boghosian, Tufts University, USA Natalya Bulashova, UT-ORNL Joint Institute for Computational Sciences, USA Massimo Cafaro, University of Salento, Italy Yves Caniou, ENS-Lyon, France Kenneth Chiu, SUNY Binghamton, USA Cees de Laat, University of Amsterdam, The Netherlands Jack Dongarra, University of Tennessee, USA Sergi Figuerola, i2cat, Spain Jean-Patrick Gelas, ENS-Lyon, France Wolfgang Gentzsch, D-Grid/RENCI, Germany/USA Paola Grosso, University of Amsterdam, The Netherlands Olivier Jerphagnon, Calient Networks, USA Admela Jukan, Technische Universität Braunschweig, Germany Thilo Kielmann, Vrije Universiteit, The Netherlands Dieter Kranzlmüller, Joh. Kepler University, Austria Jason Leigh, University of Illinois at Chicago, USA Joe Mambretti, Northwestern University, USA Madhav Marathe, Virginia Tech, USA Satoshi Matsuoka, Tokyo Institute of Technology, Japan Andre Merzky, Louisiana State University, USA Hidemoto Nakada, AIST, Japan Savas Parastatidis, Microsoft, USA Serge Petiton, Ecole Universitaire des Ingenieurs de Lille, France Marlon Pierce, Indiana University, USA Olivier Richard, UJF/INRIA, France Paul Roe, Queensland University of Techology, Australia Alain Roy, University of Wisconsin, USA Mitsuhisa Sato, University of Tsukuba, Japan Martin Swany, University of Delaware, USA Domenico Talia, University of Calabria, Italy Rich Wolski, University of California, Santa Barbara, USA Ian Taylor, Cardiff University, UK Hai Zhuge, Chinese Academy of Sciences, China Local Arrangements Chair: Karen Jones, LSU Main Conference Paper Due Dates: Submission: Oct 31, 2007 (changed due to change in proceedings publication method, no further extensions) Notification: Nov 28, 2007 Final Papers: Dec 14, 2007 Conference Schedule Workshops may start on Wednesday, 30 January, in advance of the main conference. Conference sessions will be held on Thursday, 31 January and Friday, 1 February, and for the morning of Saturday, 2 February. On Saturday afternoon an optional excursion will take participants to join in the celebrations for Mardi Gras in New Orleans, returning to Baton Rouge on Sunday morning at approximately 2 a.m. Associated Workshops Distributed Programming Abstractions Workshop: http://www.mardigrasconference.org/DPA_workshop.php Workshop on Economic Models for Distributed Systems: http://www.iw.uni-karlsruhe.de/emds2008/ Workshop on Grid-Enabling Applications: http://www.mardigrasconference.org/GEA_workshop.php Call for Tutorials Mardi Gras Conference - http://mardigrasconference.org/ 31 January 2008 We invite proposals for tutorial presentations that will teach attendees how to use software and infrastructure for distributed systems. Tutorials will be half-day events that involve a combination of expert presentations with guided, hands-on opportunities for the participants. Tutorials should address the conference theme: "From lightweight mash-ups to lambda grids: Understanding the spectrum of distributed computing requirements, applications, tools, infrastructures, interoperability, and the incremental adoption of key capabilities." Proposals for tutorials should be submitted by email to the tutorial chair, Douglas Thain (dthain@nd.edu). A tutorial proposal should consist of a cover page indicating the title, presenter, abstract, and a statement of the relevance to the conference; a two-page outline of the tutorial contents; and a one-page resume for each presenter. Tutorials will take place in a standard meeting room with digital projector. Proposals may assume that attendees will bring laptop computers and have wireless network access. However, presenters should have a backup plan in the event of a network outage. Proposals requiring any other special resources should be discussed with the tutorial chair in advance, and clearly indicated in the proposal. One presenter from each accepted tutorial will receive free conference registration and Saturday afternoon/evening excursion ticket to MardiGras in New Orleans. Important Dates: 5 November 2007 - Tutorial Proposals Due 26 November 2007 - Tutorial Acceptance Notification Tutorials Presented in advance of main conference