Overview

The 2025 USENIX Annual Technical Conference seeks original, high-quality submissions that improve and further the knowledge of computing systems, with an emphasis on implementations and experimental results. We are interested in systems of all scales, from small embedded mobile devices to data centers and clouds. The scope of USENIX ATC covers all practical aspects related to computer systems, including but not limited to: operating systems; runtime systems; parallel and distributed systems; storage; networking; security and privacy; virtualization; software-hardware interactions; performance evaluation and workload characterization; reliability, availability, and scalability; energy and power management; and bug-finding, tracing, analyzing, and troubleshooting.

We value submissions more highly if they are accompanied by clearly defined artifacts not previously available, including traces, original data, source code, or tools developed as part of the submitted work. We particularly encourage new ideas and approaches.

Submissions must contain original unpublished material that is not under review at any other forum, including journals, conferences, and workshops with proceedings. They will be judged on relevance, novelty, technical merit, correctness, and clarity. An idea or a design that the PC deems flawed can be grounds for rejection. USENIX ATC '25 will employ double-blind reviewing. Papers that are not properly anonymized may be rejected without review.

Papers need to be registered and their abstracts submitted by the abstract registration deadline. Papers with an empty abstract at the time of the abstract registration deadline will be rejected.

There will be an optional artifact evaluation process for accepted papers.

Submission Type: Full vs. Short

USENIX ATC '25 accepts both full and short submissions. Full submissions must not exceed 12 pages, and short submissions must not exceed 6 pages. In both cases, the page limit excludes references and appendices but includes all text, figures, tables, footnotes, etc. Both types are reviewed to the same standards and differ primarily in scope. A short paper presents a complete idea that is properly evaluated, just like in a full-length submission. Optionally, authors can include an appendix to provide material that may be of interest to some reviewers, such as algorithm details, proofs, and code snippets, but is not central to the contributions of the paper. For further details, see the submission instructions.

Deployed Systems Track

USENIX ATC '25 solicits papers that describe the design, implementation, analysis, and experience with real-world deployment of systems and networks. Papers for the deployed systems track (occasionally referred to as the operational systems track in other USENIX conferences) need not present new ideas or results to be accepted but should convey practical insights. Note that the rules regarding submission and anonymization are different for deployed systems track papers. The final program will explicitly identify papers accepted to the deployed systems track to distinguish them from papers accepted to the regular track.

Early Rejection Notifications

USENIX ATC '25 reviews will be conducted in multiple rounds. For papers that are rejected in an early round, early rejection notifications will be sent to the authors at least one month ahead of the date that all remaining notifications (for acceptances and additional rejections) will be sent.

Authors' Response Period

USENIX ATC '25 will provide an opportunity for authors of papers that are not early rejected to respond to the reviews prior to the final consideration of the submissions at the program committee meeting according to the schedule detailed above.

Confidentiality

All submissions will be treated as confidential prior to publication on the USENIX ATC '25 website. Rejected submissions will be permanently treated as confidential.

On the Use of Generative AI

While we acknowledge that generative AI is seamlessly included in many editing packages, e.g., Grammarly, and thus often hard to detect, authors must not submit papers containing sections generated entirely by generative AI. In particular, for papers including sections generated entirely by generative AI, i.e., text, graphs, experiments, etc., the authorship is not clearly that of the authors and may be tantamount to plagiarism. To this end, authors must submit a statement attesting that their paper does not include sections completely created by generative AI as part of the submission process in HotCRP. For more detailed questions about the appropriate use of generative AI, please feel free to contact the ATC co-chairs at atc25chairs@usenix.org.

Questions?

Please direct any questions to the program co-chairs at atc25chairs@usenix.org or to the USENIX office at submissionspolicy@usenix.org.