The papers committee decides on which talks to accept and schedules them. It usually consists of a range of community members from different areas and of different experience, usually led by one of the more experienced members.

• Are there main topics you want to be discussed in GUADEC? Make this clear, so people with potential sessions apply.
• Have a hardcoded and public calendar of deadlines and accomplish them.
• Answer clearly to all the submitters, telling them if their paper has been accepted or not, and why.

Launch an early call for papers and close most part of the schedule as soon as possible. This will attract real attention to the event. Speakers and participants will be able to decide before what to do and book tickets & hotels.

Leave slots empty for late additions, although it will be good to have the main sessions (invited keynotes and community rock stars) clearly scheduled as soon as possible. This will help the press & marketing team getting focused on promotion and press releases.

The schedule should never start before 09:00. Ideally, it should start at 10:00 and finish not too late because conferences tend to be exhausting.

Lightning talks should normally be scheduled after lunch for best attendance.

Other regular items in the schedule:

• AGM - 2 hours long
• Interns' lightning talks - 1h30-2h00 long
• Team reports and lightning talks - 2h00 long
• Opening and closing sessions

If the schedule is to be on the badges, the following is to be taken into consideration:

• The talk titles need to be short, ideally up to 50 characters long
• Speakers names need to be kept short

Previous papers committees

Submissions in recent years

Scheduled: Normal talks excluding keynotes or empty slots.