Conference management system

A conference management system is web-based software that supports the organization of conferences especially scientific conferences. It helps the program chair(s), the conference organizers, the authors and the reviewers in their respective activities.

A conference management system can be regarded as a domain-specific content management system. Similar systems are used today by editors of scientific journals.

Functionality

Typical functions and workflows supported by conference management systems include:

• Receiving paper submissions (PDF upload, collection of bibliographic metadata)
• Anonymizing submissions
• Collecting reviewers' topic preferences
• Collecting conflicts of interest
• Assigning reviewers to papers
• Disseminating submissions to reviewers
• Collecting reviews
• Monitoring review coverage
• Sharing reviews among the program committee
• Ensuring independence of reviews
  (reviewers cannot see other reviews for a submission before they have submitted their own)
• Providing a per-submission discussion forum for the reviewers
• Ranking reviews and setting acceptance threshold
• Anonymizing reviews
• Reporting reviewers' comments and program committee decision to authors
• Collecting final accepted versions

Some systems offer additional functions that go beyond supporting only the peer-review process:

• Creating a conference website and program
• Registering attendees
• Publishing proceedings