Sigcomm supplementary

SIGCOMM Supplementary

Use this when splitting a SIGCOMM paper across body, references, and appendices. The controlling rule: the 12 single-spaced pages before references must carry the argument on their own; appendices and references sit outside the cap but do not rescue an incomplete body. Reopen the current CFP to confirm this edition's appendix handling.

What goes where

• Body (≤ 12 single-spaced pages, figures and tables included): the measured problem, the design principle, the mechanism, and the decision-critical evaluation. A reviewer must understand and believe the contribution without turning to an appendix.
• References (outside the cap): as many as needed; never trimmed for space or anonymity.
• Appendices (optional, after references, outside the cap): extended measurement sweeps, additional topologies, proofs or derivations, detailed configuration, and workload specifics — support, not substitute.

The appendix-necessity rule changes the calculus

Unlike venues where appendices are a free overflow bin, SIGCOMM's shepherd approves whether each appendix is necessary at camera-ready. Write appendices you can defend as load-bearing, and never park a step the argument depends on where a shepherd might cut it. A safe test: if removing an appendix would make a body claim unverifiable, that content probably belongs in the body or the artifact, not in a droppable appendix.

Placement table

Content	Home	Why
The core mechanism and its principle	Body	The contribution reviewers evaluate
The one or two decision-critical figures	Body	The evidence the accept/reject turns on
Extra topology / parameter sweeps	Appendix	Depth without crowding the 12 pages
Full configuration and workload spec	Appendix or artifact	Reproducibility detail, referenced from the body
Proof or derivation for an analytical claim	Appendix	Body keeps the statement and a sketch
Raw logs and per-run tables	Artifact	Never the paper's job to hold these

Keep the body self-contained

• Every appendix and artifact item must be cross-referenced from the body at least once; orphaned supplementary material is invisible and, at camera-ready, deletable.
• Order appendix sections to mirror the body's flow so a reader navigates by section, not by hunting.
• State results in the body and defer only the support — a reader who never opens an appendix should still be able to reconstruct why the contribution holds.

Vignette: splitting a congestion-control paper

A submission proposes a new congestion signal with a testbed evaluation and a small stability argument. The body keeps the measured motivation, the signal and its principle, the two decision-critical tail-latency figures, and a one-paragraph stability sketch. The appendix holds the full stability derivation, a switch-buffer sweep, and the fairness-across-flows tables; the artifact carries the driver and logs. Nothing the accept decision depends on lives only in a droppable place.

Output format

[Body self-contained] yes / no (what breaks without an appendix)
[Body budget] within 12 single-spaced pre-reference pages? yes/no
[Placement map] <content -> body / appendix / artifact>
[Appendix necessity] each appendix defensible to a shepherd? yes/no
[Cross-reference gaps] <orphaned supplementary items>