Submission Configuration
Set what authors submit to your program (Paper, Abstract and Proposal types), their categories, items, choices, affirmations, each category's Important Dates and materials after acceptance.
Purpose
The Submission Configuration decides what authors submit to a program and what happens to it. It appears in the Create Program wizard, on Create Program and Edit Program in the Leadership Console, and in PC Console → Settings → Submission Config. It is the same editor everywhere.
A program offers up to three submission types. The type fixes only what the submission is and who decides:
- Paper: a manuscript (its PDF is always required), peer-reviewed; archival per category.
- Abstract: the abstract is the submission (plus any file or link a category asks for, such as a 1-page e-poster or a demo video link); the chairs decide.
- Proposal: a request to run a workshop, special session, panel or tutorial; the chairs decide. Only single programs take proposals.
Everything else (keywords, files, links, page limits, publication, deadlines) is a setting of each category.
When you use it
- When creating a program, to choose its structure and what authors submit.
- Before the call opens, to add categories (Full Paper, Poster-Only, Panel…), questions and affirmations.
- When a category needs its own deadline or a later non-archival deadline.
Walkthrough
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Program structure: choose Single program (authors submit to it) or Multi-Programs (it groups sub-programs, such as Workshops, and takes proposals). In the wizard this is step 1, and in PC Settings it isn't shown (Leadership sets it). A Multi-Programs program shows only Proposal, which is always on, and its first category is named after what the program holds (Workshop, Tutorial). Its Items decide the proposal form, e.g. set Abstract to Off to ask for the proposal PDF only. When the Multi-Program Chair approves a proposal, the sub-program is created automatically. A program that already has submissions stays single.
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Paper, Abstract, Proposal: click a type's arrow to open or fold it (On or Off beside its name says whether the program takes it); inside, Accept … submissions turns the type on or off. The arrow beside Categories folds its category list (the count shows how many). Under each, Add ▾ opens a list with checkboxes: tick as many categories as you need and click Add N selected. They go straight into the list; click Edit on each to set its dates and details. The list has two groups. This conference's categories are the conference's own, saved by Conference Leadership for every program to reuse (shown only when the conference has some). AirBalloon templates are common starting points from AirBalloon, the same in every conference (Full Paper, Poster Paper, Poster-Only, Lightning Talk, Previously Published Work, Panel, Workshop…), plus Custom. A template only fills in starting values; edit anything. The presets follow the CROSS-AI 2027 submission guidelines: Full Paper 8–10 pages, Short Paper 5–7, Poster Paper 3–4, Demo Paper 2–3 (references included); Workshop and Panel proposals up to 4 pages (2 main text + 2 information). A conference category shows Added beside it when the program already has it. Adding one replaces a same-named built-in category not yet used (it keeps that category's dates). A copy shows Predefined · vN in its editor and Updated: review when the original changes (Apply keeps your category's name and dates; Keep mine dismisses it). Conference Leadership also see Save as predefined in the category editor.
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Click a category's name (or Edit) to open it in a window and set its pages (for a paper: main text, references, appendix and a total range; the presets use the total, references included, e.g. Full Paper 8–10 pages; for a proposal: a total and labelled parts; an abstract has no page rules), its publication (Paper: Archival only, Author chooses or Non-archival only; Abstract and Proposal: Not published or Abstract in proceedings), its Important Dates (see below), its items (change any item just for this category), extra choices and affirmations, for papers the blind review (Program setting follows Review Config, or pick single or double blind for this category) and review form (the program default, or any form listed in Review Config → Review Forms), and what is asked after acceptance (camera-ready for archival papers; presentation materials for everyone). Paper pages are checked only when Check page limits per category is on. The switch covers every Paper category that has page numbers (a category with none is not checked). While it is off, the Pages section shows a warning with Turn on for all Paper categories, and the category list marks the pages (not checked). Click Save in the category window. It saves the whole Submission Configuration section, as Save Configuration does, so there is no second step.
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Important Dates in the category lists every date the category uses, grouped by phase. A new category uses the program's dates (an Abstract or Proposal category, the Abstract or Proposal dates from Important Dates), shown as Program date. Change a date to give the category its own; it then reads Changed with the program date beside it, and Use program date undoes it. You can remove a date the category does not use (Restore brings it back), and Add date adds a standard date, a date of your own, or a round (a later submission deadline with its notification: a submission goes into the first round still open). Copy dates from… copies another category's dates once. For a paper category whose authors may choose non-archival, add the non-archival submission deadline for the later date. The category keeps only what it changed, so later changes to the program's dates still reach it. When the program chairs lock the dates (PC Settings → Important Dates), the list is read only and the category uses the program dates.
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Click Edit next to General Paper settings for every category (or General Abstract settings, General Proposal settings) under a type to set its items (Abstract label, Keywords count, PDF label, audio / video / project links, Additional links and Supplemental files), its choices (a question with fixed answers, which can show other items or raise a flag), and its affirmations (statements authors select). Each supplemental file starts labelled Supplemental Materials and has a max MB: left empty, a file may be up to 50 MB, which is also the most you can set (a larger number shows "Maximum is 50 MB" and can't be saved). Its file type box starts at PDF; pick Audio (MP3, WAV, M4A, AAC, OGG), Video (MP4, MOV, WEBM, M4V), ZIP archive or Custom (type extensions such as
pdf, zip) so the item accepts the right file. Authors see the accepted types next to the item's label. A label that names audio or video (for example "Audio (Up to 10 minutes)") switches a PDF item to that type as you type it, and an item whose label and types disagree shows a yellow warning with a button that fixes it. A choice's answers are listed one per row (Option 1, Option 2…); Add option adds one, and an answer submissions have already picked can't be removed. For papers, also the Archival labels and which answer is preselected, page-limit checking and the license. - 6
Each category row has Dates, which opens the category's full list of dates without leaving the page. Problems are listed in red under the editor and block saving.
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Open a type's General settings to set Maximum per submitting author: how many submissions of that type one submitting author may have in this program. Empty uses the default (Paper 2, Abstract 2, Proposal 1); 0 means no limit. Nothing is inherited from the conference or a Multi-Program: each program and sub-program sets and counts its own.
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Optionally, in a category's window set Maximum per submitting author in this category (under Limit per author). Empty means only the type limit applies; when both are set, the lower one applies. Set it to 1 to make an author's papers go to different categories. A category copied from a predefined category starts with its limit. Click Save Configuration.
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Under Required Number of Authors, set the fewest authors (the submitting author and co-authors) a submission to this program needs. Use the setting of is checked by default: a main program follows the conference (Leadership Console, Settings → Submission Settings, default 2), and a sub-program follows its Multi-Program, or the conference when the Multi-Program has none. To set this program's own number, clear it and enter the number; it is saved with the section. Authors with fewer authors get a warning on the Authors step and can't go on.
Tips
The blind review of a category is applied on the server for every screen. In double blind, reviewers, area chairs and senior area chairs never receive the authors' names, co-authors or original file names; the program's chairs do. Reviewers are shown to authors and to each other as Reviewer 1..n per paper. Authors get reviews and the decision only after release. Nobody but its writer sees a draft review; chairs see that it exists.
Double blind also applies when authors submit a paper: the upload step asks them to anonymize the PDF, checks its file properties and first page for author details automatically (a warning, never a block; findings reach Desk Screening), and the Compliance step requires the anonymization statement. This happens whether or not your Desk Rejection policy turns the check or the statement on; single blind papers get them only from the policy.
When Conference Leadership set General settings for a type, a new program starts with them and follows later changes until you change them here. Under the type, a line says whether it follows the conference's settings or uses this program's own. Use conference settings takes the conference's settings again; Keep mine keeps yours when the conference changes them.
A choice or affirmation set under General Paper settings for every category is asked in every Paper category, so it is not in a category's own Choices for this category list. The category's Edit window lists it at the top of that section; click Edit them in General Paper settings to keep the category's changes and jump to where it is edited.
Category names are unique across the program. A category with submissions can't be removed; renaming it keeps the old name on those submissions.
Setting a page range alone does not check anything. Turn on Check page limits per category (in the category's Pages section, or under General Paper settings for every category) and click Save Configuration. Then a PDF over the category's total maximum can't be submitted, and one below its minimum moves to a category it fits or shows a warning.
Each problem starts with where it is. General Paper settings › … (or General Abstract settings › …, General Proposal settings › …) means the type's own settings, which every category inherits: open General Paper settings for every category under the categories list, not a category. Paper › Full Paper › … means that category's own setting: click the category. For example, General Paper settings › Supplemental files: "Supplemental Materials" max MB is 500 is fixed under General Paper settings for every category → Supplemental files, where the max MB box shows 500 with a red border; set it to 50 or less and save. A value set on the type is listed once, not again under each category.
Type and category limits count only the submitting author's own submissions in this program; co-authored ones do not count toward them. The conference total (set by the leadership in Setup → Review Settings, default 10) counts every submission a person appears on anywhere in the conference, as submitter or co-author. Every submission counts except drafts and those that were withdrawn or deleted, so rejected, desk rejected and accepted ones still take a slot. Authors see nothing while within the limits; when one is reached, pressing Submit shows the reason and nothing is submitted. Chairs submitting on an author's behalf may go over them. Submissions made before a limit was lowered stay.
Talk and Q&A minutes per category are set in Sessions & Schedule → Settings, where the schedule uses them.
Abstracts have no minimum or maximum word count, and neither do author rebuttals, revision responses, reviews or meta reviews. Authors and reviewers see a live word count for information only.
Abstracts are set up as the Abstract submission type above, with their own categories and deadlines. There is no separate "Abstract Submission" switch any more.