Writing for Computer Science (eBook)

Justin Zobel is Head of the University of Melbourne's Department of Computing & Information Systems. He received his PhD from the University of Melbourne and for many years was based at RMIT University, where he led the Search Engine group. As a researcher, Professor Zobel is best known for his role in the development of algorithms for efficient web search. His current research areas include search, measurement and evaluation, bioinformatics, fundamental algorithms and data structures and compression. He is an author of around 200 papers, has written three texts on postgraduate study and research methods and is an associate editor of ACM Transactions on Information Systems, Information Processing & Management, and Information Retrieval.

Preface 5
Contents 8
1 Introduction 13
Kinds of Publication 14
Writing, Science, and Skepticism 15
Using This Book 16
Spelling and Terminology 18
2 Getting Started 20
Beginnings 21
Shaping a Research Project 22
Research Planning 25
Students and Advisors 26
A ``Getting Started'' Checklist 28
3 Reading and Reviewing 30
Research Literature 31
Finding Research Papers 32
Critical Reading 34
Developing a Literature Review 36
Authors, Editors, and Referees 37
Contribution 38
Evaluation of Papers 39
Content of Reviews 41
Drafting a Review 42
Checking Your Review 43
4 Hypotheses, Questions, and Evidence 45
Hypotheses 46
Defending Hypotheses 48
Forms of Evidence 50
Use of Evidence 52
Approaches to Measurement 53
Good and Bad Science 54
Reflections on Research 57
A ``Hypotheses, Questions, and Evidence'' Checklist 59
5 Writing a Paper 60
The Scope of a Paper 60
Telling a Story 63
Organization 65
Title and Author 65
Abstract 66
Introduction 66
Body 67
Literature Review 69
Conclusions 70
Bibliography 70
Appendices 70
The First Draft 71
From Draft to Submission 72
Co-authoring 74
Theses 75
Getting It Wrong 76
Irrelevance 77
Inconsistency, Inadequacy, and Incompleteness 78
Incomprehensibility 79
Ugliness 79
Ignorance 80
A ``Writing Up'' Checklist 81
6 Good Style 83
Economy 84
Tone 85
Examples 87
Motivation 88
Balance 89
Voice 89
The Upper Hand 90
Obfuscation 91
Analogies 92
Straw Men 92
Reference and Citation 94
Quotation 98
Acknowledgements 100
Grammar 101
Beauty 101
7 Style Specifics 102
Titles and Headings 102
The Opening Paragraphs 104
Variation 105
Paragraphing 106
Ambiguity 107
Sentence Structure 108
Tense 112
Repetition and Parallelism 112
Emphasis 113
Definitions 114
Choice of Words 115
Qualifiers 117
Misused Words 117
Spelling Conventions 120
Jargon 121
Cliché and Idiom 122
Foreign Words 123
Overuse of Words 123
Padding 124
Plurals 125
Abbreviations 126
Acronyms 127
Sexism 128
8 Punctuation 129
Fonts and Formatting 129
Stops 130
Commas 130
Colons and Semicolons 132
Apostrophes 132
Exclamations 133
Hyphenation 133
Capitalization 134
Quotations 134
Parentheses 135
Citations 136
9 Mathematics 137
Clarity 137
Theorems 139
Readability 140
Notation 142
Ranges and Sequences 143
Alphabets 144
Line Breaks 144
Numbers 145
Percentages 147
Units of Measurement 148
10 Algorithms 150
Presentation of Algorithms 150
Formalisms 152
Level of Detail 155
Figures 156
Notation 157
Environment of Algorithms 157
Asymptotic Cost 158
11 Graphs, Figures, and Tables 161
Graphs 161
Diagrams 170
Tables 175
Captions and Labels 180
Axes, Labels, and Headings 182
12 Other Professional Writing 183
Scoping the Task 183
Understanding the Task 184
Documentation 185
Technical Reports 186
Grant Applications 187
Non-technical Writing 188
Structuring a Report 189
Audience 190
Style 191
Other Problem Areas 193
A ``Professional Writing'' Checklist 194
13 Editing 195
Consistency 196
Style 196
Proofreading 197
Choice of Word-Processor 198
An ``Editing'' Checklist 199
14 Experimentation 201
Baselines 202
Persuasive Data 203
Interpretation 207
Robustness 209
Performance of Algorithms 211
Human Studies 213
Coding for Experimentation 215
Describing Experiments 216
An ``Experimentation'' Checklist 218
15 Statistical Principles 220
Variables 221
Samples and Populations 222
Aggregation and Variability 223
Reporting of Variability 225
Statistical Tools 227
Randomness and Error 230
Intuition 233
Visualization of Results 234
A ``Statistical Principles'' Checklist 236
16 Presentations 240
Research Talks 241
Content 242
Organization 244
The Introduction 245
The Conclusion 246
Preparation 246
Delivery 247
Question Time 249
Slides 249
Individual Slides 250
Slide Tools 250
Layout 251
Animation 251
Other Elements 251
Copyright 252
Text on Slides 252
Figures 253
Posters 254
Content 254
Organization 255
Presentation 256
A ``Presentations and Posters'' Checklist 256
17 Ethics 258
Intellectual Creations 260
Plagiarism 260
Self-plagiarism 263
Misrepresentation 264
Authorship 265
Confidentiality and Conflict of Interest 266
An ``Ethics'' Checklist 267
Afterword 268
Exercises 269
Index 278