Comments on: DVCon goes off the rails http://www.chipdesignmag.com/bailey/2008/12/16/dvcon-goes-off-the-rails/ ESL Design and Verification Tue, 06 Sep 2011 02:23:02 -0700 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.4 hourly 1 By: Ray Salemi http://www.chipdesignmag.com/bailey/2008/12/16/dvcon-goes-off-the-rails/comment-page-1/#comment-165 Ray Salemi Sat, 27 Dec 2008 13:55:13 +0000 http://www.chipdesignmag.com/bailey/?p=25#comment-165 I guess the question is whether the papers are any good. If the papers, and their associated presentations, are nothing more than recycled marketing slides, then I'm with you. It's a waste of money, and I would rather pull the fire alarm and run screaming from the room than watch them (and I work for Mentor.) On the other hand, as we say in New England, some of these people are wicked smaht and they may have some good points to make. If that's the case, its a shame to throw the baby out with the bathwater. I guess the question is whether the papers are any good.

If the papers, and their associated presentations, are nothing more than recycled marketing slides, then I’m with you. It’s a waste of money, and I would rather pull the fire alarm and run screaming from the room than watch them (and I work for Mentor.)

On the other hand, as we say in New England, some of these people are wicked smaht and they may have some good points to make. If that’s the case, its a shame to throw the baby out with the bathwater.

]]> By: Grant Martin http://www.chipdesignmag.com/bailey/2008/12/16/dvcon-goes-off-the-rails/comment-page-1/#comment-164 Grant Martin Tue, 16 Dec 2008 22:55:18 +0000 http://www.chipdesignmag.com/bailey/?p=25#comment-164 Brian, a very interesting point. My experience with DAC and DATE indicated that conferences with a mix of academic and industrial papers and participation were always in danger of being "captured" by academics and tilting too far to the theoretical and research and much less user and industrial, given that academics have 1. grad students! (distinctly lacking in industry...) 2. a need by academics and especially their grad students to publish, and 3. time to participate on programme committees - time which is becoming harder and harder for industrial people to find, especially users. The DVCon programme, which I checked online at http://www.dvcon.org/html/home.html, seems to have tilted too far in the opposite way - too much in the way of the big tool providers. At the same time, I think the programme committee must have had a hard time with conflicts of interest because even some of the user and smaller company papers were written by colleagues of the people on the programme committee. In general, we must and should assume the programme committee selected the best of what they were given (although I don't know if DVCon is blind in paper reviews and selection). This may reflect a different phenomenon than a bias by the programme selectors. It may be that submissions from users and smaller verification tools companies were very low - especially this year, where the economic situation means that it is getting harder and harder to travel and find time to write papers in the first place. Still, the lack of variety is a bit of a disappointment, and I would imagine the DVCon committee will want to work hard to solicit a wider variety of papers from more sources next year. If it only becomes an adjunct of marketing, people will be quite unlikely to find value in attending. Grant Martin Brian, a very interesting point. My experience with DAC and DATE indicated that conferences with a mix of academic and industrial papers and participation were always in danger of being “captured” by academics and tilting too far to the theoretical and research and much less user and industrial, given that academics have 1. grad students! (distinctly lacking in industry…) 2. a need by academics and especially their grad students to publish, and 3. time to participate on programme committees – time which is becoming harder and harder for industrial people to find, especially users. The DVCon programme, which I checked online at http://www.dvcon.org/html/home.html, seems to have tilted too far in the opposite way – too much in the way of the big tool providers. At the same time, I think the programme committee must have had a hard time with conflicts of interest because even some of the user and smaller company papers were written by colleagues of the people on the programme committee. In general, we must and should assume the programme committee selected the best of what they were given (although I don’t know if DVCon is blind in paper reviews and selection). This may reflect a different phenomenon than a bias by the programme selectors. It may be that submissions from users and smaller verification tools companies were very low – especially this year, where the economic situation means that it is getting harder and harder to travel and find time to write papers in the first place. Still, the lack of variety is a bit of a disappointment, and I would imagine the DVCon committee will want to work hard to solicit a wider variety of papers from more sources next year. If it only becomes an adjunct of marketing, people will be quite unlikely to find value in attending.
Grant Martin

]]>