Scholarship Skills

Andrew Black 1Lecture 8

Scholarship Skills

Andrew BlackLecture 8 – Examples, References, Boxes and Citations

David Maier © 1996, 1997, 1999, 2000

Some material © Todd Leen, 2001, Andrew Black 2007–8

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Andrew Black 2Lecture 8

ExamplesOne of the most important parts of a

paper.•good examples can make up for other

sins

• readers can often induce definitions, algorithms, proofs from good examples

•examples are a way for the reader to fix concepts in his or her mind

I have seldom seen a paper with too many examples.

We’ll look at various kinds of examples.

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Andrew Black 3Lecture 8

The Motivating ExampleComes before the formal

description of a term, algorithm, method to “set the stage”.

•don’t use notation that is not yet introduced

Core Rule: Define terms when they are first used.

• the example should be easier to understand than the concept it illustrates.

Can also illustrate the problem you are trying to solve.

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Illustrative Example

Demonstrates a concept, method, theorem that has been introduced previously.

• keep it nearby the definition in the text.

• consider putting it between theorem and proof

• do a substantive, not trivial, case

• If there is a possibility of misinterpretation by the reader, choose an example that will disambiguate.

• “non-example” helps, too — an example where a theorem doesn’t apply because the conditions are not met. This can help to clarify the conditions under which the theorem holds. Can also use this to show applicability of algorithms.

• Clarifying example is similar — distinguishes between similar concepts.

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World’s Worst ExampleDefinition. Consider a database containing the relations

R1, R2, ..., Rk. Let R(A1, A2, ..., An) be one of these relations, or the natural join of any subset of these relations, and let R* be the transitive closure of relation R. Then if (a1, a2, ..., an)R*(a1, a2, ..., an) for any tuple (a1, a2, ..., an) of R, then R is said to be a cyclic relation and the database is called a cyclic database.

Example 8.1. The relation { 〈 a,b 〈 , 〈 b,a 〈 } is cyclic

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Example ExampleDefinition: A simple path in an undirected graph is a sequence 〈 v1, v2, ..., vk 〈 of vertices, k ≥ 1, where 〈 vi, vi+1 〈 is an edge for 1 ≤ i < k, and vi ≠ vj if i ≠ j.

〈 1,2,5,6 〈 and 〈 1,2,3,4 〈 are simple paths. The sequence 〈 1,2,4 〈 is not a simple path because there is no 〈 2,4 〈 edge. The sequence 〈 4 〈 is a simple path, with k=1. The sequence 〈 2,1,3,2,5 〈 is not a simple path because vertex 2 is repeated.

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Running Example

A single example that is used several times throughout the text•can be effective, since reader has

less investment in time per concept illustrated

•can be hard to write as you go. It can be hard to foresee all the points that need to be illustrated.

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“Pun” ExamplesAvoid examples that come from the

domain that you are writing about• using a user interface tool to build the

interface for a user interface tool

• a logic program for interpreting logic programs

The point is that you shouldn’t use something the reader doesn’t understand to explain something the reader doesn’t understand.

If you can find an example outside of computer science, great!

Beware of tired examplesPrinting “Hello, world”.

However, there can be “standard” examples

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Illustrations

Have a lexicon in mind for your charts. That is: know what your arrows and boxes mean.Consider telling the reader!

QueryTrans-

late

Algebra

ExprOptmize

Phys.

Plan

Eval.

DB

AnswerPerhaps use ellipses for data

Use different arrow and boxshape to distinguish DB access

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Lecture 8

Citations

What do you need to cite?Typically, not common knowledge found in introductory texts—the reader is likely to be familiar with the material and will not mistake it for your own.

If you’re writing a review article, or trying to establish an historical thread, you might cite familiar material.

In contrast, if material might be unknown, or from an obscure source, or should be credited as the work of another, then you need a citation.

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Lecture 8

Citation StyleUsually use in-line citation in brackets

[14] or [AHU74] or [Aho and Ullman, 1974].

Format may be dictated by journal or conference proceedings. If not: choose one style and stick to it.

If you use numbered citations, then use square brackets since parentheses may be confused with equation numbers.

Fifty-three percent of cars (13)

Treat a citation as parenthetical material, not as a noun. How can you tell?

Aho and Ullman [14] give a more general formulation of the algorithm.

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Lecture 8

Citation StyleIt’s usually a good idea to mention the authors!

Last name usually enough. Use first name or initial to disambiguate. Don’t use titles (Dr., Professor)

Sethi [16] proves the converse is false.

P. Fischer [17] proved that generalized tic-tac-toe is NP-Hard; M. Fischer [18] showed it is actually NP-complete.

Don’t start a sentence with a numbered reference

[16] proves that the converse is false

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Citations are not words

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Frequency and LocationGenerally don’t need to re-cite in

the same paragraph.Reps and Horwitz [20] present the design of a structured editor. They also observe that sometimes non-structured editing is easier [20].

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Lecture 8

Location of Citation

Not a single right place for a citation, but there are wrong places.

Morris and Pratt [4] present an algorithm for string matching, which has sublinear behavior.

Morris and Pratt present an algorithm for string matching with sublinear behavior [4].

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Lecture 8

Location of Citations

Location should be appropriate so information content is clear

Several researchers have reported good results, but the two negative reports were from studies on much larger populations [14,18,19,25,38,42].

Several researchers have reported good results [14,18,19,42], but the two negative reports [25,38] were from studies on much larger populations.

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Lecture 8

Groups of Papers and AuthorsIf the text says the same thing

about a list of citations, group the citations.

Miller [23], Rabin and Karp [24], and Ng [25] have analyzed this randomized algorithm.

Several authors [23,24,25] have analyzed this ...

Several authors [Miller 1975, Rabin and Karp 1981, Ng 1983] have analyzed ...

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Lecture 8

Groups of Papers and Authors

If you use et al. (3 or more authors), list only one author.

Aho et al. [12] proved that the conjecture is false.

Aho and colleagues [12] proved ...

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Lecture 8

Groups of Papers and Authors

Group and order citations.[17][27] [17, 27]➠

[27,17] [17, 27]➠

[17,18,19] [17–19]➠

Usually put citations in the order given in the reference list.

The reference list is the list of cited reference gathered together at the end of the paper.

If you use numbers, the reference list should be in numerical order. If you use names (e.g., “Bumpte [1975] showed” or “Bumpte [Bu75] showed”) the reference list should be alphabetical.

Some publications (IEEE Software, Software—Practice & Experience) require that the reference list is ordered by citation.

\bibliographystyle{unsrt}

BibTeX doesn't do this for you!

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Lecture 8

Side Bars and Boxes

• Boxes or Sidebars present text that does not integrate directly into the main narrative.

• It may be preliminary material, or enrichment material.

• Material in boxes is often tangential to main text.

• Boxes are used like figures and tables.

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Lecture 8

Boxes, continued

Boxes can be used to reproduce material from other sources.Sets it off from the main text

Shows that it is not your own work

Be sure to include citations and sources!

This is often called a credit line.

Boxes should be numbered, just like figures and tables.This can depend on the “house

style”

Boxes should have a title.

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Lecture 8

Boxes, continued

• Like figures and tables, each box should be “called out” in the main text.

• An example that Tim found quite effective:

An Architecture for Extensible Code Models by Daniel Vainsencher and Andrew P. Black.

http://www.cs.pdx.edu/~black/publications/ModelExtensions_1.64.pdf

•The reviewers didn’t!compare withhttp://www.cs.pdx.edu/~black/publications/ModelExtensions.pdf

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Final Reminder

Use some words following equations, figures, and examples. You should tell the readers the important conclusion they should draw from the equation or graph. Don’t assume that they’ll get the thrust: make it clear.

This also forces you to interpret results, rather than just state them. This is generally good intellectual process. It forces you to think about the results.

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Lecture 8

References

Goals: make clear what the source is; make it reasonably easy for the reader to obtain it.

Seems as if each journal or organization has its own style.We will talk about van Leunen’s

style, with a couple of suggested changes.

Three Basic parts:

I. Author.

II. Title.

III. Bibliographic Info.

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Lecture 8

Examples

BookMarla Scott.

Effective Programming in C.

Addison-Wesley, 1992.

Journal paperCraig Chambers and Guy T. Leavens.

Type checking and modules for multimethods.

ACM Transactions on Programming Languages and Systems 17(6), pages 805-843, November 1995.

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Examples 2

Proceedings paperS. Heiler and A. Rosenthal.

G-Whiz, a visual interface for the functional model with recursion.

Proceedings of the XI International Conference on Very Large Databases, pages 11-23, Stockholm, Sweden, August 1985.

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Lecture 8

Examples 3

Article in collectionUmeshwar Dayal and John M. Smith.

PROBE: A knowledge-oriented database system.

In M. C. Brodie and J. Mylopoulos, editors, On Knowledge Based Management Systems, pages 81-93, Springer-Verlag, New York, 1986.

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Lecture 8

Getting the Information Right

Get information from:•the title page of a book

•the first page of an article. Copy the cover of the proceedings with the paper!

Paper titlesMake sure that proper names are capitalized

Finding hamiltonian circuits using pascal.

Usually, the style has its own ideas about capitalization.

Usually capitalize after a colon, unless the subtitle only describes the kind of paper.

The stable-marriage problem: a parallel solution.

The stable-marriage problem: an informal survey.

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Lecture 8

Web Pages

Problem—lack of author, title or date

Problem—transitory nature

Robert Burns.

Spiders on the web.

URL: http://www.dead-poets.com/arachnid.html; revised 12 December 1886, accessed July 2001

URLs must include a protocol specifier

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Lecture 8

Web Pages 2

Another exampleUniversity of Chicago, Department of

Economics.

Our favorite Nobel prizes.

http://www.econ.uc.edu/nobel, version of 13 January 1999.

Check out these websites:http://www.columbia.edu/cu/cup/cgos2006/basic.html#webpage

http://www.cas.usf.edu/english/walker/mla.html

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Lecture 8

Instead:

The Columbia Guide to Online Style

By Janice R. Walker, Todd W. Taylor

Edition: 2, illustrated

Published by Columbia University Press, 2006

Original from the University of Michigan

Digitized May 19, 2008

ISBN 0231132107, 9780231132107

288 pages

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Lecture 8

Manuals

Cite a manual as a book, with company as author if no person is listed.MassStore, Inc.

DiscPac 2000 Installation Guide.

2400 Briarcliff Road, Gary, Indiana 50304, July 1988.