This year Organizing Committee received 93 papers by 176 authors from 21 countries: Algeria, Argentina, Austria, Brazil, Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Macedonia, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, The Netherlands, UK and USA.

All submitted papers have been reviewed by at least two independent referees: 120 reviews were given by 65 referees from abroad, and 98 by 47 Croatian referees. The proceedings contain 81 accepted papers (41 from abroad), written by 155 authors. The choice of referees and the publishing policy was conducted by the International Program Committee.

Traditionally, a wide range of topics was covered indicating the variety of the participants' interests:

• Application of Information Technology
• Artificial Intelligence and Expert Systems
• Biometrics
• Computer Systems and Networks
• Data Analysis and Statistics
• Information Systems and Databases
• Mathematics and Computation
• Modelling, Simulation and Optimization
• Multimedia
• Software Engineering and Programming Languages.

• Invited speakers from several countries, covering different topics:
  
  L. Billard, USA;
  I. Bratko, Slovenia;
  I. Futo, Hungary;
  B. Gavish, USA;
  D. K. Hammer, The Netherlands;
  J. Skorin-Kapov, USA;
  A. Smailagic, USA;

  Presentation of the contributed papers as the essential core of the Conference. During 4 working days 53 contributed papers were presented, including 17 papers presented by foreign authors;

  A panel discussion about " Basic Education Vs. Job Training: Exchange of Experiences";

  BIOSTAT '97, organized by the Croatian Society for Biometrics;

  - 4th Meeting of Researchers;

  - 2nd School of Biometrics; Lecturer: W. Martinez (France): Statistical Analysis of Textual Data;

  CEEPUS Summer School, organized by CEEPUS CRO-06 Network; Lecturers:

  M. Bielikova, Slovakia;

  T.Gyimothy, Hungary;

  N. Pavesic, Slovenia;

  S. Ribaric, Croatia;

  Software / hardware presentations and a book exhibition.

A selection of papers presented at the Conference (longer, revised versions) are considered for publishing in special issues of the following international journals:

• IMACS journal Mathematics and Computers in Simulation
• CIT Journal of Computing and Information Technology.

We are grateful to all who have contributed to this Conference. Our special thanks go to the authors of papers and to the referees. The invited speakers give a particular flavour to the Conference. So do the moderators and the participants at the panel discussion. Sponsors and co-operating institutions gave us invaluable help, too. And last, but surely not the least, the strong international component, the enjoyable social events and a scenic environment have always helped to create a memorable atmosphere.

We are looking forward seeing you at the 20th International Conference on "Information Technology Interfaces" ITI '98. We believe that ITI '98 will bring a growth in quality and abundance of the Conference activities and a further increase in the number of participants. We hope that you, the participants of ITI '97, will help us to achieve these objectives.

June 1997