其中包括gatech，MIT,INDANA~~~~~~~~~~
浏览地址：
http://www.cc.gatech.edu/student.services/phd/phd-advice/
下面是一个教授对计算机专业学生论文写作的建议：
On Ph.D. Thesis Proposals. By H. C. Lauer.
Newcastle upon Tyne: University of Newcastle upon Tyne, Computing
Laboratory, 1975.
UNIVERSITY OF NEWCASTLE UPON TYNE. Computing Laboratory
Technical Report Series No. 68.
Suggested classmarks (primary classmark underlined)
Library of Congress: Dewey (17th): 378.242 U.D.C.: 378.2
Suggested keywords: COMPUTER SCIENCE EDUCATION COMPUTER
SCIENCE RESEARCH PH.D. THESES
Abstract
The role of a thesis proposal for Ph.D. research in Computing Science
is discussed. In the form suggested, the proposal comes at about
the mid-point of a post graduate student's career and includes six
specific parts: the statement of the problem to be addressed in the
thesis, a survey of previous and related work, a summary of the candidate's
own ideas and preliminary work, a characterization of the solution
being sought, a plan of action to bring the research to a conclusion,
and an outline of the thesis.
About the Author
Dr. Lauer has been a Lecturer in Newcastle University Computing Laboratory
since January 1971, before which he was a Ph.D. candidate in Computer
Science at Carnegie-Mellon University, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
-----------------
A Ph.D. candidate in Computing Science at Newcastle typically comes
to us with some knowledge of programming, and a clear indication of
high ability. But his specific background in computing may range from
a broad appreciation of some of the fundamental problems of the science
to a total ignorance of others; and he perhaps may have some specialized
experience in some area of interest. We educate him to a level of
expertise worthy of the title "Doctor" by providing an environment
in which he can learn, teach and do research and by demanding of him
a thesis representing an original contribution to the science. The
actual character of this educational program is, necessarily, tailored
to the individual or to small groups of individuals with closely related
interests. In one model for such a program, the student spends the
first part of his candidacy-the whole candidacy normally taking about
three years, as in most British universities-working on small projects,
attending lectures and doing reading to broaden his knowledge and
to fill gaps in his background, and exploring the science for topics
which interest him. During this time, he develops close working relationships
with one or more members of staff who, in turn, agree to become his
supervisors. With their help, and the help of visitors, his own colleagues,
and others, the candidate eventually narrows his sights to a particular
area of the science as a potential source of research problems. He
hones his skills to the point at which he can do original work in
that area and finally defines a problem which he believes he can solve
and which is suitable for presentation as a thesis.
It is at this point in his career that he ought to be able to present
a thesis proposal. This article is concerned with the character and
content of such proposals, and it concentrates on this important period
of a research student life. Obviously, the necessity or desirability
of this kind of thesis proposal in different Ph.D. programs and/or
different sciences is a matter for debate; but that discussion is
beyond the scope of this paper. Instead, we concentrate on what we
expect of the proposal and on six vital points it should address.
What is a thesis proposal?
A thesis proposal should represent a considerable effort, perhaps
several months of very intensive, full-time work. It should lay the
ground work for the thesis research by providing convincing arguments
that the problem is worth solving and can be solved. It allows the
candidate to "stake out a claim" in a potentially crowded
area. It provides a good yardstick against which the candidate can
measure his own progress or lack of it, and it helps him to focus
his energy when he feels he is waffling. It provides extremely useful
evidence of achievement if he needs to seek additional financial support
when his grant expires. Finally, it helps him to combat the common
occupational affliction of Ph.D. students, namely depression.
The timing of a thesis proposal is important. For a three-year research
program, it should be presented during the second year. If it is
done much earlier, it is likely that the problem will not have been
well-enough defined or that the candidate will not have done enough
background work and/or made enough progress in the area to convince
himself and others that he can solve it. If the proposal comes much
later, then either there is too little time to do the work before
the money runs out or it is a spurious proposal produced after the
fact, when the thesis is nearly done.
The form of a thesis proposal is a matter of individual taste of the
candidate, his supervisors, and the university. It may be written
down in one document, presented orally in seminar, evolved by mutual
agreement, or done in some other fashion. It may include research
memoranda and/or published articles by the candidate (or co-authored
by him). Some parts of it may be eventually included directly in
the thesis. The different sections of the proposal may be done in
any order, depending upon how the thesis topic was developed. But
it is important that it be 'public' at least within the department,
so that everyone can know what the candidate is investigation and
why.
A thesis proposal in computing science should address at least the
following six points:
1. A statement of the problem and why it should be solved;
2. Reference to and comments upon relevant work by others
on the same or similar problems;
3. The candidate's ideas and insights for solving the problem
and any preliminary results he may have obtained;
4. A statement or characterization of what kind of solution
is being sought;
5. A plan of action for the remainder of the research and
6. A rough outline of the thesis itself.
If the candidate is unable to include and defend these six points
in his thesis proposal - or indeed, if he cannot defend them at the
corresponding stage in his career even if he does not prepare this
kind of thesis proposal - then he is not ready to commit himself to
the one or two years or blood, sweat and fears to turn it into an
acceptable thesis.
Naturally, neither his supervisor, nor the university, nor his examiners
are going to hold him to the details presented in the proposal. The
nature of research in this science is that it provides the biggest
surprises to those who are most strongly convinced of some fact or
idea. When a lot of people are working in a given area at a lot of
universities, anyone can be easily "scooped" or may feel it
necessary to revise his plan or problem in mid-stream He may find
that his original ideas do not work and he must modify his expected
solution. This is perfectly acceptable, and the plan of research
will have to be adapted to fit. Nevertheless, a candidate who is
unable to answer the six points is not ready to embark on the work,
let along follow it, control it, adapt it and force it to some kind
of conclusion.
Let us consider these points in turn.
Problem Statement and Background
The first obvious thing which a thesis proposal should contain is
a statement of the problem to be considered, in both specific and
general terms. The specific statement must deal with the very specific
issues in which the candidate is interested, for example, the optimization
of tables of LAIR parsers. The general statement should relate the
problem to the larger context of the science and show why it is worth
solving. The problem statement in the thesis proposal should be directed
to an audience of intelligent scientists who have no specific interest
in the problem but who are interested in knowing what the candidate
is doing. It should not be directed to the candidate's supervisors
and/or to people with similar research interests.
To prepare the proposal for their benefit is to make a very common
mistake. Such a proposal is filled with jargon which is private to
that local group. It fails to state important constraints and frequently
does not provide enough background. Sometimes the candidate assumes
that his supervisors know as much about the specific area of the thesis
as he does something which makes it difficult for the department
and the examiners to evaluate the research on its merits. The candidate
is then exposed to the very real danger that he and supervisors may
have been working very happily in their own microcosm, only to find
that at the end of three years he has no results which justify a Ph.D.
degree.
In order to present the problem to the wider audience, and in order
to justify proceeding with the work, it is necessary for the candidate
to present the background to the problem and to survey related work
by others. This is the second component of a thesis proposal; and
in some cases, it may be included directly in the thesis. It may
take any of several forms-for example, annotated bibliography or a
comprehensive summary, explanation, and analysis of existing results. It
may be necessary or desirable for the candidate to include his own
critical comments. For example, if the thesis is to present a new
technique for solving a class of numerical problems, then this section
of the proposal should review existing techniques and analyze their
inadequacies.
This summary/survey/overview is not without its traps. If most of
the references cited and most of the work mentioned are from within
the candidate's own department (or in one other department with whom
we are very "chummy") then there are serious grounds for
questioning his breadth of knowledge and background for pursuing his
problem. The danger is that people who limit their horizons to their
own local environments produce very inbred research, narrow attitudes,
and unacceptable theses. They tend to reinvent ideas already known
elsewhere; they fail to apply techniques which could simplify their
problems considerably; they often attach too much importance to minor
results and do not recognize major ones worth reporting; and they
write incomprehensible theses and papers which make no effective contribution
to knowledge. In inbred environments, the work of other organizations
is often dismissed as irrelevant or unimportant characteristic
of a disease called NIH (Not Invented Here). It is extremely important
for the thesis proposal to indicate that the candidate knows about
the complete work.
The Candidate's Ideas
It is hard enough to schedule 'invention' when one has some good ideas
for solving a problem. It is almost impossible when he does not. Thus
the Ph.D. student, who is working to a tight and very emotionally
constraining timetable, needs to have some insight, some ideas, some
preliminary results before he commits himself to discover more. These
should be described in the third section of the thesis proposal. If
he has none of significance, then his proposal is premature. For
he would have no indication that the problem can capture his attention
for as long as it takes to solve it an write the thesis. He would
have no assurance that he is heading in the right direction, that
he is capable of finding a solution.
By implication, then, the candidate must have done some successful
work in the area, perhaps in collaboration with others, before the
thesis proposal. This may be something like the discovery of an interesting
algorithm, representation, or relation while working on one of his
pre-thesis projects. He recognized this as a tip of the iceberg,
the introduction to a new problem area which eventually becomes his
thesis research. For example, a student simulating a well-know paging
algorithm stumbles across a phenomenon quite different from that which
was expected or generally accepted. This result and his subsequent
explanation for it form the basis of his thesis proposal and thesis
research in memory management. They form the seed of the methods
which he develops to specify and solve his problem. Without such results,
a plan to investigate the area would have seemed like hot air, and
his efforts would have lacked direction. But with them, the success
of his research is assured and the timely completion of his thesis
is much more likely.
A common situation occurs when a student proposes what seems to be
a good problem to investigate, involving brand new broad, general
models or theories. But when he is pressed, he has only some ideas
about a very small, special case or example. He might not even have
explored these ideas fully because he regards that example as uninteresting
in the context of the overall problem and those ideas as having no
apparent generalization. Some students will be able to discover the
necessary general ideas, develop them and defend them. But such theses
are few and far between, and their authors are typically awarded Nobel
prizes and other very high distinctions. Ordinary mortals with good
first class honours degrees have no such luck and often get stuck,
unable to find any other examples, applications or ideas which are
substantially different from the ones they know already.
At this point, it is time to go back and look at the problem statement
again. As often as not, that "uninteresting" example may
be the foundation for an interesting and valuable thesis problem in
its own right. If so, it is probably a better investment of the candidate's
energy to solve it, finish his thesis, and then devote his life's
work to the general problem in a more relaxed fashion.
The Shape of the Solution
The most important part of the thesis proposal is a statement of what
kind of solution to the problem is expected, i.e., a characterization
of the stopping condition of the project. This, more than anything
else, will help the candidate estimate the value of his efforts to
separate the chaff from the wheat, to allocate his time. Without
such a characterization, the candidate has no good way of knowing
when to stop and submit. He cannot measure how far towards his goal
of a Ph.D. degree he has progressed. He might even discover a satisfactory
solution to his problem and not perceive that he has. With a
characterization,
he will know where he stands during his research, and he will be able
to argue convincingly at the appropriate time that he has done what
he set out to do.
Occasionally, a research student will say, "I know precisely what
problem I want to solve. I have no idea of what the solution will
be, but I will certainly recognize it when I've got it. After all,
this is research. So how can I possibly give a characterization of
the solution beforehand?" That is, he thinks he is an exception,
but if he cannot characterize his expected solution, how can he recognize
it? More likely, he has not specified his problem sufficiently precisely,
or he has not yet done enough preliminary work and obtained some preliminary
results in the area of the problem. In either case, he must do more
legwork before presenting his thesis proposal. Sometimes it is easy
to characterize the solution, particularly in the light of preliminary
results. For example, a candidate developing a new analytical model
to describe message traffic among communicating machines would expect
to prove some theorems about the model, validate it empirically against
some existing systems, construct some algorithms based on it for calculating
the performance of similar systems with different parameters, and
argue by example that they are useful in the design and understanding
of future systems. At other times, it is much harder to be so specific
about a stopping condition. It may also be necessary to change it
as the research progresses. However, a moving target is better than
no target at all (providing that it is not moving so fast that the
candidate cannot catch it.)
Plan of Action and Outline of the Thesis
The first two points which a thesis proposal should address are almost,
but not quite, afterthoughts. After the candidate knows what he wants
to do, has some background to allow him to do it, has done a little
bit, and has some idea where it will take him, he had better draw
up a plan of action. This section of the thesis proposal is like a
road map and timetable of how he will travel during the remainder
of his research. If it is carefully and realistically prepared, it
will expose to him any hazard of trying to do more than he reasonably
can before he runs out of steam. Obviously this plan, like everything
else in the proposal, is subject to change as new results are obtained
and new ideas gained. But some plan is better than no plan.
Finally, it is always useful when doing research to keep in mind how
it is to be reported, what issues will be emphasized, and what will
be de-emphasized. Thus, the thesis proposal should contain a rough
outline of the thesis itself, preferably in terms of the expected
solution to the problem. This will have at least a small impact on
the shape of the research, and it will provide a set of good guidelines
when the candidate decides that it is time to "write it all up".
The Thesis Itself
It is almost impossible to define what a Ph.D. thesis in Computing
Sciences ought to be. Neither can we characterize the differences
between an acceptable one and an unacceptable one. No one can present
the candidate with a prescription for success when he embarks on his
studies. We cannot predict who among the entering research students
will succeed, who will lose interest and drift away, who will work
hard for three years at what they perceive to be genuine research
only to leave in great bitterness after discovering that they have
nothing to present in theses. There are no formulas which tell us
how to conduct research in this science, what steps to take, what
things to avoid. The same road can lead to progress and results for
one person and to disaster for another.
It follows that the thesis proposal as we have described it is not
a guarantee of anything and may not always be appropriate. But it
helps, particularly when the problem, the investigation and the expected
results are ill-defined. By considering his research in terms of
the guidelines we have presented, the candidate and his supervisors,
will go a long way toward developing the sensitivity and awareness
necessary to make the research lead to a successful thesis. It is
an effort not to be undertaken lightly.
Note and Acknowledgment
In this note, I have attempted to set down some personal ideas about
Ph.D. thesis proposals, what I think they ought to be, and what I
feel they ought to contain. These ideas have evolved from my own
experience in doing a thesis, from observation of colleagues during
my post-graduate days, from supervising Ph.D. students here at Newcastle,
from analyzing why some apparently brilliant students never finish,
and from dozens of conversations with my students, colleagues, teachers
and friends. I have come to expect and demand that my own research
students use the guidelines which I have outlined here when they define
their thesis topics and prepare their proposals. When other students
and colleagues seek my comments and advice about thesis topics and
projects, I ask the same questions and apply the same criteria. I
offer these thoughts to you for what they are worth, whether you
be student or teacher, in the hope that you, your supervisors,
and/or your students will derive at least some small benefit from
them.
I must acknowledge my deepest debt to Professors Brian Randell, William
Lynch and Bernard Galler, who have taught me enough to be able to
recognize a good thesis topic when I see one and to be able to head
off at least a few bad ones before the student gets too committed.
