IAPR TC11 Newsletter 2022 12
December, 2022
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- Message from the Editor
- Message from the TC11 Chair
- Dates and Deadlines
- Deadlines
- Upcoming Conferences and Events
- SSDA 2023
- Call for SSDA 2023 Proposals
- ICDAR 2023
- ICDAR 2023: Call for Tutorials *(repost)*
- ICDAR 2023: Call for Papers *(repost)*
- ICDAR 2024
- DAS 2024 Call for Proposals *(repost)*
- Job Offers
- Two assistant professor posts at Luleå university, Sweden
- Post-doc position: Federated learning and differential privacy
- Datasets
- TC11 Datasets Repository *(repost)*
Dear TC11 members,
Starting next year, the ICDAR flagship conference of the document analysis and recognition community will be held annually. Both ICFHR and DAS are joining forces with the main conference. More about the outcome of the vote on the future of ICFHR and the organization of ICDAR in the message from the TC11 chair below.
In other ICDAR-related news, the ICDAR 2023 organizers are seeking proposals for tutorials until January 11, 2023. Also, please find in this issue a call for proposals to host the Document Analysis Systems (DAS) workshop as a satellite workshop of ICDAR 2024 in Athens, Greece. Due date for proposal submission is February 28, 2023.
The TC10/11 summer school on document analysis (SSDA) is one of the main educational activities of TC10 (Graphics Recognition) and TC11 (Reading Systems). If you are interested in hosting the 5th SSDA in 2023, please respond to the call below. The deadline for submitting proposals is January 23, 2023.
This issue also announces new job opportunities, two assistant professor posts and a postdoc position.
With this last newsletter of the year 2022, I wish you all happy holidays and a happy new year!
Nibal Nayef, TC11 Communication Officer
( n.nayef@gmail.com )
Join us! If you are not already a member of the TC11 community, please consider joining the TC11 mailing list. Follow us on Twitter (iapr_tc11): https://twitter.com/iapr_tc11
Dear members of the IAPR TC11,
Since October this year, I am glad to serve as the new TC11 Chair, taking over from the past chairs Dimosthenis Karatzas and Faisal Shafait. I would like to thank them both very much for their dedicated efforts for supporting the TC11 community.
I am also welcoming the new TC11 leadership team with Mickaël Coustaty as Vice-Chair, Nibal Nayef replacing me as Communications Officer, Joseph Chazalon continuing to serve as Dataset Curator, and Foteini Liwicki as Education Officer. Together, we will do our best to support the different activities of the TC11.
In the past decades, our community has been very active and has established, together with TC10, several major scientific events to discuss and exchange the latest research on Reading Systems. Among them, the International Conference on Document Analysis and Recognition (ICDAR) has emerged as the flagship conference, with several prestigious satellite workshops, including the longstanding Graphics Recognition (GREC) workshop associated with TC10. In the past, ICDAR has been a bi-annual conference held in odd years. The even years were dedicated to two other major events, the International Conference on Frontiers in Handwriting Recognition (ICFHR) and the International Workshop on Document Analysis Systems (DAS), focusing on handwriting and system-level research, respectively.
Under the leadership of the past chairs, a discussion has been held in recent years on the future directions and strategy for these scientific events, in order to find the best way to promote document analysis and recognition research. One of the main ideas that emerged was to fuse ICDAR, ICFHR, and DAS into a single annual conference. Arguments in favor and against such a fusion can be found here: https://www.kialo.com/we-should-fuse-icdar--icfhr--das--grec-into-a-single-annual-conference-30656
For each of the three events concerned, community votes were held to decide about such a change. In 2021, ICDAR decided to be held annually starting in 2023. In 2022, DAS decided to join forces with the annual ICDAR as a satellite workshop, similar to GREC.
Finally, earlier this month an online community vote was held on the future of ICFHR. I would like to thank all the TC11 members and ICFHR participants who have voted. Overall, 109 votes were cast, all of them valid. For the first question, a majority of 71.6% voted in favor of joining forces with the annual ICDAR. For the second question, a majority of 62.8% expressed their wish to join ICDAR in the form of a dedicated track on Frontiers in Handwriting Recognition (FHR), which will become a part of the main conference every year. This change will already be implemented at ICDAR 2023 in San José, California, USA.
With the vote about the future of ICFHR, the strategy to fuse ICDAR, ICFHR, and DAS into a single annual conference has been adopted. Although losing ICFHR and DAS as independent events is a step we do not take lightly, as it marks the end of longstanding individual events with their own identity, we are looking forward to the benefits of the fusion, including the creation of a strong momentum for document analysis and recognition research at a single flagship conference, the reduced effort for local organization, and the simplification of the yearly paper submission and evaluation schedule.
Concretely, the next years will feature the following events:
- 2023: ICDAR with FHR track, GREC as one of the satellite workshops
- 2024: ICDAR with FHR track, DAS as one of the satellite workshops
- 2025: Same as 2023
- 2026: Same as 2024
- Etc.
If you are interested in hosting a future ICDAR conference, please look out for the calls for bids in the TC10/11 newsletters. The next call for bids will be published in 2023 and concerns ICDAR 2026. You can also proactively get in touch with the ICDAR Advisory Board, which includes the TC10/11 Chairs, to announce your interest. We can then advise you on a suitable year for submitting your bid, taking into account the rotation principle among geographic regions.
I am looking forward to the new dynamics an annual ICDAR will bring to our community. Do not hesitate to contact me if you have any questions about the organization, or if you have ideas for new activities that may benefit TC11.
Wish you Happy Holidays and a Happy New Year!
Andreas Fischer
TC11 Chair
Deadlines
2023
- January 8 (extended, hard deadline) Workshop proposal due ICDAR 2023
- January 11 Tutorial proposal due ICDAR 2023
- January 15 Conference paper submission ICDAR 2023
- January 23 Proposals due for hosting SSDA2023
- February 28 Proposals due for hosting DAS 2024
Upcoming Conferences and Events
2023 and Later
- ICDAR 2023. San José, USA (August 21-26, 2023)
- ICDAR 2024. Athens, Greece (September, 2024)
Call for SSDA 2023 Proposals
SSDA2023 call for proposals: IAPR TC10/TC11 5th Summer School on Document Analysis
Important Dates
Jan 23 2023 Proposal submission deadline
Submit Proposals via email to:
- Foteini Simistira Liwicki (TC11 Representative), foteini.liwicki@ltu.se
- KC Santosh (TC10 Representative), Santosh.KC@usd.edu
Part of the mission of International Association for Pattern Recognition (IAPR) TC11 and TC10 is to promote high quality educational activities related to Reading Systems and Graphics Recognition. Responding to this need, TC10 and TC11 have established a series of summer schools. After the successful organization of summer schools in Jaipur, India, La Rochelle, France, Islamabad, Pakistan, and Luleå, Sweden, we are now soliciting proposals for the organization of the fifth “IAPR TC10/TC11 Summer School on Document Analysis” (SSDA) in 2023.
The “IAPR TC10/TC11 Summer School on Document Analysis” is intended to become the primary educational activity of IAPR TC11 (Reading Systems) and TC10 (Graphics Recognition). The School is meant to be a training activity where participants are exposed to the latest trends and techniques of Reading Systems and Graphics Recognition.
The aim of the School is to provide both an objective and clear overview and an in-depth analysis of the state-of-the-art research in selected topics of Reading Systems and Graphics Recognition. The School should aim to provide a stimulating opportunity for young researchers and PhD students in the field.
Individuals and groups who are interested in Reading Systems and Graphics Recognition are invited to submit proposals for organizing and hosting the 2023 IAPR TC10 / TC11 Summer School. As the previous summer schools were organized in Asia, Europe, and the Sub-continent, organizing teams from the Americas are encouraged to submit a bid in order to facilitate the envisioned rotational scheme of the IAPR TC10 / TC11 Summer School.
In order to fully plan their bid, it is expected that proposers familiarize themselves with the guidelines for organizing the School first. The Guidelines can be found at the TC11 Web site:
http://www.iapr-tc11.org/mediawiki/index.php/Guidelines_for_Organising_and_Bidding_to_Host_the_TC10_/_TC11_Summer_School
The submission of a bid implies full agreement with the rules and procedures for organizing the School. Especially, this means that organizers will apply for IAPR support and that the event will use the series title “IAPR TC10/TC11 Summer School on Document Analysis” with an optional sub-title denoting a special focus of the respective event.
Please consider submitting a proposal for this increasingly important event for the TC10/TC11 community. If you have questions, please do not hesitate to contact the TC11 and TC10 SSDA representatives: Foteini Simistira Liwicki (TC11 Representative) and KC Santosh (TC10 Representative).
Previous events: As a reference, the 2021 Summer School on Document Analysis was held in Luleå, Sweden with the theme Digital Transformation in a Changing World.
ICDAR 2023: Call for Tutorials (repost)
Important Dates
Jan 11 2023 Proposal Due Jan 31 2023 Acceptance Notification Aug 24-26 2023 Dates of Tutorials
The ICDAR 2023 Organizing Committee invites proposals for tutorials that will be held on August 24-26th (the correct final date will be communicated as soon as possible), before the main conference begins.
ICDAR 2023 Tutorials should serve one or more of the following objectives:
- Introduce students and newcomers to major topics of Document Analysis and Recognition (DAR) research.
- Provide instructions on established practices and methodologies.
- Introduce expert non-specialists to a DAR subarea. Survey a mature area of DAR research and/or practice.
- Motivate and explain a DAR topic of emerging importance.
- Overview DAR systems for industrial solutions (suggestion for researchers in industry).
- Introduce some recent innovative techniques for DAR research and software quality, such as open-source libraries, high-level API, technical frameworks for expert developments, etc. (suggestion for expert programmers).
An ICDAR tutorial should aim to give a comprehensive overview of a specific topic related to DAR. A good tutorial should be educational rather than just a cursory survey of techniques. The topic should be of sufficient relevance and importance to attract significant interest from the ICDAR community. Typical tutorial audiences consist of PhD students studying computer vision, image processing or pattern recognition, but also include researchers and practitioners from both academia and industry.
In order to facilitate innovative collaboration and interaction between researchers in academia and industry, the Tutorial Chairs strongly encourage proposals for industrial tutorials, in which researchers in companies describe DAR systems and overview industrial solutions to document analysis problems in real use-case industrial scenarios.
Proposals should be up to 4 pages in length, and should contain the following information:
- Title of the tutorial.
- Scope and motivation. A brief description of the tutorial, suitable for inclusion in the conference registration brochure.
- Preference for the duration (full day or half day). Due to agenda constraints, half day tutorials are recommended. If a full day is needed, provide a brief justification.
- A detailed outline of the tutorial. Course description with list of topics to be covered, along with a brief outline.
- Relevance for ICDAR. A description of why the tutorial topic would be of interest to a substantial part of the ICDAR audience.
- Expected target audience in terms of composition and estimated number of attendees. Prerequisite knowledge of the ICDAR audience for attending the tutorial.
- Short CV of organizers. A brief CV of the presenter(s), including name, postal address, phone number, e-mail address, web page, background in the tutorial area (projects, relevant publications or tutorial-level articles on the subject), evidence of teaching experience.
- The name and e-mail address of the corresponding presenter. The corresponding presenter should be available for e-mail correspondence during the evaluation process, in the case clarifications and discussions on the scope and content of the proposal are needed.
Evaluation
The evaluation of the proposal will take into account its general interest for ICDAR attendees, the quality of the proposal (e.g., a tutorial that simply lists a set of concepts without any apparent rationale behind them will not be approved) as well as the expertise and skills of the presenters. We emphasize that the primary criteria for evaluation will be whether a proposal is interesting, well-structured, and motivated in relation to Document Analysis and Recognition, rather than the perceived experience/standing of the proposer.
Last but not least, the tutorial should attract a meaningful audience, cover hot topics and incorporate new knowledge to the community. Those submitting a proposal should keep in mind that tutorials are intended to provide an overview of the field; they should present reasonably well established information in a balanced way. Tutorials should not be used to advocate a single avenue of research, nor should they promote a product.
Notes:
Tutorial slides must be provided to us for inclusion on the conference website and also on the TC-10 and TC-11 websites, as educational material.
The ICDAR main conference organizers will handle the tutorial registration and provide the space, coffee breaks and other facilities required to organize tutorials (e.g. a room, a projector and a screen).
Submission Guidelines & Inquiries
All proposals should be submitted by electronic mail to the Tutorial Chairs:
Elisa Barney (elisa.barney@ltu.se)
Laurence Likforman-Sulem (likforman@telecom-paris.fr)
Feedback, comments and/or suggestions would be provided within two weeks of receiving the proposal. Final acceptance (or rejection) would be decided by January 31, 2022.
Inquiries should be sent to tutorials-chairs@icdar2023.org or the above emails.
ICDAR 2023: Call for Papers (repost)
The 17th International Conference on Document Analysis and Recognition (ICDAR 2023)
August 21-26, 2023 San José, California, USA
https://icdar2023.org/
PDF version of this call: ICDAR 2023 CfP
ICDAR is the premier event for scientists and practitioners involved with document analysis and recognition, a field of growing importance in our current age of digital transition. The 17th edition of this flagship conference will be held in San Jose, August 21-26, 2023. (The conference will be an in-person event).
Important Dates
Jan 15, 2023 Conference paper submission (23:59 AoE) Mar 26, 2023 Conference paper notification Apr 15, 2023 Conference camera-ready papers due
Paper Submissions:
There is both a standard conference paper track and a journal track at ICDAR 2023; details regarding the journal track may be found in a separate Call for Papers on the conference website.
Reviewing for conference papers will be double blind. Authors should not include their names, affiliations, or acknowledgements in submitted manuscripts, and should ensure that their identity is not revealed indirectly by citing their earlier work in the third person.
Papers may be up to 15 pages long (including references) in Springer Lecture Notes in Computer Science (LNCS) format. Detailed submission instructions for authors can be found on the conference website (https://icdar2023.org).
Topics of Interest:
- Document image processing
- Physical and logical layout analysis
- Text and symbol recognition
- Handwriting recognition
- Document analysis systems
- Document classification
- Indexing and retrieval of documents
- Document synthesis
- Extracting document semantics
- NLP for document understanding
- Office automation
- Graphics recognition
- Human document interaction
- Document Representation Modeling
- Structured document generation
- Multimedia document analysis
- Mobile text recognition
- Pen-based document analysis
- Scene text detection and recognition
- Recognition of tables and formulas
- Historical document analysis
- Signature verification
- Document summarization and translation
- Document forensics and provenance
- Medical document analysis
- Document analysis for social good
- Document analysis for literature search
- Gold-standard benchmarks and datasets
Publication: Springer Lecture Notes in Computer Science
The conference proceedings will be published as part of the Springer Lecture Notes in Computer Science (LNCS) series. Accepted papers will be freely available through SpringerLink from the conference website for one year after publication and will later be freely available through SpringerLink for four years after publication.
Contact: pc-chairs@icdar2023.org
DAS 2024 Call for Proposals (repost)
Important Dates
Feb 28 2023 Proposal Due
Submission Method: email to andreas.fischer@unifr.ch / jean-christophe.burie@univ-lr.fr
Document Analysis Systems (DAS) is an IAPR sponsored workshop focusing on system-level issues and approaches. In DAS2022, it was decided by the participants that DAS joins ICDAR as a satellite workshop every two years, starting from 2024 onwards.
We are seeking proposals to host the 16th Document Analysis Systems workshop as a part of ICDAR2024. This implies a new organization of DAS compared to the previous versions. Proposals should take this into account. For example, DAS would only be a 1- or 2-day workshop, won't have satellite events (i.e tutorials) of its own. It could provide one or more hands-on activities, discussion groups and possibly demo sessions etc.
Anyone interested in submitting a proposal to host DAS2024 in Greece should drop an email to andreas.fischer@unifr.ch and jean-christophe.burie@univ-lr.fr by February 28, 2023.
We are looking forward to receiving high quality proposals and making the first chapter of DAS-ICDAR 2024 a big success!
Andreas Fischer (Chair, TC11)
Jean-Christophe Burie (Chair, TC10)
Find below a post about two great job openings for tenured positions (assistant professor or senior lecturer) with a prestigious 2PhD+2PostDoc WASP-funded package in Sweden.
Also find a description for a job opportunity as a postdoc in the CVC, Barcelona, Spain.
Two assistant professor posts at Luleå university, Sweden
We have two prestigious open positions in Machine Learning and Robotics (tenured) either assistant professor or senior lecturer. It is a fully funded position with a WASP-funded package of 2 PhDs and 2 Post-Docs. In the webpage below, look for the openings in Machine Learning and in Robotics.
We are looking for outstanding candidates with international experience!
Find more details here: https://www.ltu.se/ltu/Lediga-jobb?l=en
Post-doc position: Federated learning and differential privacy
We are seeking a postdoc to join the Vision, Language and Reading group at the Computer Vision Center (CVC), in Barcelona, Spain. The position is for 2.5 years. The position will remain open until a good candidate is found.
The position is linked to a European Project: the “European Lighthouse on Secure and Safe AI” (ELSA), funded by Horizon Europe and backed by the ELLIS network of excellence. The project covers research topics that include robustness, privacy and human agency and will develop use cases in areas such as autonomous driving, robotics, health and document intelligence.
The specific focus of this postdoc position will be on applying federated learning and differential privacy to document intelligence tasks. The candidate will co-supervise one PhD student.
PROJECT PI & HOSTING GROUP
The direct responsible for this post will be Dr. Dimosthenis Karatzas. He is the leader of the Vision, Language and Reading research group at the CVC. For more information visit: http://vlr.cvc.uab.es/
CANDIDATE’S PROFILE
The candidate should possess a PhD in machine learning or computer vision and have a strong publication record. We are looking for candidates who have publications in top conferences like NeurIPS, ICML, ICLR, AISTATS, CVPR, ECCV, ICCV. The candidate should have a background in machine learning, federated learning and differential privacy. The applicants are expected to be fluent in both oral and written communication in English. They should work well in a team while demonstrating initiative and independence. The candidate is expected to supervise PhD students. The successful candidate is expected to contribute to the design and development of AI solutions for document understanding, employing privacy preserving techniques and infrastructures set up by the ELSA project.
THE COMPUTER VISION CENTER
The selected candidate will work at the Computer Vision Centre (CVC), Barcelona, a research institute comprising more than 130 researchers and support staff, dedicated to computer vision research and knowledge transfer. With a strong international projection and links to the industry, the Computer Vision Centre offers an exciting environment for scientific career development. The Computer Vision Centre has a plan for expansion of its permanent research staff base and has received the “HR Excellence in Research” award as a provider and supporter of a stimulating and favourable working environment. Barcelona is a vibrant city and an important Artificial Intelligence hub. The high quality of life is combined with an open and international looking character of the city. Barcelona is very well connected by air, sea and ground transportation. The region of Catalonia boosts its own AI strategy, in which the CVC is a key player.
SALARY AND CONDITIONS
Gross salary of 30-40k€/year depending on experience.
RESEARCH CONTACT
If you are interested in the position, please contact Dr. Dimosthenis Karatzas for more information and applications (dimos@cvc.uab.es)
APPLICATION PROCESS
Apply by filling in the online form at:
http://www.cvc.uab.es/blog/2022/12/07/postdoc-federated-learning-and-differential-privacy/
WEB SITES
ELSA project
Computer Vision Center
Vision, Language and Reading group
TC11 Datasets Repository (repost)
TC11 maintains a collection of datasets that can be found online in the TC11 Datasets Repository.
If you have new datasets (e.g., from competitions) that you wish to share with the research community, please use the online upload form. For questions and support, please contact the TC11 Dataset Curator (contact information is below).
Joseph Chazalon (TC11 Dataset Curator)
( joseph.chazalon@lrde.epita.fr )
Call for Contributions: To contribute news items, please send a short
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Contributions might include conference and workshop
announcements/updates/reports, career opportunities, book reviews, or anything
else of interest to the TC-11 community.
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