FedWeb 2013 Submission instructions

[TREC FedWeb track]

Dear Federated Web Search Track participants,

The TREC runs submission system is now open for Federated Web Search  track runs.  The submission form is linked to from both the Tracks page in the Active Participants' part of the TREC web site and the Results Submission page (which in turn is linked from the main page of the Active Participants' section).

The submission deadline for resource selection task runs is August 11.  A submission deadline of August 11 effectively means that you must successfully submit your run prior to NIST staff arriving at NIST on August 12---basically by 7:00am EDT on August 12.  

To submit a run,  fill in the submission form by answering questions that describe the run and specify the file to upload.  After you click submit, the submission system will run a check-input script that will test the submission file for various kinds of formatting errors.  A version of this check script can be found on the Tracks page, as well as in the Tools section of the TREC web site.  Over the years NIST has found that strict checking of the "sanity" of an input file leads to far fewer problems down the line as it catches a lot of mistakes in the run at a time that the submitter can actually correct them.  You are strongly encouraged to use the script to test your submission file prior to submitting the file to NIST.   If any errors are found by the script at the time the run is submitted, the submission system will reject the run.  Rejected runs are not considered to be submitted; indeed, no information is retained about rejected runs.  Submitting a run through the submission system is the only acceptable way to send a run to NIST.  In particular, do not email submission files to NIST as they will be deleted without being read.

One field in the submission form is a list of organizations that have applied to participate in TREC 2013, sorted by Group ID. Make sure you are listed in that field, and contact NIST if you are not.  Please make that check soon, and especially do not wait until August 11 to make the check  as NIST staff will not be tending the submission system on weekends.

Regards,

Ellen Voorhees