From owner-cse663-fa08-list@LISTSERV.BUFFALO.EDU Fri Nov 14 10:09:53 2008 Date: Fri, 14 Nov 2008 10:09:45 -0500 From: "William J. Rapaport" Subject: 663: Term-Project Report FAQ To: CSE663-FA08-LIST@LISTSERV.BUFFALO.EDU ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Subject: Term-Project Report FAQ ------------------------------------------------------------------------ ------------------------------------------------------------------------ A. How should I organize my report? ------------------------------------------------------------------------- During Raj Reddy's visit to our department on 12 April 1994, several grad students gave brief presentations of their research for him. In each case, even though Reddy was unfamiliar with what they were doing, he asked very general, though very penetrating, questions. When these questions are put together, they serve as an excellent guide to the kinds of issues that all researchers--and grad students in particular-- should pay attention to ... * when trying to find a research project (e.g., for a dissertation) * when presenting one's research to an audience. * when writing up a report Here they are: 1. What is the problem you are trying to solve? [In our case, here's where you would give a brief discussion of the CVA project and of your particular passage and word] 2. What are the recent advances or interesting ideas in X? (where X = the subdiscipline of CS or AI that your problem comes from) [This is not necessarily applicable in our case; it depends on such things as whether or not you are using some KR device such as scripts or frames or default reasoning (or whatever) in your specific project--if you are, here's the place to discuss it.] 3. What have you accomplished (so far)? How far along are you? [Here's where you say what you've done, complete with demos, etc.] 4. What is the next step? How does it relate to your broader goal? Why is it an important thing to do, given your goals? [Here's where you say what you still have to do, what future work or unsolved problems are left to be accomplished. Be as detailed as you can, so that your report will be useful to someone (possibly a future incarnation of you yourself!) who takes on the job of continuing your work.] 5. How will you know when you are done? [This may not be directly applicable for our project.] ------------------------------------------------------------------------ B. Should/can I cite any websites? What about the CVA website? What about Wikipedia? ------------------------------------------------------------------------ It's perfectly fine to have a footnote somewhere pointing readers to the CVA or SNePS websites, but a reference list at the end of a professional article should not cite a website, only a publication (in a journal, book, etc.). A minor "exception" to this is that if a paper is unpublished and only appears on someone's website, then you can list that website as you would normally list the publication or publisher of a published paper. One reason for this is that websites are not "archival"; they change too frequently or can disappear. Another is that they are not "peer-reviewed". Granted, my CVA website (which, by the way is mine, not Kibby's (look at who has the copyright to see who the "author" of a website is)) and the SNePS website are "legitimate", but it's often hard to tell about the legitimacy of other websites, whereas published papers at least have the imprimatur of a journal or publisher. All of this holds for Wikipedia, too. For more on Wikipedia, see: http://www.cse.buffalo.edu/~rapaport/575/F08/EMAIL/20081031-WikipediaFAQ (a document prepared for my CSE 575 course). ------------------------------------------------------------------------ C. Is there any special format that my project report should be in? ------------------------------------------------------------------------ YES! Please see my "How to Write" document for full information and requirements: http://www.cse.buffalo.edu/~rapaport/howtowrite.html