Problem Solving with Constraints CSCE496/896, Fall 2011 cse.unl/~ choueiry/F11-496-896

1. Guidelines for Reports Problem Solving with Constraints CSCE496/896, Fall 2011 www.cse.unl.edu/~choueiry/F11-496-896 Berthe Y. Choueiry (Shu-we-ri) Avery Hall, 360 cse496cp@cse.unl.edu Tel: +1(402)472-5444 Guidelines for reports

2. Outline • Writing a critical summary • Committing to a project • Writing a progress report • About your final report Guidelines for reports

3. Writing a Critical Summary This generic template is provided as an aid but is not mandatory • PART I: your understanding of the paper • PART II: your opinion of the paper Guidelines for reports

4. PART I: The paper • What: Context of the paper • problem the authors claim to address (i.e., motivation) • assumptions they make • solution they claim to provide • How: Short Description of proposed technique • basic algorithmic steps • optimizations, if any • evaluation: empirical/theoretical • Impact: Comparison to previous techniques • if provided, how? • can you identify/propose some other? • What next: Directions for future research Guidelines for reports

5. PART II: Your opinion • Is the paper a ‘real’ advancement of the state of the art? • Is it useful for the theory? for practice? • Can you identify other uses of the proposed technique(s)? • What are the shortcomings? • Can you identify more? can you propose a fix? • Any issues swept-under-the-carpet? • Can you identify other directions for future research? Guidelines for reports

6. Outline • Writing a critical summary • Committing to a project • Writing a progress report • About your final report Guidelines for reports

7. Committing to a Project • By Wednesday, March 9th, you must commit to a project • Submit to handin a short report (up to 1 page) stating: • Project title, your name • A short justification for your choice • A clear work-plan listing main tasks, approximate dates, and expected outcomes • A bibliography, if applicable • Clearly state whether you are collaborating with colleagues and/or with a research assistant • One proposal per team is sufficient. Teams are reminded that each member will have to provide a full evaluation of the performance of each other team member, listing both good and bad aspects. This is a requirement for collaboration. Guidelines for reports

8. Outline • Writing a critical summary • Committing to a project • Writing a progress report • About your final report Guidelines for reports

9. Progress report: format • In your report, you discuss your progress on the work-plan you had set to yourself in the proposal you submitted • Be as concise as possible but do not be bothered by a limitation on the number of pages. Thus, there is no requirement concerning the number of pages (could take from 1 page to whatever is needed), shorter reports are welcome  • If you have finished your project, this could be your draft for your final report Guidelines for reports

10. Progress report: content • Document what you did so far • Comment on what you accomplished with respect to what you promised you would • State whether you are early/late and why • Explain in case you have changed your plans and explain why • Report any difficulties, breakthroughs • Discuss anything else you feel is appropriate Guidelines for reports

11. Progress Report: Intent • Imagine you are a professional hired to carry out some investigations for a client. The client is paying you for the number of hours and for the quality of service/result you are providing. • It is time to re-evaluate the contract. You need to update your client on your progress. • How would rate your performance? how much would you charge? are able to finish the task? • if so how and when? • if not, will you keep the contract? drop it (a penalty is involved)? Guidelines for reports

12. Outline • Writing a critical summary • Committing to a project • Writing a progress report • About your final report Guidelines for reports

13. Your Final Report (1): Content • Given the variety of the projects, it is difficult to give general guidelines on the content of the report • Please discuss them with me on an individual basis • Include • What you accomplished • The problems you encountered • Your findings Guidelines for reports

14. Final Report (2): Typical Structure • Title, Course Number, Your Name , Date • Abstract • Table of Contents. In LaTeX: \tableofcontents • Introduction, motivation, roadmap (Section 2, Section 3, etc.) • Contributions • Experiments • Experiments set-up, data sets • Results • Discussions • Conclusions & future work • Bibliography Guidelines for reports

15. Final Report (3): Advice • Format: Use a one column format (not two columns) • Have as many figures as possible (including all those you are going to use in your slides): a picture is worth a million word.. • Include all your pseudo code (if any) • In your figures/plots, do not rely on color but use different line styles • Also, you may want to check my Golden Check to avoid annoying common mistakeshttp://csce.unl.edu/~choueiry/Advising/BeforeYouSubmitaReport.txt • The length of the report is not an issue. The shorter the better, but you should use any number of pages as you need. Guidelines for reports