In this workshop we want to investigate composition techniques that are ‘free’ in the sense that they are not fixed and limited by specific language or system designs. Instead we intend to explore the notion that languages should not offer a limited set of fixed composition mechanisms, but allow for flexibility, a wide variety of compositions, domain-specific and tailored compositions, or programmable compositions of various program artifacts.

Workshop topics

Examples of topics targeted by this workshop include, but are not limited to:

*flexible, tailorable composition mechanisms

*unified techniques for expressing a wide range of compositions

*flexible and adaptable compositions

*new composition mechanisms

*tools and case studies

*techniques for expressing/introducing domain-specific compositions

*general concepts/theories underlying generic composition techniques

*languages that are extensible with new composition mechanisms

*conflict detection and/or resolution when combining composition mechanisms

*flexible composition time (compile-, load-, run-time, etc.)

*formal models for expressing generic or flexible composition mechanisms

*design techniques for supporting a wide range of composition mechanisms

* ...

Format

FREECO is a one-day workshop, co-located with SPLASH/Onward! in Lancaster. The planned workshop agenda interleaves presentation of accepted papers and discussions to stimulate participants. We intend to solicit both technical and position papers of up to 5 pages in ACM style. These papers will be peer-reviewed by the program committee. Accepted papers will be published in the workshop’s proceedings in the ACM Digital Library. Authors of papers that are not accepted for publication in the proceedings will still be invited to the workshop. They will be encouraged to shorten their paper into a position statement (see below).

We will allow participating in the workshop without an accepted or even submitted paper, to generate interest in the topic of the workshop. All participants of the workshop are encouraged to formulate a position statement of maximal one page ACM style. These position statements are not reviewed and not published in the workshop proceedings, but they will be made available on the workshop’s homepage before the workshop. All accepted papers will also be published in advance on the workshop homepage. Participants are furthermore encouraged to read all position statements and accepted papers before the workshop. It is our intention to receive submissions from researchers new to the field as well as experienced researchers and practitioners. For the former, we want to offer a platform for discussing their ideas and receiving feedback on them. This will be supported by question and answer sessions as well as by group discussions.

Furthermore, authors of accepted technical and position papers are required to prepare a presentation of their work. From the presentations and the ensuing discussions, all participants will try to distill interesting research questions that can be discussed in open discussions and breakout groups in depth during the workshop. The position statements provided by participants will be used by the organizers to derive an initial division into break-out groups of four to eight participants. The position statements also act as input to the break-out group discussion. For open discussions and break-out groups, in total 120 minutes are allocated in the planned agenda.