Motivation and Aims

Taking place on 1st June, after the main conference (29-30-31 MAY 2002), this post-conference workshop should add value to the issues addressed during the conference. It should bring together people who are actively involved in Arabic Written language and/or speech processing in a mono- or multilingual context, and give them an opportunity to report on completed and ongoing work as well as on the availability of LR, evaluation protocols and campaigns, products and core technologies. This should enable the participants to develop a common view on where we stand with respect to Arabic language processing.

We expect to identify problems of common interest, and possible mechanisms to move towards solutions, such as sharing of resources, tools, standards, sharing and dissemination of information and expertise, adoption of current best practices, setting up joint projects and technology transfer mechanisms, etc.

By bringing together players in the Arabic NLP field, we target the definition of a first broadly supported Roadmap for Arabic Language Resources, i.e. a broadly supported view on the longer, medium and shorter term needs and priorities. This would help the community to identify new opportunities and possible synergies.

Topics of Interest

The submissions should address some of the LREC issues that are specific and of paramount importance to the Arabic resources and evaluation; some of these issues are:

• Issues in the design, construction and use of Arabic Language Resources (LR);
• Methods, tools, procedures for the acquisition, creation, management, access, distribution, use of Arabic LR;
• Exploitation of LR in different types of applications (information extraction, information retrieval, vocal and multisensorial interfaces, translation, summarisation, www services, etc.);
• Industrial LR requirements and community's response;
• Industrial production and/or use of LR;
• Evaluation, validation, quality assurance of LR;
• Benchmarking of systems and products; resources for benchmarking and evaluation for written and spoken language processing;
• Evaluation of products and applications, benchmarking;
• Local, regional, and international activities and projects;
• Needs, possibilities, forms, initiatives of/for regional and international cooperation.

Format of the Workshop

It will be a full-day workshop. The workshop is not intended to be a mini-conference, but as a real workshop aiming at concrete results that should clarify the situation of Arabic with respect to Language Resources and Evaluation. Sessions will include introductory speeches, invited talks, a small number of refereed presentations, a panel session, etc.

Submission Details

Submissions must be in English, Abstracts for workshop contributions should not exceed two A4 pages (excluding references). An additional title page should state: the title; author(s); affiliation(s); and contact author's e-mail address, as well as postal address, telephone and fax numbers.

Submission is to be sent by email, preferably in Postscript or PDF format, to: choukri@elda.fr, to arrive by 11th February 2002.
Abstracts will be reviewed by at least 3 members of the program committee.

Formatting instructions for the final full version of papers will be sent to authors after notification of acceptance.

Important Dates

Workshop Registration Fees

• If you are not attending LREC: 140 EURO
• If you are attending LREC: 90 Euro

Invitation Letter

If you need a visa to travel to Spain for the workshop and/or for the conference, please send an email to choukri@elda.fr

Contact Point

Workshop Programme Committee

Scientific Committee (tentative)