X World Call for Participation

Second round CFP now open!

We’re really pleased to bring back a combined /dev/world + X World in-person event! Once again, in 2024 this will be a combined event bringing together two tracks from our popular /dev/world and X World conferences. In addition, we’re hoping to bring back a separate day of workshops.

    • the /dev/world track is for those who develop software on, for, and with Apple platforms;
    • the XWorld track is for those who support users of Apple platforms, including in user education, system administration, platform deployments, and Apple device management.

Our goal is to provide a welcoming and professional environment so that people can work together to share their experience in the use of Apple technology, to develop as leaders in the use of Apple technology, and to inspire and foster innovative use of Apple technology. Our primary focus is learning environments, but we also welcome proposals from those who work more broadly with Apple platforms.

The event will run in-person, in Naarm/Melbourne, from May 8 through 10, 2024 and the Call for Participation (CFP) is now open.

While you’ll need to select a track in your proposal, we may move it to a different track depending on how well we feel it will fit in with existing content across the entire event. Feel free to get creative!

More details on each track are included below, followed by information on making a submission.

Important Things to Know

If you want to speak at this event, you will need to read and agree to our policies. These are very important, so please don’t skip them.

/dev/world Track

Apple Silicon is well and truly here, Apple Vision Pro has shipped, iPad is a computer, iPhone is a camera, Apple Watch is for extreme sports, and Swift is 9 years old and consistently hovering in or around the Top 10 programming languages by use.

With even more new Apple platforms likely on the horizon, Apple writing a new Foundation in Swift, for Swift, C++ interoperability is in full swing, and the App Store bigger than ever, the development community is healthy and vibrant.

The /dev/world Track is seeking 30-minute talk submissions that explore what it’s like to make software on, for and with Apple platforms. Here’s some of our ideas, but don’t feel limited:

  • Are you building a cross platform app? How are you approaching that? What technologies and tools have you used, and what have you stopped using? In what learning and research contexts is it important to offer cross-platform? In what contexts does it not matter much, if at all?
  • Have you built the same app for several years? What’s changed in that time? How has your approach to change been handled?
  • Should we all be building apps for iPhones using web technology now? Has that approach been working for you as you develop apps for learning? Is React Native good, actually? In what ways is it well suited to developing apps for research, teaching or learning?
  • What’s the iPad for? What are its strengths and weaknesses for apps in contexts like universities, libraries, or museums? What apps are you building for iPad?
  • How do you handle changes between versions of Swift, as Swift evolved rapidly?
  • How’s SwiftUI going for you? What’s harder, what’s easier? What have you built?
  • How’s macOS Catalyst going? What’s your experience with Catalyst apps so far?
  • What’s your approach to building for new Apple platforms, particularly when they often only give a month or two of warning?
  • Rust? Go? C#? Something else? Why? Why not? What for? Would the nature of the application (research/teacher/student users, subject area) be relevant in your process of selecting the language in which to develop an app?
  • Built a game in Unreal Engine, Unity, Godot, or something else? Tell us what you learned!
  • How do you prepare for what’s coming when you don’t know what it is? Is it Augmented Reality? Is it Virtual Reality? Is it replacing physical experiences like exhibitions and concerts with solutions for lockdown? Who knows!
  • What languages, compilers, libraries and integrated development environments work best for your discipline? What are the strengths and weaknesses of MacOS as a platform for scientific programming, as compared with, say, Windows and Linux?

All topics that are of interest to developers building and designing software on, for, and with Apple platforms are welcomed, regardless of whether they focus on Apple’s developer tools.

XWorld Track

Everyone is working from home, bringing their own device, and trying to plug malicious USB cables into your Thunderbolt port. Managing and administering devices in modern workplaces is—somehow—easier and harder than ever. Is it even your Thunderbolt port, and who said you could manage or administer student’s devices? How can we come to an understanding which lets students, teachers, and researchers make the best use of their own and the institution’s technology while protecting the institution and its people from intended or unintended detriment from within or beyond?

Are macOS, iOS, and iPadOS just another cookie-cutter operating system in the toolchain of business and university? Or are they still different enough, interesting enough to warrant separate discussion?

The XWorld Track is seeking 30-minute talk submissions that explore the uniqueness, in both the positive and negative, of supporting Apple’s platforms and its users, and how they coexist in a diverse, fragmented, WFH, BYOD, sometimes hostile ecosystem. Some ideas include:

  • What’s it like managing and administering macOS, iOS, and iPadOS in support, lab, network, sysadmin and related roles in 2024?
  • Should we even be trying to administer, manage, and control devices in 2024? Considering the Apple eco-system and the needs of students, researchers, and other learners, what’s the role for IT support professionals?
  • What are the latest best practices, and what’s working for you, for supporting Apple users  in educational contexts like classrooms, lecture theatres, scientific laboratories, lecture theatres, and Zoom sessions?
  • If everyone’s WFH, what does device administration and management look like? What’s the purpose of a finely tuned, beautifully appointed lab of machines if everyone is hunched over a laptop on their couch at home? How do you support the laptop-hunchers, and those who work from an iPad?
  • What tools support administering, managing, and controlling devices in 2024? What hasn’t worked for you?
  • How do we stay secure in 2024? Physical attacks are more sophisticated than ever, and online attacks range from sophisticated scams with a social component, to crypto-ransoms, to traditional malware. Security and reliability? In this economy?!
  • Bringing your own device, and working from home: there’s nothing new about that in education. What was new during the pandemic was that students, and even staff, were rarely, if ever, on campus. What lessons can we learn from that experience about how best to support these people in their use of Apple technology? What worked for you and for those who you support? What didn’t work?
  • What processes, systems, tools, and techniques can make it easier to support and work with users who have more autonomy, control, and flexibility with their hardware than ever before? How does a managed environment fit in with this reality?
  • iPadOS vs macOS? macOS vs iOS? Windows? Android? As the platforms become more and more similar, how does your job change? What tools are the same, and what are different?

Submissions that focus on these questions in some way will be prioritised, but feel free to get creative with your ideas. All topics that are of interest to those supporting Apple platforms are welcomed for the XWorld Track.

Making a Submission

AUC events are very welcoming of first-time speakers, and anyone at any level of their career or speaking experience is welcome to participate in the CFP. If you’d prefer to discuss a talk or workshop idea in person, please email contributions @ auc.edu.au – be sure to provide some contact details so that we can get in touch with you.

Make a submission

Once submissions are received, the conference team will review them and may request clarifications or additional information. Accepted submissions will be notified by or before the dates listed below in the timeline. If your submission is not accepted, you will be notified.

Presenters of accepted submissions will received a complimentary conference registration, and travel and accommodation support (within defined limits).

Presentations can be on any subject related to the goals of the event tracks. These sessions are normally 30 minutes long (plus 5 minutes Q&A), and would ordinarily be expected to occur live at the event on May 8, May 9 or May 10, 2024.

The presentation submission timeline is as follows:

  • First round CFP closes 23 Mar, 2024 08:00pm (AEDT)
  • Second round CFP (if required) closes 6th April, 2024 at 5pm AEST.
  • First round acceptances notified by April 2nd, 2024, others soon thereafter.
  • Presentations in Melbourne at the event May 8-10, 2024