[HSDIP] Call for Papers: ICAPS 2026 Workshop on Heuristics and Search for Domain-independent Planning (HSDIP 2026)

[Malte Helmert]

Heuristics and Search for Domain-independent Planning (HSDIP 2026)
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ICAPS'26 Workshop Dublin, Ireland June 28-29, 2026

Aim and Scope of the Workshop
-----------------------------

Heuristics and search algorithms are the two key components of heuristic
search, one of the main approaches to many variations of domain
independent planning, including classical planning, temporal planning,
planning under uncertainty and adversarial planning. This workshop seeks
to understand the underlying principles of current heuristics and search
methods, their limitations, ways for overcoming those limitations, as
well as the synergy between heuristics and search.

The HSDIP workshop has always been welcoming of multidisciplinary work,
for example, drawing inspiration from operations research (like row and
column generation algorithms), convex optimization (like gradient
optimization for hybrid planning), constraint programming,
satisfiability, or applications of machine learning in heuristic search
(e.g., learning heuristics, or heuristic selection).

The workshop is meant to be an open and inclusive forum, and we
encourage papers that report on work in progress or that do not fit the
mold of a typical conference paper. Contributions do not have to show
that a new approach outperforms the state of the art. While performance
measured in the number of evaluated nodes, time, and solution quality
remains relevant, in this workshop we seek above all crisp and
meaningful ideas and understanding. We are interested in all variations
of domain-independent planning such as classical planning, temporal
planning, hybrid planning, planning under uncertainty, adversarial
planning, or (model-based) reinforcement learning. Non-trivial negative
results are welcome to the workshop, but we expect the authors to argue
for the significance of the presented results.

Topics of Interest
------------------

Examples of typical topics for submissions to this workshop are:
- automatic derivation of heuristic estimators for domain-independent
planning
- formal results showing equivalence or dominance between heuristics
- novel heuristic methods dealing with planning with numeric variables
and effects, partial observability and non-deterministic action effects
- heuristic estimators for domain-independent planning via procedures or
suitably defined encodings of declarative descriptions of planning tasks
into satisfiability or optimisation
- novel search techniques for domain-independent planning that
explicitly aim at exploiting effectively the properties of existing
heuristics
- empirical observations of synergies between heuristics and search in
domain-independent planning
- challenging domains for existing combinations of heuristics and search
algorithms
- applications of machine learning in heuristic search, e.g., learning
heuristics, adaptive search strategies, or heuristic selection
- interesting algorithmic optimizations for the calculation of a
heuristic or the execution of a search


Important Dates
---------------

Submission deadline:
May 7, 2026 (UTC-12 timezone)

Notification:
May 28, 2026

Workshop:
June 28-29, 2026


Submission Details
------------------

Please format submissions in AAAI style (see instructions in the Author
Kit at https://aaai.org/authorkit26-1/). Long (up to 9 pages including
references) and short (up to 5 pages including references) papers are
the standard category, submissions shorter than the page limit are
welcome. Long papers will be allocated a longer presentation at the
workshop.

Submissions will be made through EasyChair:
https://easychair.org/conferences/?conf=icapshsdip2026

The following conditions apply:
- Submissions will be double blind (except for two program chairs who
will see author names).
- Papers will be reviewed by a member of the organizing committee,
and/or external reviewers selected by the organizing committee,
according to the usual criteria such as relevance to the workshop,
significance of the contribution, and technical quality.
- Discussions between reviewers and organizers will remain private.

At least one author of each accepted paper must attend the workshop in
order to present the paper.


Policy on Previously Published Materials:

Previously published papers to conferences other than ICAPS are allowed.
They will only receive a light review for relevance by a member of the
organizing committee. Please do not submit papers accepted at the main
conference.

Rejected papers from the main conference are welcome if you do your
utmost to address the comments given by ICAPS reviewers.

Parallel submissions sent to other conferences are allowed from our
side. It is your responsibility to ensure that those venues allow for
papers submitted to be published in parallel "informal" ways (e.g. in
workshop proceedings or websites without associated ISSN/ISBN).


Workshop Committee
------------------

Organizing Committee:
- Malte Helmert, University of Basel, Switzerland
- Arnaud Lequen, Linköping University, Sweden
- Alison Paredes, Queen's University, Canada
- Devin Thomas, University of New Hampshire, United States

Contact: hs...@googlegroups.com