Review Process

Relevance

Is the topic of the paper relevant to the scope of DMIN’06 and its participants? (or related conferences of WORLDCOMP such as ICAI etc) Does it show the potential to stimulate interactive discussion?

Originality

How novel and innovative is the paper? A paper presenting methods or application domains not frequently discussed will receive a high mark. This also takes into consideration whether the topic has been published in similar form before. If the paper contains mostly known material, i.e. established methods and well understood application domains, it is not considered very original. Empirical case studies of a particular application domain are often highly original, but may have only limited significance to the field.

Significance

Does the paper make a valuable contribution to the theory or the practice of data mining? A high significance indicates a high influence of this research on following publications in the field or applications, implications for practices, policies and future research etc. It represents an indicator of the importance of the findings, regardless of their degree of originality.

Content

What is the information content of the paper? Does the paper allow non-experts in the field to comprehend its research objective? DMIN as part of WOLRDCOMP is inherently interdisciplinary. Therefore a balanced literature review of relevant aspects, sufficient description of the application domain, methods and established best practices will be considered as good information content.

Soundness

 

Is the paper technically correct (considering its submission category)? What is the technical quality?

For research papers:

Quality of literature review and statement of research goals. Appropriate use of the most relevant references to indicates orientation within the field. Appropriately chosen and documented methods, logical presentation and analysis of results, findings, inferences and conclusions. Were all technical and technological aspects of the experiments well documented? (reliability) Were results compared to established benchmark practices, methods etc.? Were the results evaluated taking care of established standard procedures? (validity)

For application papers:

Creativity, leadership and excellence in professional practice, demonstrated in teaching, staff development, program or institutional development, educational media or services developments, or learning skills services.

Clarity

Is the paper well presented and organised? A well presented paper enhances the understanding of the presented content also to non experts in the field. It often shows clear and logical presentation, appropriate style, the standard of English, freedom from errors, ease of reading, correct grammar and spelling, appropriate abstract, adequate use of graphical materials and tables to support ideas & findings, conformance with DMIN specifications for referencing, length and format details. DMIN is a highly international conference, so English quality may be substandard. Please indicate mandatory revisions and the need for corrections through a native English speaker, if the content of the paper is still comprehensible. Indicate it if the level of English prohibits an understanding of the thoughts presented.

Overall rating

All aspects will be evaluated and combined to an overall rating, providing a suggestion for acceptance or rejection of the paper.

Reviewer
expertise & confidence

The combined overall ranking will be weighted with each reviewers expertise in the area. A reviewer’s expertise for a topic indicates how familiar he is with current research, publications, best practices and applications in the field. Is he familiar with the references? Reviewers with a high confidence will be able to evaluate a paper more accurate then a reviewer with little expertise in the field.

Detailed Comments

Try to provide constructive criticism that allows feedback on what to change for a resubmission or even future submission to other conferences. No arrogance even for abysmal papers, very bad English language etc. You may not need to comment on all aspects. Think of a student learning to ski – just indicate the next steps to alleviate the paper to a higher level. Please indicate spelling mistakes and inconsistencies in equations if there are not too many.

 In your comments, please pay particular attention to

• the suitability of the title & adequacy of the abstract

• tables & illustrations regarding readability

•  length & formatting of the paper

• conclusions

• references

• plagiarism