Open Review Process: All users shall be able to access and review all papers

We want to use an "open review process" for all submissions, i.e., every user shall be allowed to review all submissions he likes to.
How is this supported by ConfTool Pro?

An open review process can be easily defined.
You have to enable the open review mode of ConfTool Pro and set the corresponding phase to fit your needs.

To switch to the open review mode, please go to:
Overview => Settings => Main Settings for the Review Process

Enable the Expert settings at the bottom of the page by clicking on “Expert Settings”.
The page now shows a new section called '”Open Review” Process?' (see Screenshot).

• Choose “Yes” if you want all users to see all submissions, all existing reviews and give them the right to create reviews. The names of the reviewers will not be displayed to the authors.
• Choose “Yes, and reviewer names (!) will be revealed to the authors” if you also want the names of the reviewers to be displayed to the authors. Save the new settings

Now set the corresponding conference phases to fit your needs:
Overview => Settings => Conference Phases and Deadlines

Enable the "submission phase" and also enable the "Reviewing phase: PC members and reviewers can access the submitted contributions assigned to them for review". In this case, all users act as reviewers and have been assigned all contributions.

We recommend one more setting for the open review process: If you want the authors to access their reviews before they have been set to "accepted" or "rejected", you have to change the settings of the standard acceptance status "On Hold".
Please go to:
Overview => Settings => Manage Acceptance Status
Edit the status "On Hold" and set "Show Results" to "Detailed..." (see Image 2).
Now authors can see the reviews and will also get a confirmation mail if a new review is entered.


Please note that ConfTool Pro also offers an additional "Open Peer Review" where the reviewers’ names are shown to the authors and vice versa.