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Thesis writing
MSc and BSc thesis guidelines
My Name
{ Master's thesis │Bachelor’s thesis}
School of Computing
{Computer Science│Statistics}
January 2014
UNIVERSITY OF EASTERN FINLAND, Faculty of Science and Forestry, {Joen-suu│Kuopio}School of Computing{Computer Science│Statistics}
Opiskelija, Onni Oskari: Title of Thesis{Bachelor’s│Master’s} Thesis, 19 p., 1 appendix (2 p.)Supervisors of the {Bachelor’s│Master’s} Thesis: PhD Liisa Liimatainen and MSc Matii MeikäinenJanuary 2012
Abstract: Abstract about 150-200 words with line spacing 1, written with fluent Eng-lish.
Keywords: about 5 keywords in English
CR Categories (ACM Computing Classification System, 1998 version):
i
ITÄ-SUOMEN YLIOPISTO, Luonnontieteiden ja metsätieteiden tiedekunta, {Joensuu│Kuopio}Tietojenkäsittelytieteen laitos{Tietojenkäsittelytiede│Tilastotiede}
Opiskelija, Onni Oskari: Tutkielman nimi{Kandidaatin tutkielma│Pro gradu –tutkielma}, 19 s., 1 liite (2 s.){Kandidaatintutkielman│Pro gradu –tutkielman} ohjaajat: FT Liisa Liimatainen ja Matti MeikäläinenTammikuu 2012
Tähän tulee noin 150-200 sanaa pitkä tiivistelmä, jonka tulee mahtua yhdelle sivulle. Tiivistelmän kirjoittamisohjeet löytyvät tutkielman laatimisohjeista.
Tiivistelmässä rivivälinä käytetään 1:stä.
Avainsanat: n. 5 kpl avainsanoja (ks. tutkielman laatimisohje)
ACM-luokat (ACM Computing Classification System, 1998 version): ks. tutkielman laatimisohje
ii
Foreword (17, bold)
This thesis was done at the School of Computing, University of Eastern Finland dur-ing the spring 2014.
I want to extend my gratitude to my parents, friends, teachers etc.
iii
List of abbreviations (17, bold)
ACM Association for Computing Machinery CD-ROM Compact Disc Read-Only Memory; medium for data storingUEF University of Eastern Finland
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Contents
1 Introduction 1
2 Collection of information 2
2.1 The aims of the thesis 22.2 Beginning writing 2
3 Structure of the document 4
3.1 The title of the thesis 4
4 Tips for the style of the thesis 6
4.1 SWAN 74.2 Emphasis 74.3 Tables 74.4 Figures 84.5 Lists 94.6 Quotations 94.7 Software Code 10
5 Language 11
5.1 References 11
6 Conclusions 12
References 13
Appendices
Appendix 1: Checklist (2 pages)
v
1 Introduction
For the Master’s thesis the amount of credit points is 30 ECTS that corresponds in
average 780 hours work and for the Bachelor’s thesis the numbers are 6 ETCS and
156 hours. The exact amount may vary according to the student's personal efforts and
topic of the thesis. Keep tight contact with the supervisor at all times during the
work. The supervisor provides necessary literature references to get the work started.
For additional searches of literature, the student must independently look for proper
scientific journals, books etc., and use electronic retrievals. When reading the arti-
cles, other references therein, and the later work of the author should be browsed.
The main goals in writing the thesis are to learn (1) basic practices of research work
in computer science, and (2) learning how to write in the language of science. The
latter includes not only the English grammar or appropriate use of literature refer-
ences, but learning to write scientific text in a reader-friendly way. Even if your re-
search results would be significant, but you fail to convince your readers (audience),
the impact of your findings might be lesser than in deserves. Thus, when writing a
scientific paper -- or in your case, master's thesis -- keep always the reader in your
mind. Specifically, do not write your thesis for the supervisor only, but for a general
computer science reader. Your thesis has to be understandable to your fellow stu-
dents, even if they are not familiar with your particular topic.
You can use LaTex to write your thesis, and use a template to have the basic format-
ting. Or you can use Ms Word to write the thesis, we have a template with the basic
formatting. You can find more information from the web-pages.
1
2 Collection of information
It is natural that the topic first seems obscure, and little information is found. After an
active search, even too much materials can be found. Then it is necessary to return to
the assignment in order to obtain a more precise definition of the task. Make notes of
the article contents, and your own ideas while browsing the literature. When enough
literature, notes on the articles and your own ideas is gathered - together with theo-
retic or practical research - it is time to draft the paper. Even one page is enough for
that. The reason is to find a basis for communication with the supervisor, and for the
final agreement and definition of the goals.
2.1 The aims of the thesis
The aims of the thesis work can vary greatly. The work may be e.g. a review on the
topic, purely based on literature. Then a logical and comprehensive presentation is
essential. At the other end of the range may be a description of original research.
When the final assignment is defined, the goals must be clarified.
Irrespective of the nature of the work, it must always contain a review on the back-
ground issues of the topic on the basis of relevant literature. This proving of scholar-
ship is essential even when the weight of the work is set on presentation of original
research. On the other hand, the grading is affected by the amount of original contri-
bution generated by the author. An important issue is also a critical evaluation of the
subject. Framework chapter will describe the general framework for the thesis.
2.2 Beginning writing
When the contents have found a form, the writing can begin. When the topic and ma-
terials are mastered well enough, the extent of each part of the work can be defined.
Now the final text may in some cases be produced in a short period of time.
When writing the thesis, you should bear in mind the points the referees will pay at-
tention to:
2
1) Mastering the literature. Does the author show adequate mastering of relevant
literature, and is the literature cited appropriately?
2) Mastering the topic. Does the author show command on the topic and can
he/she apply the information correctly? If the subject is not in command by
the author, the reader cannot comprehend it either.
3) Presentation. Is the text outline, formatting, and language trimmed? A bad
presentation steals the reader's attention from the subject, and makes it harder
to comprehend.
4) Originality. Does the work consist of the authors own contribution? Is the
presentation original and, perhaps, more clear than in the source materials? Is
there pertinent critics on the materials referenced? Are there illustrative ex-
amples compiled by the author? Does the work contain original observations
or scientific results?
3
3 Structure of the document
Writing is a creative process that is not easy in all circumstances. You can learn to
write acceptable scientific prose. In scientific writing, the structure and style of the
text affect readability and comprehensibility of the message. The structure of a scien-
tific paper depends on the subject at hand, and the rules for formatting are specified
by the forum of publication.
The structural elements of MSc thesis are in the order following:
cover page
abstract
table of contents
the actual text
list of references
possible appendixes
The abstract may be followed by a classification, e.g. applying the classes from the
journal "Computing Reviews", and by a list of key words.
3.1 The title of the thesis
When the title of the thesis is chosen, one must consider the way how scientific pa-
pers are read. Because of the multitude of journals available, the reader must choose.
The first criteria is the title; if the title is uninteresting the paper will not be consid-
ered, even though the contents would be interesting. The summary is a brief descrip-
tion of the paper's contribution. The Introduction puts the work in its context, and
what topics are dealt with. On the basis of these information, the reader decides
whether is worthwhile to continue.
The title should describe the paper contents in a concise and accurate manner. It
should, nevertheless, not be verbose.
The objectives, methods, and results are described in a short, compact abstract. The
abstract must also reveal, how the results were derived: are they new results gener-
4
ated by the author, or have they been collected from literature. The abstract must be
written for a reader somewhat familiar with the topic. The length of the abstract is
less than one page and it does not usually contain any references.
The first chapter of the actual text is an introduction with a short review to the back-
ground of the work: relevant literature, general objectives of the field, methods ap-
plied, and main results obtained. The reader is oriented in the context of the other
chapters. The reader of the introduction may have less comprehension on the subject
than the reader of the abstract. Basic concepts can sometimes be defined in the intro-
duction, but also later in the text. The introduction shall not become a mere verbose
table of contents. Even though the introduction gives a glance on the main results, it
must do so in a general way, not by revealing them in detail. The introduction must
underline the main issues of the work, and what the author considers original or new.
The last chapter of text may consist of a summary and conclusions. The need for
such chapter depends on the nature of the work. In no case it should replicate the in-
troduction. Contrary to the introduction, the summary must presume that the reader is
already familiar to work, and make sure the reader has picked the main contributions.
The conclusions should include critics on the work, show possible alternative ap-
proaches, and topics not dealt with here but worth assessing.
The text is to be divided in chapters, the chapters in sections, and possibly in subsec-
tions, all with numbered titles. A hierarchy too deep makes the outline overly com-
plex. The introduction usually needs no such hierarchy. In the beginning of each
chapter the reader is oriented in the contents by showing and explaining the division
into sections. Correspondingly, each section is preceded by a similar description.
Thus, there never appears sequential titles without any text in between.
5
4 Tips for the style of the thesis
Readability must be considered while writing. In no situation the author may pre-
sume that the reader knows something that is said only later. It is worthwhile to use
simple sentences, still trying to avoid monotony and repetition.
Before new issues are introduced, the reader must be prepared. Presentation of main
concepts and results must follow an opportunity to 'have a breath' and check if every-
thing was correctly understood. This may happen by inspecting some special situa-
tions, logical consequences, or showing simple examples. The reader may also be
aided by providing enough redundancy: the same issue might be approached from
different directions, i.e. by using both mathematical formalism and natural language.
Terminology must be used in a concise manner. A lexicon for IT terminology should
be used, but with caution, since terms may have multiple meanings. When a term has
been introduced, it must be used without any synonyms later in the text.
Selection of symbols must be consistent. A symbol shall not have multiple meanings,
or one concept not denoted by different symbols in different context without a spe-
cific reason. This applies even to selection of indexes. If i is used as an index in one
place, k should not be used in another without a reason. When multiple sources are
referenced, the notation must be unified.
Formulas should not list wise follow each other without words making the text read-
able. The words intended to make reading easier shall not be replaced by the respec-
tive mathematical symbols. The symbols and formulas must be understood as parts
of the sentence, taking this into account in language structures and punctuation. The-
oremas and separate definitions must be formatted as independent entities with no
references to other text.
Direct citations or translations from source literature may not be used in papers of
our discipline. Even when an issue is presented according to a source, the text refer-
enced must be adapted to one's own writing. The source must be clearly stated.
6
Use of list notation must be avoided.
If that must be applied, texts in a list must have a uniform structure.
If e.g. one list element is in imperative, also other elements must follow the
form.
If a list element is a complete sentence, it starts with a capital letter, and ends
with a dot, otherwise it starts lowercase and ends without a dot.
4.1 SWAN
To help practicing to write reader-friendly scientific text, School of Computing pro-
vides you a free, semi-automatic SWAN (Scientific Writing AssistaNt) tool that
gives feedback on your text. While this tool is mainly targeted for PhD students and
researchers, similar principles apply also to writing master's theses and, especially to-
wards the end of your writing process, you are encouraged to use SWAN to get feed-
back of your text. The developers of SWAN are also constantly interested in feed-
back to improve the tool itself.
4.2 Emphasis
The first occurrence of any (technical, theoretical) term is written with italics. Do not
use bold for the terms.
4.3 Tables
Tables have to fit inside the margins of the text. Table 1 is an example.
Table 1. The title of the table.
Attribute Value
Readable Yes
7
After the table we will tell what is presented in the table and what the reader should
learn from the table. Table 2 presents the version history of the document.
Table 2. Example – version history.
Date Changes
6.8.2011 Initialization of the document
The table 2 shows that the document has not been changed since is was initialized.
4.4 Figures
Figure 1 shows a thesis writer in action.
Figure 1. The thesis writer.
The same goes on with the figures. We will tell what is depicted in the figure. Figure
1 depicts the thesis worker in action. The thesis work does not differ from other skill
based work.
Figure 2. Shooting stars?
The goal setting for the thesis should be realistic (Figure 2).
8
4.5 Lists
Some parts of the text can be written as a list. In most of the cases the list is not the
best way of representing things. But if do, this is the way:
Choose Format – Bullets and Numbering
Choose Bulleted Style
And the same for numered:
1) Choose Format – Bullets and Numbering
2) Choose Numbered Style
The chapter should not end with a list. The space between the list items is 1,5.
4.6 Quotations
It is possible to use quotations in the thesis text. Usually the direct quotations should
be avoided. At least they should be minimized in the text. But if we will use them
this is the way to do it.
Short quotations (under three lines) are written in text body in quotes with reference
in the end; " … " (Meikäläinen, 2007). Long quotations, over two lines, are indented
from both left and right margin. They are also separated from the text body by para-
graph brake.
" Long quotations, over two lines, are indented from both left and right
margin. They are also separated from the text body by paragraph brake.
The quotations are copied from word to word from the original."
(Meikäläinen, 2007).
After quotation the text body continues normally.
9
4.7 Software Code
The thesis may contain code. If the code is included in the body text, it has to fit into
one page. If the code is longer than one page, it can be included as an appendix.
1: IF Code > 1 age THEN
2: Move to an appendix
3: ELSE
4: Include into the text body
5: ENDIF
The formatting of the code is different from the text body. The code is intented by
0,5 cm. The line spacing is 1,5 and the font is Courier. The code lines may be num-
bered.
10
5 Language
Use of personal pronoun may follow e.g. the rules specified below:
Use "I" when you refer to your own, independent results. Do not address the writing
process itself, however, if it has no importance to the end product.
Use "we" when the text implies both to the author and the reader. It is thus natural to
write: "In the following we examine ..."
Use of passive voice should be avoided. For example in a descrition of a system's op-
eration, use of passive voice leads to an ambiguous conception of when the text
refers to the system, when to the user of the system, and when to the author of the
text. Passive voice may replace "we", if a concise manner is maintained.
A fluent course of text must be paid attention to.
A sentence shall never begin with a numeral.
5.1 Referencing
A part of scientific presentation is the use of references. The references give credit to
the original presenter of an idea, but on the other hand shows where the reader may
find more information. A correct use of references can best be learned by reading sci-
entific articles, and by reasoning why a specific reference exists in the text, and in the
location where it is placed. The following paragraphs list some observations on the
usage of references, but by no means void the need of an inspection of literature
practices.
If the idea borrowed from literature is no longer that one sentence, the reference is
placed at the end of the idea (not necessarily the end of the sentence). If the idea is
longer, the reference should be placed before the idea - still not in the beginning of
the sentence. It should be placed in a natural position together with a statement that
such an idea is about to be presented. Especially when all information in a paragraph
has a single source, the correct place of the reference is not at the end of the para-
11
graph, but somewhere near the beginning. If the contents of more than one paragraph
refers to a same source, the reference is not to be repeated in every paragraph, but the
entity should start with only one reference, and an explanation of which part of the
text comes from the source.
When the references are identified by the name and year of publication, the reference
can be written by two ways. If the name is included in text, only the year is enclosen
in parenthesis, e.g. "Aho (1985b) has developed the following...". In other cases, the
name(s) are also enclosed in parenthesis, e.g. "We can now calculate the result using
the algorithm (Aho, 1985b)...". If there is two authors, both names are often men-
tioned, but if there is more than two, only the first author is mentioned in the refer-
ence, followed by text et al., for example (Denning et al., 1989). Consult the APA
manual and with your supervisor for more details on referencing.
12
6 Conclusions
Think about the objective of your presentation.
1. Get familiar with the subject by making notes.
2. Plan the outline of the paper.
3. Write using simple, precise prose, following the plan.
4. When you leave your work for examination, make sure it is in the final form
throughout.
In all phases of the work you may ask advise from your supervisor. Keep the super-
visor informed on the course of the work.
Once the thesis has been accepted
After the thesis has been accepted and graded, the student must take a maturity ex-
amination. This is an essay of about three hand-written pages in English on one of
three subjects given. The subjects are from the topic area of your thesis, and there are
two aims for the maturity exam: Firstly, to ensure that you have produced and written
the materials of your thesis by yourself, and secondly, that you are able to express
yourself fluently by writing on the substance area of your thesis. The factual side of
the text will be examined by the supervisor of the thesis, and the language and matu-
rity of expression is checked by an English teacher.
13
References
Hirsijärvi, S., Remes, R., Sajavaara, P. (2003): Tutki ja kirjoita. Kustannusosakeyhtiö
Tammi Oy, Vantaa.
Koponen, T., Hotti, V. (2004): Evaluation Framework for Open Source Software.
Proceedings of The 2004 International MultiConference in Computer Science and
Computer Engineering, Las Vegas, 91-97.
Liang, Y. D. (2013): Introduction to Java programming: brief version. Pearson, Bos-
ton.
Lotus (1996) Symphony Reference Manual. Lotus Development Corporation, USA.
UEF (2012) Study forms. University of Eastern Finland, Faculty of Science and
Forestry, http://www.uef.fi/lumet/lomakkeet (3.1.2014).
14
Appendix 1: Checklist
The text is formatted with line space 1.5. Each chapter (but not section) starts
a new page. Use clearly different typing in titles, e.g.:
2. CHAPTER TITLE
2.1. Section title
2.1.1. Subsection title
A suitable margin width is 3 cm (left) and 2 cm (right), due to binding.
If the paragraphs are separated with blank lines, the text starts at left margin,
otherwise a new paragraph starts with an indent (about three spaces wide).
Extra space should be left around titles, lists, and separate line formulas. In
the same way, theorems and independent definitions are separated by space.
New terms are emphasized by italics. If the term is not especially defined, its
first occurrence is emphasized.
Mathematical formulas are written on separate lines if they are too long to be
written inline, or if they need reference numbers. The reference numbers in
parenthesis are right justified. The formulas must be placed neatly on the
page, centered or at constant indent from the left margin.
Figures and tables are numbered and must have captions that specify their
content. Figures, tables, formulas, definitions and theorems are numbered in-
dependently within their class. In short texts a sequential numbering will do,
in larger presentations the numbers may be preceded by the number of the
chapter. When the numbers are referenced in text, the number is not followed
by a dot (Fig. 2), even when a dot were used in the caption, like:
Fig. 2. A schematic presentation ...
Table of contents occupies its own page after the Abstract. Use indent to il-
lustrate the hierarchy of chapters, sections and subsections. List of references
and appendixes are also mentioned in the Table of contents.
The page numbers of the Abstract and Table of contents are either not num-
bered, or numbered using small Roman numerals (i, ii, ...). Page number of
Introduction is 1. Page numbering continues over the List of references.
Multi-page appendixes are numbered as follows: Appendix 1(1).