SIGCHI Conference Proceedings Format

1st Author Name

Affiliation
City, Country
e-mail address

2nd Author Name

Affiliation
City, Country
e-mail address

3rd Author Name

Affiliation
City, Country
e-mail address

ABSTRACT

UPDATED23 September 2016. This sample paper

describes the formatting requirements for SIGCHI
conference proceedings, and offers recommendations on
writing for the worldwide SIGCHI readership. Please
review this document even if you have submitted to
SIGCHI conferences before, as some format details have
changed relative to previous years. Abstracts should be
about 150 words and are required.
Author Keywords

Authors choice; of terms; separated; by semicolons;

commas, within terms only; this section is required.
ACM Classification Keywords

H.5.m. Information interfaces and presentation (e.g., HCI):

Miscellaneous; See http://acm.org/about/class/1998 for the
full list of ACM classifiers. This section is required.
INTRODUCTION

This format is to be used for submissions that are published

in the conference proceedings. We wish to give this volume
a consistent, high-quality appearance. We therefore ask that
authors follow some simple guidelines. You should format
your paper exactly like this document. The easiest way to
do this is to replace the content with your own material.
This document describes how to prepare your submissions
using Microsoft Word on a PC or Mac. Specific instructions
about accessing menu items in Word refer to the PC version
of Word 2013.
PAGE SIZE AND COLUMNS

On each page your material should fit within a rectangle of

7 x 9.25 in (18 x 23.5 cm), centered on a US letter page
(8.5x11 in), beginning 0.75 in (1.9 cm) from the top of the
page, with a 0.33 in (0.85 cm) space between two 3.3 in
(8.4 cm) columns. Right margins should be justified, not
ragged. Please be sure your document and PDF are US
letter and not A4.
TYPESET TEXT

The styles contained in this document have been modified

from the default styles to reflect ACM formatting
conventions. For example, content paragraphs like this one
are formatted using the Normal style.
Title and Authors

Your papers title, authors, and affiliations should run

across the full width of the page in a single column 7 in
Paste the appropriate copyright/license statement here.
ACM now supports three different publication options:

ACM copyright: ACM holds the copyright on the work.

This is the historical approach.

License: The author(s) retain copyright, but ACM

receives an exclusive publication license.

Open Access: The author(s) wish to pay for the work to

be open access. The additional fee must be paid to
ACM.
This text field is large enough to hold the appropriate
release statement assuming it is single-spaced in Times
New Roman 8-point font. Please do not change or modify
the size of this text box.
Each submission will be assigned a DOI string to be included here.

(17.8 cm) wide. The title should be in Helvetica or Arial 18point bold (the Title style in this document). Authors
names should be in Times New Roman or Times Roman
12-point bold (Author Name style), and affiliations in the
font as 12-point regular (Author Affiliation style).
To position names and addresses, use a single-row table
with invisible borders, as in this document. Alternatively, if
only one address is needed, use a centered tab stop to center
all name and address text on the page; for two addresses,
use two centered tab stops, and so on. For more than three
authors, you may have to place some address information in
a footnote, or in a named section at the end of your paper.
Leave one 10-point line of white space below the last line
of affiliations.
Adding and Removing Author Fields Above

If you need a 4th block for an additional author with a

different affiliation, click on the table, click layout under
table tools, and click insert left or insert right. Then
right-click anywhere on the table, click Table Properties,
and within the Table tab, click the tab box for Preferred
Width and enter 7.
If you need author blocks for only 1 or 2 authors, you
should remove one column from the table. Right-click in
the unwanted cell, click Delete Cell, click Delete entire
column, then click OK. Repeat if necessary.
Abstract and Keywords

Every submission should begin with an abstract of about

150 words, followed by a set of keywords. The abstract and
keywords should be placed in the left column of the first
page under the left half of the title. The abstract should be a
concise statement of the problem, approach, and
conclusions of the work described. It should clearly state
the papers contribution to the field of HCI.
Normal or Body Text

Please use 10-point Times New Roman or Times Roman

font (the Normal style) or, if this is unavailable, another
proportional font with serifs, as close as possible in
appearance to Times New Roman 10-point. Other than
Helvetica or Arial headings, please use sans-serif or nonproportional fonts only for special purposes, such as source
code text.
First Page Copyright Notice

This sample word document has the correct ACM SIGCHI

copyright notice in place (see page 1, bottom of column 1).
Accepted papers will be distributed in the conference
publications. They will also be placed in the ACM Digital
Library, where they will remain accessible to thousands of
researchers and practitioners worldwide. ACMs copyright
and permissions policy is here:
http://acm.org/publications/policies/copyright_policy

Subsequent Pages

SECTIONS

On pages beyond the first, start at the top of the page and
continue in double-column format. The two columns on the
last page should be of approximately equal length.

The heading of a section should be in Arial 9-point bold, all

in capitals (Heading 1 style). Sections should not be
numbered.
Subsections

Headings of subsections should be in Arial 9-point bold

with initial letters capitalized (Heading 2 style). For subsections and sub-subsections, a word like the or of is not
capitalized unless it is the first word of the heading.
Figure 1. Use high-resolution images, 300+ dpi, legible if
printed in color or black-and-white. Number all figures and
include captions below, using Insert, Caption.
References and Citations

Use a numbered list of references at the end of the article,

ordered alphabetically by last name of first author, and
referenced by numbers in brackets [1,3,4].
Objects

Caption
pre-2002

Caption 2003 and

afterwards

Tables

Above

Below

Figures

Below

Below

Table 1. Table captions should be placed below the table. We

recommend table lines be 1 point, 25% black. Minimize use of
unnecessary table lines.

Your references should be published materials accessible to

the public. Internal technical reports may be cited only if
they are easily accessible (i.e., you provide the address for
obtaining the report within your citation) and may be
obtained by any reader for a nominal fee. Proprietary
information may not be cited. Private communications
should be acknowledged in the main text, not referenced
(e.g., [Borriello, personal communication]).
References should be in ACM citation format:
http://acm.org/publications/submissions/latex_style.
This
includes citations to internet resources [1,4,8,1] according
to ACM format, although it is often appropriate to include
URLs directly in the text, as above.

Sub-subsections

Headings for sub-subsections should be in Arial 9-point

italic with initial letters capitalized (Heading 3 style).
FIGURES/CAPTIONS

Place figures and tables at the top or bottom of the

appropriate column or columns, on the same page as the
relevant text (see Figure 1). A figure or table may extend
across both columns to a maximum width of two columns,
or 17.78 cm (7 in.).
Captions should be Times New Roman 9-point bold
(Caption style). They should be numbered (e.g., Table 1
or Figure 2), centered, and placed beneath the figure or
table. The words Figure and Table should be spelled
out (e.g., Figure rather than Fig.) wherever they occur.
All figures should also include alt text for improved
accessibility. In Word, right click the figure, and select
Format Picture | Layout | Alt Text). Papers and notes may
use color figures, which are included in the page limit; the
figures must be usable when printed in black-and-white in
the proceedings.
The paper may be accompanied by a short video figure up
to five minutes in length. However, the paper should stand
on its own without the video figure, as the video may not be
available to everyone who reads the paper.
Inserting Images

Occasionally MS Word generates larger-than-necessary

PDF files when images inserted into the document are
manipulated in MS Word. To minimize this problem, use an
image editing tool to resize the image at the appropriate
printing resolution (usually 300 dpi), and then insert the
image into Word using Insert | Picture | From File.

Figure 2. Sample of a wide figure. Be sure to place at the top or bottom of the page. Ensure that important information is legible in
both black-and-white and color printing. Image: CC-BY-ND ayman on Flickr.
Table Style
The text of tables will format better if you use the Table
Text style (as in Table 1). If you do not use this style, then you
may want to adjust the vertical spacing of the text in the
tables. To adjust the spacing of text in a table in Word, use
Home | Paragraph | Indents and Spacing. Generally, text in
each field of a table will look better if it has equal amounts of
spacing above and below it, as in

Table 1. Table captions should be placed below the table.

We recommend table lines be 1 point, 25% black. Minimize
use of unnecessary table lines.For improved accessibility,
header rows of tables should be marked. In Word, rightclick a header row, and select Table Properties | Row |
Repeat as header

Explain
colloquial
language
and
puns.
Understanding phrases like red herring may
require a local knowledge of English. Humor and
irony are difficult to translate.

Use unambiguous forms for culturally localized

concepts, such as times, dates, currencies, and
numbers (e.g., 1-5- 97 or 5/1/97 may mean 5
January or 1 May, and seven oclock may mean
7:00 am or 19:00). For currencies, indicate
equivalences: Participants were paid 22, or
roughly US$29.

Be careful with the use of gender-specific

pronouns (he, she) and other gendered words
(chairman,
manpower,
man-months).
Use
inclusive language that is gender-neutral (e.g., she
or he, they, s/he, chair, staff, staff-hours, personyears). See the Guidelines for Bias-Free Writing
for further advice and examples regarding gender
and other personal attributes [9]. Be particularly
aware of considerations around writing about
people with disabilities.

If possible, use the full (extended) alphabetic

character set for names of persons, institutions,
and places (e.g., Grnbk, Lafrenire, Snchez,
Nguyn, Universitt, Weienbach, Zllighoven,
rhus, etc.). These characters are already included
in most versions and variants of Times, Helvetica,
and Arial fonts.

LANGUAGE, STYLE AND CONTENT

The written and spoken language of SIGCHI is English.

Spelling and punctuation may use any dialect of English
(e.g., British, Canadian, US, etc.) provided this is done
consistently. Hyphenation is optional. To ensure suitability
for an international audience, please:

Write in a straightforward style.

Try to avoid long or complex sentence structures.

Use common and basic vocabulary (e.g., use the

word unusual rather than the word arcane).

Briefly define or explain all technical terms that

may be unfamiliar to readers.

Explain all acronyms the first time they are used in

your texte.g., Digital Signal Processing
(DSP).

Explain local references (e.g., not everyone knows

all city names in a particular country).

Explain insider comments. Ensure that your

whole audience understands any reference whose
meaning you do not describe (e.g., do not assume
that everyone has used an Android phone, or a
particular application).

ACCESSIBILITY

The Executive Council of SIGCHI has committed to

making SIGCHI conferences more inclusive for
researchers, practitioners, and educators with disabilities.
As a part of this goal, the all authors are asked to work on
improving the accessibility of their submissions.
Specifically, we encourage authors to carry out the
following five steps:
1. Add alternative text to all figures
2. Mark table headings
3. Generate a tagged PDF

4. Verify the default language

5. Set the tab order to Use Document Structure
For more information and links to instructions and
resources, please see: http://chi2016.acm.org/accessibility.
PAGE NUMBERING, HEADERS, AND FOOTERS

Your final submission should not contain footer or header

information at the top or bottom of each page. Specifically,
your final submission should not include page numbers.
Initial submissions may include page numbers, but these
must be removed for camera-ready. Page numbers will be
added to the PDF when the proceedings are assembled.
PRODUCING AND TESTING PDF FILES

We recommend that you produce a PDF version of your

submission well before the final deadline. Your PDF file
must be ACM DL Compliant. The requirements for an
ACM Compliant PDF are available at:

first author. Example reference formatting for individual

journal articles [3], articles in conference proceedings [7],
books [9], theses [10], book chapters [11], an entire journal
issue [6], websites [1,4], tweets [1], patents [5], and online
videos [8] is given here. This formatting is a slightly edited
version of the format automatically generated by the ACM
Digital Library (http://dl.acm.org) as ACM Ref. More
details of reference formatting are available at:
http://www.acm.org/publications/submissions/latex_style
Note that the Hyperlink style used throughout this
document uses blue links; however, URLs that appear in the
references section may appear in black.
REFERENCES

1. @_CHINOSAUR. 2014. VENUE IS TOO COLD.

#BINGO #CHI2016. Tweet. (1 May, 2014).
Retrieved February 2, 2014 from
https://twitter.com/_CHINOSAUR/status/4618643
17415989248

http://sheridanprinting.com/typedept/ACM-distillingsettings.htm
2.

ACM. How to Classify Works Using ACMs

Computing Classification System. 2014. Retrieved
August 22, 2014 from
http://www.acm.org/class/how_to_use.html

3.

Ronald E. Anderson. 1992. Social impacts of

computing: Codes of professional ethics. Soc Sci
Comput Rev 10, 2: 453-469.

4.

Anna Cavender, Shari Trewin, Vicki Hanson.

2014. Accessible Writing Guide. Retrieved August
22, 2014 from http://www.sigaccess.org/welcometo-sigaccess/resources/accessible-writing-guide/

5.

Morton L. Heilig. 1962. Sensorama Simulator,

U.S. Patent 3,050,870, Filed January 10, 1961,
issued August 28, 1962.

6.

Jofish Kaye and Paul Dourish. 2014. Special issue

on science fiction and ubiquitous computing.
Personal Ubiquitous Comput. 18, 4 (April 2014),
765-766. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s00779-0140773-4

7.

Scott R. Klemmer, Michael Thomsen, Ethan

Phelps-Goodman, Robert Lee, and James A.
Landay. 2002. Where do web sites come from?:
capturing and interacting with design history. In
Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human
Factors in Computing Systems (CHI '02), 1-8.
http://doi.acm.org/10.1145/503376.503378

Sample text: We thank all the volunteers, and all

publications support and staff, who wrote and provided
helpful comments on previous versions of this document.
Authors 1, 2, and 3 gratefully acknowledge the grant from
NSF (#1234-2012-ABC). This is just an example.

8.

Psy. 2012. Gangnam Style. Video. (15 July 2012.).

Retrieved August 22, 2014 from
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9bZkp7q19f0

9.

Marilyn Schwartz. 1995. Guidelines for Bias-Free

Writing. Indiana University Press.

REFERENCES FORMAT

10. Ivan E. Sutherland. 1963. Sketchpad, a ManMachine Graphical Communication System. Ph.D

When creating your PDF from Word, ensure that you

generate a tagged PDF from improved accessibility. This
can be done by using the Adobe PDF add-in, also called
PDFMaker. Select Acrobat | Preferences from the ribbon
and ensure that Enable Accessibility and Reflow with
tagged Adobe PDF is selected. You can then generate a
tagged PDF by selecting Create PDF from the Acrobat
ribbon. Test your PDF file by viewing or printing it with the
same software the publisher will use, Adobe Acrobat
Reader Version 10, which is widely available at no cost.
Note that most reviewers will use a North
American/European version of Acrobat Reader, so please
check your PDF accordingly.
CONCLUSION

It is important that you write for the SIGCHI audience.

Please read previous years proceedings to understand the
writing style and conventions that successful authors have
used. State clearly what you have done, not merely what
you plan to do, and explain how your work is different from
previously published work, i.e., the unique contribution
that your work makes to the field. Please consider what the
reader will learn from your submission, and how they will
find your work useful. If you write with these questions in
mind, your work is more likely to be successful, both in
being accepted into the conference, and in influencing the
work of our field.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

References must be the same font size as other body text.

References should be in alphabetical order by last name of

Dissertation. Massachusetts Institute of

Technology, Cambridge, MA.

11. Langdon Winner. 1999. Do artifacts have politics?

In The Social Shaping of Technology (2nd. ed.),
Donald MacKenzie and Judy Wajcman (eds.).
Open University Press, Buckingham, UK, 28-40.