PC members and administrators can attach tag names to papers. It’s easy to add and remove tags and to list all papers with a given tag, and ordered tags preserve a particular paper order. Tags also affect color highlighting in paper lists.

Tags are visible to the PC and hidden from authors. Twiddle tags, with names like “#~tag”, are visible only to their creators. Tags with two twiddles, such as “#~~tag”, are visible only to PC chairs.

A paper’s tags are shown like this on the paper page:

Tags  Edit

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#earlyaccept

To find all papers with tag “#discuss”: 

You can also search with “show:tags” to see each paper’s tags, or “show:#tagname” to see a particular tag as a column.

Tags are only shown to PC members and administrators. Additionally, twiddle tags, which have names like “#~tag”, are visible only to their creators; each PC member has an independent set. Tags are not case sensitive.

• For one paper: Go to a paper page, select the Tags box’s “Edit” link, and enter tags separated by spaces.

  

• For many papers: Search for papers, select them, and use the action area underneath the search list. Add adds tags to the selected papers, Remove removes tags from the selected papers, and Define adds the tag to the selected papers and removes it from all others. The chair-only Clear twiddle action removes a tag and all users’ matching twiddle tags.

  

• With search keywords: Search for “edit:tag:tagname” to add tags with checkboxes; search for “edit:tagval:tagname” to type in tag values; or search for “edit:tags” to edit papers’ full tag lists.

  

• In bulk: Administrators can also upload tag assignments using bulk assignment.

Although any PC member can view or search most tags, certain tags may be changed only by administrators.

Tags have optional numeric values, which are displayed as “#tag#100”. Search for “order:tag” to sort tagged papers by value. You can also search for specific values with search terms like “#discuss#2” or “#discuss>1”.

It’s common to assign increasing tag values to a set of papers. Do this using the search screen. Search for the papers you want, sort them into the right order, select their checkboxes, and choose Define order in the tag action area. If no sort gives what you want, search for the desired paper numbers in order—for instance, “4 1 12 9”—then Select all and Define order. To add new papers at the end of an existing discussion order, use Add to order. To insert papers into an existing order, use Add to order with a tag value; for example, to insert starting at value 5, use Add to order with “#tag#5”. The rest of the order is renumbered to accommodate the insertion.

Even easier, you can drag papers into order using a search like “editsort:#tag”.

Define order might assign values “#tag#1”, “#tag#3”, “#tag#6”, and “#tag#7” to adjacent papers. The gaps make it harder to infer conflicted papers’ positions. (Any given gap might or might not hold a conflicted paper.) The Define gapless order action assigns strictly sequential values, like “#tag#1”, “#tag#2”, “#tag#3”, “#tag#4”. Define order is better for most purposes.

The autoassigner has special support for creating discussion orders. It tries to group papers with similar PC conflicts, which can make the meeting run smoother.

Tags “red”, “orange”, “yellow”, “green”, “blue”, “purple”, “gray”, and “white” act as highlight colors. For example, papers tagged with “#red” will appear red in paper lists (for people who can see that tag). Tag a paper “#~red” to make it red only on your display. Other styles are available; try “#bold”, “#italic”, “#big”, “#small”, and “#dim”. The settings page can associate other tags with colors so that, for example, “#reject” papers appear gray.

The settings page can declare certain tags as badges, which display near titles.

Emoji codes like “:fire:” and “:confused:” can be used as tags. The corresponding emoji displays next to the paper title. Tag values show multiple emoji, so “#:star:#5” shows five stars.

Here are some example ways to use tags.

• Skip low-ranked submissions at the PC meeting. Mark low-ranked submissions with tag “#nodiscuss”, then ask the PC to search for “#nodiscuss” (“tag:nodiscuss” also works). PC members can check the list for papers they’d like to discuss anyway. They can email the chairs about such papers, or, even easier, add a “#discussanyway” tag. (You might make the “#nodiscuss” tag chair-only so an evil PC member couldn’t add it to a high-ranked paper, but it’s usually better to trust the PC.)
• Mark controversial papers that would benefit from additional review. PC members could add the “#controversy” tag when the current reviewers disagree. A search shows where the PC thinks more review is needed.
• Mark PC-authored papers for extra scrutiny. First, search for PC members’ last names in author fields. Check for accidental matches and select the papers with PC members as authors, then use the action area below the search list to add the tag “#pcpaper”. A search shows papers without PC authors. (Since PC members can see whether a paper is tagged “#pcpaper”, you may want to delay defining the tag until just before the meeting.)
• Vote for papers. The chair can define special allotment voting tags. Each PC member is assigned an allotment of votes to distribute among papers. For instance, if “#vote” were a voting tag with an allotment of 10, then a PC member could assign 5 votes to a paper by adding the twiddle tag “#~vote#5”. The system automatically sums PC members’ votes into the public “#vote” tag. To search for papers by vote count, search for “rorder:vote”. (Learn more)
• Rank papers. Each PC member can set tags indicating their preference ranking for papers. For instance, a PC member’s favorite paper would get tag “#~rank#1”, the next favorite “#~rank#2”, and so forth. The chair can then combine these rankings into a global preference order using a Condorcet method. (Learn more)
• Define a discussion order for the PC meeting. Publishing the order lets PC members prepare to discuss upcoming papers. Define an ordered tag such as “#discuss”, then ask the PC to search for “order:discuss”. The PC can now see the order and use quick links to go from paper to paper.
• Mark tentative decisions during the PC meeting either using decision selectors or, perhaps, “#accept” and “#reject” tags.