fse

name

fse

description

Writing and formatting guidance for ESEC/FSE (European Software Engineering Conference / ACM SIGSOFT Symposium on the Foundations of Software Engineering). Use when drafting, formatting, or submitting to FSE. Covers ACM acmart with sigconf format, anonymous double-blind review mode, FSE page limits, software engineering conventions, camera-ready preparation with DOI/ISBN, and ACM-Reference-Format citations.

ESEC/FSE Conference Writing Skill

CCF-A | SE | Publisher: ACM Conference: https://conf.researchr.org/track/fse-2026/fse-2026-papers Template: FSE/acmart.cls (ACM acmart, SIGCONF format)

Document Setup

Preamble Structure

% === SUBMISSION MODE (anonymous, double-blind) ===
\documentclass[sigconf,review,anonymous]{acmart}
\settopmatter{printfolios=true}

% === CAMERA-READY MODE ===
\documentclass[sigconf]{acmart}
\setcopyright{acmlicensed}
\acmConference[FSE 2026]{Proceedings of the 30th European Software Engineering
  Conference and the 30th ACM SIGSOFT Symposium on the Foundations of
  Software Engineering}{September 5--11, 2026}{Singapore}
\acmISBN{978-X-XXXX-XXXX-X/26/09}
\acmDOI{10.1145/XXXXXXX}
\acmPrice{}

Required Packages

\usepackage[round]{natbib}     % Author-year citations
\usepackage{algorithm}
\usepackage[noend]{algorithmic}
\usepackage{amsmath}
\usepackage{amsthm}
\usepackage{listings}
\lstset{basicstyle=\small\ttfamily}

Page Limits

Section	Limit
Main paper (submission)	14 pages
References	No limit
Appendix	Permitted (not counted)

FSE enforces a strict 14-page limit for the main body. References and appendix do not count toward this limit, but reviewers are not required to read the appendix.

Anonymity Requirements

Double-blind review with anonymous class option:

1. Do not include author names anywhere in the submission
2. Use third person for self-citations: "Smith et al. showed..." not "we showed..."
3. Anonymize URLs (e.g., GitHub repositories, institutional links)
4. Remove PDF metadata that reveals authorship
5. Do not include acknowledgments

Camera-Ready Differences

When preparing camera-ready after acceptance:

1. Remove review and anonymous options from \documentclass
2. Add \setcopyright{acmlicensed} or appropriate rights mode
3. Fill in \acmConference with full conference title and dates
4. Add \acmISBN, \acmDOI, and \acmPrice fields
5. Restore all author names and affiliations
6. Add acknowledgments if desired

Section Organization

Standard FSE paper structure:

1. Introduction — Problem, motivation, contributions (enumerate contributions explicitly)
2. Background/Motivation — Context, related work positioning
3. Approach/Method — Core technical contribution
4. Implementation/Development — System details, tool support
5. Evaluation — Experimental methodology, results, comparison
6. Discussion — Threats to validity, limitations
7. Related Work — Positioning against prior art
8. Conclusion — Summary and future work
9. References

Theorem Environments

FSE papers may include formal reasoning:

\theoremstyle{plain}
\newtheorem{definition}{Definition}
\newtheorem{property}{Property}

\theoremstyle{plain}
\newtheorem*{theorem}{Theorem}
\newtheorem*{lemma}{Lemma}
\newtheorem*{corollary}{Corollary}

\theoremstyle{plain}
\newtheorem*{invariant}{Invariant}

Code Listings

% Inline code:
The linter uses \lstinline!AST.Visitor! to traverse the parse tree.

% Code blocks:
\begin{lstlisting}[language=Python, caption={Bug detection pattern}, label={lst:pattern}]
class BugDetector(ast.NodeVisitor):
    def __init__(self):
        self.bugs = []

    def visit_Call(self, node):
        if self._is_unsafe(node):
            self.bugs.append(node)
        self.generic_visit(node)
\end{lstlisting}

Figures and Tables

• Use vector formats (.pdf) where possible
• Ensure figures are legible in grayscale
• Number figures and tables sequentially
• Captions should be descriptive and self-contained

\begin{figure}[t]
  \centering
  \includegraphics[width=0.9\linewidth]{figs/architecture}
  \caption{System architecture showing the main components and data flow.}
  \label{fig:architecture}
\end{figure}

References (natbib)

ACM-Reference-Format bibstyle with author-year citations:

\bibliographystyle{ACM-Reference-Format}
\bibliography{references}

% Citations:
\citet{smith2023}      % Smith et al. (2023)
\citep{smith2023}      % (Smith et al. 2023)

Each reference must list all authors — do not use "et al." in the bibliography.

Formatting Rules

• Format: ACM sigconf (two-column, single-spaced)
• Paper size: US Letter
• Margins: Top/bottom 1in, sides 0.75in, column gap 0.25in
• Body font: 9pt minimum, Times New Roman
• References: 8pt, no page limit
• Line spacing: Single-spaced (template default)

Submission Checklist

• 14 pages or fewer (main body)
• \documentclass[sigconf,review,anonymous]
• All author/anonymization info removed
• No self-identifying URLs or citations
• PDF metadata cleared
• References list all authors
• Figures legible in grayscale
• Compiles with pdflatex

Camera-Ready Checklist

• Remove review and anonymous options
• Add \setcopyright{acmlicensed} (or appropriate)
• Fill \acmConference, \acmISBN, \acmDOI, \acmPrice
• Restore author names and affiliations
• Include page numbers (\settopmatter{printfolios=true})