Am I understanding you correctly that your grades dropped form a 100 to a 99.6?  I mean a 99.6 is still excellent work unless perfection is your standard. Regarding the extra curricular activities, pick two or three at the most, trying to do too much never works in the long run. I routinely review scholarship applications at the college where I am employed. When I see a long laundry list of activities I often question how much the student really contributed. Many students today seem to be more concerned with resume building through a variety of activities rather than developing, in greater depth a smaller number of activities. Grades still matter but don't try to be perfect, just excellent.


When is a good time (during graduate studies) to start thinking about writing the thesis?

I think it is a good idea to start writing down parts of your thesis early on. You need to consider possible structures for the thesis as well so that you know what you might need to write.

Starting early will, however, not remove the need for significant efforts at the end because the thesis evolves and it is only when you have your last papers/experiments/equivalent done when you really know how the text will have to look. This means you should write down text early on with the clear understanding that this text will likely undergo lots of revisions. While this may seem like a waste of time, I have found it useful to have the thoughts down on paper, it also provides a sense of fulfillment, "that you are on your way". In some cases I have had to scrap the texts altogether and start over but I see this as part of the iterative process of scientific work.

By going through the iterations your text will improve and the last efforts will be ever closer to a final product than were you to start from scratch at the end. I went through this myself and I have seen countless students do the same. Being prepared and realising that much awaits ahead is just a realisation that must be clear. Going blindly into the final stages without having a grasp of what is needed is what causes extra and unnecessary stress.


Options:

Ignore the newly found paper for now. The result would be the same as if you learned of the paper just after the conference rather than before. Downside: People might get a chuckle over your lack of knowledge of prior art. Someone might point out the prior work at the conference if you don't mention it there. Some might think you plagiarized. However: You did the work in good faith and submitted in good faith.
Inform the conference chair of the issue and ask for advice. Tell them you can add a note about the recently found paper OR you can do a rewrite incorporating the old work and emphasizing your own contributions. This assumes there is time and process for rewrites. Downside: The chair may withdraw the paper or just let it go, again assuming good faith. However: You clearly show due diligence.
Withdraw the paper and rewrite it for the future. Downside: You don't get a publication just now. However: Time can also let you rethink and possibly extend.

The sticky wicket here is that it was the most important theorem that was previously proven, leaving you, perhaps, with less novelty.


Referee suggests to split the paper into two. How is it done?

Should I submit the two sub-papers into the "resubmit" form? (but what if the other referee does not agree to the split?)

No

  Does the other paper have to go again through the entire review process, including finding new reviewers?

Yes

  How much additional work does this split entail for the editorial board, the reviewer and the authors (in addition to the obvious work of writing a new paper)?

As much as any two submitted papers.

Keep in mind: you don't have to follow a reviewers suggestions. Splitting a paper may sound reasonable, but writing the second paper can be a lot more work than you may think - you cannot just copy the first paper's introduction and add different results. Especially when the editor doesn't ask you to do so (or asks you to remove part of your results). Also, the "smaller half" resulting from such a split may not be enough to get published on its own.

The way to go would be to remove part of the results (those that would make up paper#2), as well as the other bits that are focussed on results#2 only (introduction, methods, discussion, references, ...). That revised/shortened paper would be what you submit as revision (paper#1). You can start writing paper#2 (make sure not to copy from paper#1) and submit as a new manuscript.

You could submit paper#2 to the same journal/editor, explain where it came from, and ask to send it to the same reviewers - but there is no guarantee (a) the editor will like what you did and think it's sufficient for a paper in the journal, (b) the editor will send it to the same reviewers, and (c) the reviewers will accept to review it.


What if you love your field but can't take the heat of academia?

I think the heart of this question comes to what this hypothetical person actually wants when it comes to "doing research."  This could mean a lot of different things, but when I hear people speak vaguely in this manner, the notions often roughly categorize into three clusters:

Exploring ideas relating to a field of knowledge: To explore ideas and communicate about them a person can readily participate as an amateur, working at whatever level of intensity and engagement makes most sense.  There's nothing wrong with engaging on this level, and it can actually be quite important, especially when it comes to communication of scientific ideas (e.g., many science journalists can be considered to engage with research in this way).
Doing work that supports the advancement of knowledge: One can do work that supports research without actually signing up for the full primary investigator load.  Lab technicians, amateur astronomers, and industrial researchers are all people who "get things done" that directly contribute to research and the advancement of knowledge, yet rarely or never need face the challenges associated with publication and funding.  The bigger the research project, the more space there is for people of this sort: most of the people working on the Large Hadron Collider, for example, probably fall into this category.  Depending on the particulars, contributions might require no formal education at all anywhere up to a doctorate and postdoc specialization.
Organizing and leading investigations that advance knowledge: Leading research as a primary investigator is where the serious "heat" comes in, and where a doctorate is definitely required. Here one needs to have not only the technical training but also to be able to deal with strong criticism of one's ideas and to be well organized and capable of communicating scientifically.  Note, however, that "dealing with criticism" should not mean putting up with verbal abuse and ad hominem attacks.

Now, relating this to your hypothetical person.  The two key warning flags that I see in your statement are "crumbles easily under stress and is psychologically vulnerable" and "difficulty making time for everything."

If "difficulty making time" means the person cannot really commit to things, then only amateur work is likely to be a good path.
If "crumbles easily" means "cannot handle people challenging ideas", then leading investigations is definitely out, and any sort of doctoral program is likely problematic.  On the other hand, if it means "is easily hurt by verbal abuse" then graduate school is entirely possible---it would just be important to find a good advisor match and some sort of supportive personal network.


Another student has been assigned the same MSc thesis as mine (and already defended)

The answer is very simple: ask your current supervisor and be completely transparent with them about the situation. Whatever is acceptable to them is the right answer. Standards for masters theses are much more flexible and inconsistent than for doctoral theses, so, for all practical intents and purposes, whatever your supervisor approves is acceptable. (But this assumes that you are absolutely transparent and do not withhold any information about the situation from them.)

But be sure to email a recapitulation of their response to them and let them reply, confirming that you have understood their resolution correctly. That way, you have an official written record with dates so that there is no forgetfulness or confusion in the future. (In fact, that's a general tip for any important verbal conversation throughout your professional life.)


How to respond, safely, to a student's 'risky' email?

If you want to be completely safe, I would answer something along the lines of: "This is outside my area of expertise. I recommend that you consult the career center on campus (insert contact information to career center)".

If, however, you want to actually give them advice, I would give it in a very neutral manner, where you could substitute every mention of "adult videos" by "video of student kicking a puppy" (or other potentially career damaging Google result). If you keep it on that very professional, neutral level, it shouldn't get you in trouble (note: I'm not a lawyer). Write your response, and then try the "puppy kicking test". If the email still makes sense, you're probably (again, I'm not a lawyer) safe.


How likely is it for a student to be expelled from university for online posts they wrote as a minor?

I'd say it's unlikely for a student to be expelled from university for on-line posts they made years prior. It may impact the student's reputation and may sway acceptance decisions in case of multiple potential candidates for a course or curriculum with limited capacity for students, but being expelled for such a thing would actually not reflect well on the university in question and may actually have repercussions for the institution.

Of course, it strongly depends on many factors; the nature of the posts, the association with certain groups or not, individual student acceptance rules and conduct rules of the university and what is considered "enough time passed" to reduce the weight of those posts.


What percentage of UK academic faculty are in UCU?

I don't know what the numbers are for academic faculty specifically is, but the numbers for education in general is 47% (https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/trade-union-statistics-2018), and that is in line with membership within my department (STEM, Russel Group). UCU has a membership of 120,000.

As well as collective bargaining on pay, conditions and pensions, perhaps the most important work of the Union is local. On a collective level the union will represent its members in situation where your employer might be going through a "restructuring" involving a reduction in headcount or a change in contractual terms and conditions for example. This has happened to me twice in my career, once when my employer laid of 30% of staff in my area, a second time when I was transferred from being employed by UKRI to being employed directly by the university.

But perhaps the most important thing is casework. Your membership would entitle you to representation in any HR dealing with your employer. In the case of the worst this can include provision of a lawyer or solicitor paid for by the union. This might be important if you are subject to discrimination at work, or accused of discrimination, or placed on performance review or have been otherwise mistreaded. In the five years I've been faculty, I've seen colleagues require union help with probation, and one (a professor) require union help when they were placed on performance review. I also knew someone who had to involve the union when their head of department took a dislike to them and did everything they could to get rid of them.

One way to think of union membership is like health insurance, but for employment/legal matters.


Journal paper plagiarism, use of same words

If the conclusions are written in exactly the same manner in both papers, and the conclusions themselves are sufficiently long that there is no way the repetition could be "innocent" (for instance, "X increases with temperature when Y is present" can only be said so many ways!), then plagiarism has occurred.

In such a case, you should report the situation to the journal in which the later paper appeared and indicate that you believe plagiarism has occurred.


Order of authors when publishing bachelor's thesis (CompSci)

Actually, the concept of "first author" is a bit foreign to CS in most places. Authors are listed alphabetically and only contributors are listed as authors. You say the supervisor contributed to the paper and if so should be an author.

I think you are correct to refuse if it is your thesis that is being published, and I think the university will back you on it. I hope so, anyway. But for a paper "related" to the work, it is a different issue.

But, you have a political problem. One way to handle it is not to publish a shortened version of the thesis jointly, but an extension. Publish the thesis under your own name, but acknowledge your advisor. Then get to work on an extension.

The concept of "first author" is common in other fields, of course, but not really in CS or in math.


Is it possible to recover after a career setback such as this?

The situation you describe is unfortunately common. It is an unfortunate reality that the number of people well qualified for research jobs is greater than the number of jobs.

A few notes:

Hiring committees will be looking for good publications, and for recommendation letters coming from leaders in the field attesting to your husband's impact and further potential. If he continues to do good research, publish it in well-known venues, and speak about it at conferences, then he has a good chance. If not, then unfortunately he is competing with people who are.
Most of the complaints you mention are common at research jobs as well. I teach at a large state university, where we have our share of poorly prepared students, and/or students who are just going through the motions. Indeed a Harvard professor once quipped to me that "we have remedial classes here, too".
I do know people who have successfully moved from one teaching position to a different teaching position, and been much happier afterwards. Some departments have more motivated students, pay better, and/or do a better job of keeping the paperwork down, and your husband could look for one of these.
I know people who have taken a variety of non-academic mathematical jobs, and for the most part they are quite happy with them!

The bottom line is that your husband can probably get a research job if he can sustain a very strong research program during the interim. Otherwise, there are likely to be appealing alternatives as well.

Good luck!


what are good ways to find team-mates on research and writing papers?

Attend conferences on that topic and network, read papers on the topic and contact the authors with questions, suggestions etc.


First it depends on the type of tenure-track job you're seeking.  For some jobs (e.g. liberal arts college or regional university focused more on teaching than research) your teaching will be considered more seriously than your research.  You should also know that for many of these jobs, having a postdoc at a research university is "one strike" against you: they will still consider you, but they really want to see and believe that you are interested in their institution because of a true interest in teaching, not just as a backup if a research job falls through.

Second, teaching just one course as a graduate student is a bit behind the curve for math students at American universities.  With this kind of background you would have to do something rather heroic to be seriously considered by teaching-oriented programs -- not necessarily teaching more courses, but perhaps exploring a combination of teaching and outreach or taking on more leadership responsibilities within the teaching life of the department.

If you are looking for a research-oriented job then my feeling is if you have good rather than bad teaching evaluations, that will serve you reasonably well.  The academic job market is certainly very competitive, but for a research job your time and energy is probably better spent concentrating on your...research.

I don't think a higher teaching load needs to be prepared for.  But it's a good idea to get experience teaching calculus of various sorts, since most math faculty I know teach a lot of that.

As a postdoc at a research university with a 1-1 teaching load, I would encourage you to take some teaching assignments that are routine in the sense that you will not spend too much time engaging with or preparing the material (again, calculus is good for that).  For your own interest as much as your future career, it might be pleasant to alternate those with some more interesting teaching assignments.  If you can teach one graduate course while you're there, that will probably be a fun, rewarding experience, and it will strengthen your connection with the graduate students there (many of whom will end up being your future colleagues). Teaching an advanced undergraduate class is also a good data point for understanding what undergraduate math majors are really like.

In summary, there are no clear answers here, and for a future research job your choices will probably be informed more by your own predilections and a desire to broaden your perspective rather than to specifically increase your chances of being hired at a research university.


What exactly is an embargo for a journal?

So far as I know, your understanding of the typical use of "embargo" for journals is correct: it is when a journal wants to be the "first to press" with its article, and so places a gag order on the authors and their institutions so that they don't go talking to the press first.

There is another place where journals also often want to be "first to press," however, and I suspect that this is what "embargo" refers to in this case. It is often the case that a journal makes its content available through multiple routes: immediately through the publisher for a premium, and with time-lag through larger accumulations, such as PubMed or ScienceDirect.

Thus, I think that what is probably going on here is that your institution does not judge this journal important enough to subscribe to directly, but gets it as part of a time-lagged "package deal."  You should check with your librarian how long the time-lag is, and then decide whether it's worth waiting or if you want to ask a colleague to help you get around the paywall...


why is the impact factor of mathematical journals "often" lower than the impact factor of journals in other disciplines

There are a lot of different factors, and I know of no reliable way to determine which is the best explanation.  For example, one theory is that mathematics simply has less impact (in the non-technical sense) than most scientific fields.  I don't believe this, but it's hard to give a principled refutation.  The whole subject strikes me as a little silly, with lots of opinions and numbers with no clear meaning.

One important factor is clearly that mathematicians write fewer, often longer papers than most scientists.  Another is the two-year cycle mentioned by walkmanyi (citations after two years do not count for impact factor, which is incompatible with both the time lag in mathematics publication and the time required to carry out research in mathematics in the first place).

Another factor is the size of the field.  The highest impact factors should occur in an enormous field with some incredibly important research and also a ton of less important papers that cite the great ones.  Mathematics is just not that large a field (compared with biology or medicine, certainly), and it furthermore fragments into a lot of subfields it's difficult to move between.  When someone makes an amazing discovery in algebraic geometry, you aren't going to get a flood of mathematicians from other areas rushing in to take the next steps, because algebraic geometry requires a lot of background.  I don't think that's a bad thing for mathematics as a whole (the things the would-be algebraic geometers are doing instead are probably as valuable as following the latest trends would be), but it cuts down on the opportunities for amassing citations quickly.

Ultimately, I doubt there's any conclusive or satisfying way to determine how much of a role each of these factors plays.

For some published commentary on impact factors in mathematics, see Nefarious Numbers by Arnold and Fowler and Impact Factor and How it Relates to Quality of Journals by Milman.  The first paper focuses on the flaws of impact factors and their abuse/manipulation, while the second explains how impact factor calculations relate to mathematical publication practices (and some of the incentives for journal editors).  Neither directly answers the question here, but they both shed some light on it.


Double blind peer review: authorship can be inferred from the manuscript

You know the luggage locks people buy for their suitcases when travelling? They look good, they're reassuring to have, they supposedly deter people from stealing the suitcase because they can't open it. But it shouldn't be surprising that they are ineffective: after all, to open the suitcase in spite of the lock, all one needs to do is cut up the suitcase with a knife. Sure, that ruins the suitcase, but the thief probably only cares about what is inside the suitcase.
Double blind peer review is similar. It looks good, it's reassuring, it supposedly remove bias from the peer review process. But the fact is that if the reviewer really wants to, they can probably deduce your identity regardless of how you diligently you anonymize the paper, especially with the aid of search engines like Google. The journal probably knows this too, in fact I'd bet that one of the reasons double-blind peer review hasn't become the industry standard is because people question the benefits for the amount of work one has to invest.
So I would not worry about it: anonymize the obvious things, remove explicit self-references (such as saying "[neutroshock did this]" as opposed to "we did this"), and submit it.


Are replies from editors automatically generated?

In the case of editor's mails, some will need some form of response, some will not. If you receive mails from an editor requesting information concerning a manuscript you have submitted, you will obviously have to reply.

Since most journals use electronic manuscript handling systems, many mails will be generated automatically as reminders or to tell you something about the status of your manuscript. Unless there is a specific question for you to respond to, you do not have to respond. Editors handle lots of manuscripts and and the automated systems generate lots of mail for each as information to authors, reviewers and the editor. Responding to mails that do not request information is not wrong but completely unnecessary and the editor will likely glance at it and go on. Obviously the situation would get out of hand if everyone responded to all mails in such a system so just focus on those that request a response, that is all that is expected.

As for conferences, I would expect a similar scenario. Many mails will be information and only those that request information need to be answered.

The bottom line is, you need to make sure you answer the mails where you are requested to do so but the rest can safely be left as the information they were intended to convey.


Is there a way to improve the readability of equations in research papers?

I do not believe that the problem is fundamentally about space, but rather is a cultural problem that stems from three things:

Reviewers do not demand clarity in their mathematics
There is often a perception that "fancy" or "difficult" math means more important science (related to #1)
Really clear presentation of mathematics is difficult and takes a lot of work
("I would have written a shorter letter, but I did not have the time.")

Ultimately, a community tends to get what it rewards.  There is no reason that math must be impenetrable.  Even if one is faced with a space problem, you can play the same sort of games that you do with figures and data in order to fit.  Right now, however, it is typically understood and accepted that you don't have to do that with your mathematics.  In fact, some scientific communities will punish a researcher for presenting mathematics more clearly, because it makes the work look "less significant."

Technology cannot help solve this, because ultimately it is a problem of human communication.  Anyone who is bothered by mathematical impenetrability can, however, take their own small steps towards changing this culture:

In your own work:

Include tables and clear explanations in your papers.
Use as few symbols as possible, and choose the symbols to improve clarity, e.g., matching the symbol to the first letter of its description.
Buffer your equations with explanatory prose that restates their content in plain English.

When considering other people's work:

Call out mathematical impenetrability as a reviewer
Ask for tables, clear prose, etc. in the papers that you review
View the mathematical impenetrability of a work as a flaw rather than a good thing.

This is a very difficult problem, and unlikely to change any time soon, but it can be made better one paper at a time.  Moreover, it is my belief (and experience), that clearer mathematics can make for a higher impact and better cited paper, so it will likely be valuable to you in the short term as well, unless you are in a community that has a toxic relationship to mathematical impenetrability.


What should I do now when this conference first sends me an "accept", then a "reject"?

Should I put any endeavor in contacting the PC Chairs and ask them to explain this strange stand? Should I explain my stand that the work has been drastically changed and improved from what it was when submitted?

I think an email to the PC would be appropriate.  Don't expect the answer to change, however, and it may very well have been an administrative oversight.  Even as a mistake, it is a relatively minor one that you don't have much control over.

  Does such a behavior make them accountable for any legal action from my side? And, is it worth for me to take such an action?

No. Their decisions aren't bound by any laws (that I know of) that could force them to honor their original email.  If you make a big deal of it, you're likely to make a bad name for yourself, regardless of the mistake being on their end.

In the end, you've now got a better paper that probably shouldn't have been published anyway.  Your changes are now in place, and you admit to having improved it.  Submit it to another conference, and move on.


Walk up and talk to random people at academic conferences - is that appropriate?

Absolutely. It helps, though, to be a little context sensitive.

If you've just come from an amazing presentation and want to talk about it to someone else, then "did you just hear that great talk by/about X?" is a good way to start the conversation, better than just "Hello" or "Great conference, eh?"

If you know who the person is (they're speaking, you recognize them, etc), then greeting them ("Hi Kate," or "good morning, Dr. Gregory," according to your industry norms) and introducing yourself with context ("I'm Susan, I really enjoyed your book") is a fine first sentence but please, have a second sentence ready. After the person says "thankyou, that's very kind," what will happen next? A question is good here - perhaps there's something you've always wanted to ask - or you could go back to your opener for a complete stranger, "did you just hear that great talk by/about X?"

Never open with something negative - "were you in that stinker of a session? Wasn't it the most boring thing ever?" - is right up there with the friend of mine who asked someone at a wedding "who is that obnoxious fat woman in the flowered dress and why is she even here?" only to be told "that's my mother."

My biggest problem with conference conversations is when someone wants to have a conversation with me but doesn't actually have anything to say. That puts all the conversational effort on me and it's hard work. Should you find yourself in this situation, have a selection of questions you can ask:

is this your first time at [this conference]? (don't ask an industry luminary, or a speaker, this question)
are you enjoying the conference so far?
what is your favourite talk so far? (not good the morning of Day 1)
is there a particular session you're really looking forward to?

It's a little trickier to ask questions outside the scope of the conference, like "where are you from" or "where do you work?" because they often contain assumptions - you might assume someone is a student who has graduated, or is a prof when they aren't yet, or is in a lab when they are not, and it's possible to offend someone. So don't lead off with these. Often, stating your own circumstances is a way to prompt the other person to respond in kind: "I flew here from just outside Toronto. You?" or "I'm doing/finishing a Ph.D/postdoc/intership at ABC. You?" though again be careful if the person thinks you should know this thing about them, or if it's on their badge. You usually want to get a paragraph or two into conversation before discussing "real life" rather than the conference.

Well chosen questions not only move the conversation along, they can meet your other goals. Maybe you'll decide to attend a session you hadn't planned to. Maybe you'll learn about a great book or other resource related to something you enjoyed. Maybe you'll be invited to something, or exchange business cards, or al those other benefits of networking at conferences. None of those things can happen if you just say "hi" and leave it at that, the other person says "hi" and then the two of you stand there awkwardly, wondering why you're not having a conversation.

I read and enjoyed a book called How to Work a Room that emphasizes knowing what you want from encounters like this. Are you trying to find a job? Hire someone? Learn more about something? Tell people what you've discovered? For every want you bring to that conference, someone else brings the matching one and if you two find each other you will both be happy - but only if you tell them what you're looking for and what you have to offer. This is a skill you can learn, and marching up to strangers and saying "hi" is only the first step.


Which is the correct term, supervisor or coordinator?

I have seen the term "Line Manager" used in the context of post-doctoral researchers here in the UK.

I have also seen reference made in CVs to the principal investigator for the research project to which the author contributed, e.g. "I worked with Prof. X, Principal Investigator for Project Y". The term "Scientific Co-ordinator" seems to be most closely related to this.  Perhaps, therefore, the term "scientific co-ordinator" suits your purposes best.


I am a PhD student seeking to collarborate with PhD student/professors from other department. How can I make this happen?

Yes, go for it.  It sounds like a great idea.
Regarding your formal status with the other labs you collaborate with, as a grad student you could be considered more appropriately as an "intern" for them, which is not in the usual sense of the word, in terms of responsibilities, but I've seen the term used a lot in academia for researchers collaborating at other labs.


Why do many talented scientists write horrible software?

I'll have a go at this. This is mainly my personal view based on my use and implementation of academic software. Like many of the comments already mentioned, I don't think bad software is specific to or even more frequent in  academia. That said, I think there are a few reasons why it occurs that are specific to the field.

Software is not a priority

In academics, the key performance indicators are all about paper publications. Software, while highly useful in my opinion, has very little value. More often than not, software implementations are side tracks or proof-of-concepts at best used to bump up the citation count (ofcourse exceptions exist).

As a software engineer, I am sure you are aware of the knowledge, time and effort required to produce quality software. Given the publish or perish mantra in academia, this time investment is often spent writing a new publication. It's a risk-reward consideration.

My personal point of view is that quality software is very important. For example, often, the first step in comparing a new algorithm with previous state-of-the-art is reimplementing the state-of-the-art due to a lack of implementation. Obviously this introduces a time delay and can cause a series of bugs. That said, I think in general little will change until software gets valued by performance indicators somehow.

Researchers are not programmers

Most researchers have little or no programming experience, though YMMV depending on the field. I think it's fair to say the majority of researchers learned to program by themselves when confronted with problems where they need it. Superficially learning a language is typically not the problem, but you need more than superficial knowledge to produce quality software (choosing data structures, design patterns, deep knowledge of the language, ...). This is a hurdle for self-taught programmers without a computer science background.

Another problem that less experienced programmers face is not realizing when refactoring is necessary. You can find countless pieces of poorly structured software. In research, this is a natural consequence of iteratively implementing while designing an algorithm which evolves into a monstrous piece of software full of hacks. That monster might still do what it was meant to, though, if you know exactly how to ask it nicely. For many researchers that's where the story ends: get the results and put the beast away forever. It often takes a serious time investment to wash the monster prior to talking it out for a walk in public. This is not always worth it.

Trends in machine learning

My field is machine learning, in which software is being valued increasingly. Examples of this trend include a growing software repository and a position paper by some big names in the field. I am very happy with this evolution, because quality software allows the field as a whole to progress faster and increases reproducibility.

A current patch to the problem is being able to publish papers about peer-reviewed software implementations. I know this is possible in machine learning and statistics. Such software is usually of higher quality.


Can a publisher publish a manuscript without the authors permission?

Of course I'm not a lawyer, but I'd distinguish between two thresholds:

Before the paper can be published, you need to grant legal permission via a license or copyright transfer.  If you haven't done that yet, then the publisher can't force you to let them publish the paper.  That gives a narrow window in which you could still block publication after the paper is accepted (but whether you could ethically do so depends on your reason for objecting).
Once the published version has appeared (even just on the publisher's website), there's nothing you can do without a powerful reason.  At that point, you would be retracting a published paper, which is a far more serious act.

In between these thresholds, I don't know what would happen.  I'd guess that if you asked the publisher not to publish a paper you had already signed a copyright transfer for, then they would probably agree.  After all, publishing a paper against the author's wishes could look bad, even if they were legally entitled to do so.  However, if you didn't have a very good reason (such as a major error in the paper), then the publisher would be rather unhappy.  I wouldn't be surprised if they asked you to cover any copyediting or typesetting costs, and this sort of unprofessional behavior would be terrible for your reputation.

  Further, who has the final say on copy edits and type setting?

In principle this depends on the publishing agreement.  In practice, the ones I've seen usually give the publisher final say, but the publisher usually defers to the author about anything intellectually substantive during the proofreading stage.  (On the other hand, the author gets more or less no input into matters of style such as font choice, British vs. American spelling, etc.)


Background review in a multidisciplinary paper

Write the introduction to the paper last. Start with the content: the data, the proofs, the discussion of pseudocode, whatever it is. Then think about your target audience. Who read the kinds of journals you are hoping to publish in? Who attends the kinds of conferences you are hoping to present in? Then add whatever perambulatory context those people need to understand the paper. Hoping to accommodate everyone who might be interested is hopeless.

Let's say you want to make your paper accessible to general knowledge physicists. You can assume that they all have a good understanding of undergraduate physics. You probably can't assume that they've kept up with all the coursework they did as PhD students, but the kinds of things covered in the first year or so of classes should be pretty common across disciplines. You're reminding people of the content from those courses, not teaching them. But anything that's at an advance graduate level or research level probably isn't something someone is going to know, unless that's their field.

If this is being published in a journal on GR, you can give less but deeper GR context because readers of GR journals know more about that. Spend more time and less depth presenting the thermo or QM topics.


What's the difference between Advisor and Mentor?

In the context of your question the answer of Bryan Krause is almost certainly correct - no real difference.

But in a wider context, the idea of a mentor is a bit broader than that of an advisor. An advisor will usually have some official relationship as an intermediary between a student and the university with official responsibilities. A mentor, on the other hand, can be quite informal.

In my doctoral studies I was lucky to have both. My advisor advised me on the specific doctoral work and the field. But I had a separate mentor in a quite different mathematical field in which I was much less adept. But he was and remains my role model for what a faculty member should be and he gave me good advice and aided by development at one critical point.

With that in mind, you normally have one advisor (exceptions exist), but you can have several mentors.


Can a Mathematics Undergrad do a Ph.D. in Bioinformatics?

Sure. There are many people who transitioned to Bioinformatics from a math background. As one example, there is a lot of machine learning being applied to various aspects of biology, and that could be a good fit for you.
But I would just caution that when choosing a Ph.D. topic, you should really think about what you want to do in the future, rather than what you've done in high school, or even taken a couple classes on in college. In a Ph.D. you'll anyway have to learn a lot about some very narrow topics and also (possibly) take some broad classes, so the fact that you know a bit extra about some biological concepts is not that important; a student without that background could probably catch up by reading a couple of books or taking a Coursera class, and both of you will be way behind an actual Biochemistry major (but still OK in the end). Pick your topic and advisor based on what sort of problems you want to solve for the next five years, and where you really see yourself ten years from now.


Is it okay to add mention of a grant in the acknowledgements at the proof-stage when the grant started after the paper was submitted for publication?

I think you need to look deep within yourself and do some introspection about the reason why you are thinking of adding an acknowledgement.

If the reason is that you genuinely believe the work you did on the corrections to the paper was substantial enough that the grant agency truly deserves to be acknowledged for its support in making the paper come to a successful fruition -- sure, go ahead and add the acknowledgement. No need to overthink the issue.

But if on the other hand the reason is that you are essentially looking for an excuse to add an acknowledgement so that you can later list the paper in your final or periodical report to the funding agency -- perhaps due to a feeling of insecurity about your ability to produce more substantial work later on in the life of the grant for which you can add a more sincere acknowledgment -- in that case, no, sorry to disappoint but I think such an action would be borderline unethical (and in my personal opinion falling on the wrong side of the border, though not by much), and would also look quite ridiculous should anyone (e.g. the program director at the funding agency, or a panel reviewing a future grant application) later scrutinize your report about what you did for the grant.


Not listed as author despite doing statistical work

Talk to the PI who said you would be an author, or your boss, whoever you are more comfortable talking to first. Best to assume it was an honest mistake (there's really no cost to adding another author in medical sciences). There's a bit of gray area on when statistical support is included/not included in authorship in medical science.
Let them know you expected to be an author (and remind them of your previous conversation), but that you found a preprint that didn't have you listed.
A preprint is just a preprint; hopefully you can still be included on a submission of the paper to an actual journal.


Can I cite a secondary source if the primary source is available?

The norm for secondary sources varies by field, and it is generally suggested that you follow what is normal in your field.

As I note in my answer to this related question, Should I cite a paper for its literature review? - some institutions insist on secondary citations, like Columbia, while some style guides (APA) permit secondary source citation. IEEE on the other hand explicitly calls out not to use secondary sources, period.

If you were in any of the fields I work in (computer science, psychology, HCI, etc.) which use APA/IEEE styles, I would suggest a third option: cite paper B if it is important, and don't accept that you first have to read the whole chain of papers leading up to B. Saying "B is important for [reason], and shows an important historical method that is not used here", and cite it. You don't have to understand every aspect of it in detail  to get the gist and determine if it should be cited or not.


If you do use a color CV make sure it still looks good when printed monochrome!  Some people on the committee will prefer to read hard copies, and in all likelihood they will be printed in monochrome.


Is it fair to use techniques I found on the web to solve my assignment?

Whatever it was, it wasn't plagiarism. Whether it was within the rules set by your professor is another question. But, assuming that the rules permitted online research to answer the question, then that is all you did. You will have to judge conformance to the rules of your course.

If someone has accused you of plagiarism they are probably using the word incorrectly. That doesn't mean, of course, that you aren't without fault. That is for you and others to judge.

Using the same symbols in mathematics can hardly be faulted in any case, as many of them are standardized and used in the same way throughout mathematics. They might, however, have been a tip-off that you went outside the allowed bounds.

But, for your own educational progress, I hope you don't go to the web too soon to get such questions answered. Struggling with a problem expands your mind in a way very different from finding a solution or a solution framework. If you want to be a mathematician, you need to develop that skill.

Note that exercises given in almost every course, aren't given for the purpose of finding an answer. The professor already has the answer. The purpose is to help you grow your mental abilities. Work on the hard problems. If you want to learn more, work on harder problems.


What are the different acceptance levels in peer review?

In my discipline (CS) in conferences you can find several levels of reviewer recommendations that are different depending on the venue's regulations. You may have:

Strong Accept (+3)
Accept (+2)
Weak Accept (+1)
Borderline (0)
Weak Reject (-1)
Reject (-2)
Strong Reject (-3)

Not all conference have the same levels. E.g., The Borderline level is not very common (I have only met it in one conference) and Strong Reject or Strong Accept might not be there as well.

Usually, for your paper to be accepted in good conferences, when we are talking about 3 reviewers, you usually need at least 2 weak accepts and 1 accept or something similar. Getting accepted with a weak reject is not very likely, unless the other two reviewers gave an Accept or better, but I do not think this is very common.


Is it worth it to purchase a coursera certificate in Machine Learning for grad school apps?

By and large, no. Buying the certificate is meaningless with regards to graduate admissions. You can list MOOCs that you have taken on your CV but do not expect them to carry any weight whatsoever. Admissions will only pay attention to accredited courses.

Note: I say this both as someone who evaluates applicants and as someone who is a lead educator on a MOOC.


Is there a need to mention page numbers from a book in APA 6?

APA 6 seems clear on this: you should include the page numbers if it is relevant to a paragraph or chapter or you are directly quoting text, see the image (source https://libguides.library.usyd.edu.au/c.php?g=508212&p=3476096):


IELTS Listening Complaint due to coughing

So I tried getting this resolved but was not successful. The center is responsible for the actions that need to be taken and IELTS (British Council I believe) will not participate in the process. The center decided that my inquiry was not valid and released my results. This obviously makes no sense to me. Also, I was told that it was my fault that I chose a center which did not have headphones so I have to bear the consequences according to IELTS. I hope this helps someone in the future pick a better center with headphones or a decent speaker system for listening.


How to decide contribution percentages for authors of a paper which is based on a patent?

It sounds like the project resulting in the paper began with the patent, but has since then required a large amount of additional technical work (the writing itself may count as well, but is generally much less important).

As such, it would be scientifically dishonest to pretend that the other work did not exist, and that authorship should be derived only from the patent, since the patent is clearly only part of the work being presented.  Authorship should thus be re-evaluated on the basis of the total contributions, both in the patent (since it does not count as a peer-reviewed publication) and in the subsequent work.

Without knowing exact details, however, it is impossible to know what order the authors should be in.  It may be that the patent work is so much more significant than the subsequent work it still makes sense to keep the same author order; just as easily, it may just as easily be that the subsequent work weighs more heavily, and that the order changes when the full work is taken into account.


Top app to run the University course classes remotely during a medical epidemic emergency

If you are in China, you can use https://www.ulearning.cn/

We are using it for our university. However, I do not know much about the technical aspect of it because I am just using it as a lecturer.


Chances of research position in mathematics without going to a top graduate school?

Here is some relevant research that might actually help you estimate the probability that you will find a good post-doc, and after that, a good tenure-track job:

Systematic inequality and hierarchy in faculty hiring networks. Supplementary material

Their empirical data comes from Business, Computer Science, and History, but you can probably extrapolate to Mathematics.


The status remained "awaiting for reviewer selection" after 5 months since re-submission

Contact someone else from the journal. This could be the editor-in-chief, the associate/managing editor if the journal has one, or simply the journal office. The journal is the only one who's able to solve your problem.

If the journal never replies regardless of who you contact, then you'll have to assume the journal is dead, withdraw your manuscript, and submit elsewhere.


Claiming authorship for substantial work on a single-author-only paper

Would it be acceptable (conventional, ethical, etc.) for me to list this publication alongside the others (for which I am listed as author) on my CV?

No.  If you are not on the author list in the publication, never imply that you are on the author list in your CV.  It's dishonest, even if you deserved to be on the author list.


When citing a book (Harvard) what should year be?

You write down the year in which the particular book that you are holding in your hands was published -- not any earlier or later reprints, not the first publication.

Since you are citing a literary work, and since that work has been republished many times, the date of its publication is not very meaningful. You may be better off using an author-title format (MLA) rather than an author-date format (Harvard).


What should I do if I want to work in computer science but my advisor actively despises the field?

My question to you is why would you have non-computer science advisor if you are in the computer science field? That being said, you should change your advisor


Abstract submission versus full research paper submission

The conference link that you have provided (here) is not ranked in recent CORE-2018 database. So, if it is your hard work, you might want to be extra cautious about going ahead with this conference.

Moreover this conference is too generic. I would advise you to go for a specialized conference in your research area. Conferences are not just for publication, they offer way more than just that. You get chance to meet researchers around the globe. If the conference is specialized, then it would be really helpful to get some real feedback and inputs.

Generic conferences do offer some of the benefits, but are not comparable.

Regarding submission to this conference: You could put up your full paper as a preprint in any server and give a link to this shorter version.


Is it normal that a PhD supervisor requires a student to apply for a grant?

So, first of all, in Europe the relation PhD sutudent–supervisor can be detached from the relation employee–employer.

While it is possible to obtain a PhD sitting on a different job all the time, I can only support the urge to move to a grant-funded position. You would have much more time for your research when compared to part-timing for money. I am speaking out of experience.

So, the first conclusion is: you probably need a grant.

Now, for application. Typical funding bodies I know, require the applicant to hold a PhD already. So, it's your supervisor, who needs to apply. Contrarily, a stipend can be granted for a student. I heavily suggest talking in person about this issue.

The second conclusion is: you need to clarify, what kind of funding it is and who would do most of the writing. Talk with your supervisor.

The general rule of thumb is: agree with your supervisor, as he/she has much more experience in the academic questions than you do. There are some common pitfalls and non-obvious issues. For example: where to publish, what kind of a position is better, etc.


Is 14/20 a good grade on master studies in France?

Your question is a bit too broad; even restricting to classes I graded or saw graded by others, the answer can vary a lot. What I can say with some confidence (after about 20 years as a student then teacher in French higher education in mathematics) is:

it is almost universal (by law!) that the passing grade is 10, so all grades above 10 should mean the work deserves more than just a passing grade,
in some classes (projects, internships, etc.) 14 might be a bit plain, but still good,
in most written exam classes at the licence level (first to third year), 14 is pretty good but not outstanding,
in most written exam classes at the masters level (fourth and fifth year), 14 is between pretty good to very good (the best grade in a course can be lower than that).

Of course, on some occasion I have been disappointed by a 14. But in higher education I don't think I ever thought it was disgraceful.

To make a comparison I have seen quite a few files from Italians, our grading system is very different. Every Italian application I ever saw but one had maximal grades everywhere (70/70 or 110/110), while that is very rare in France for a single grade, let alone an yearly average.


Is it ok to write a professor again who did not reply me yet?

Yes, it is ok to write again. Say you hope she is still interested and hope you can discuss the project soon. You could even suggest one or two days that it would be convenient for you and ask for alternatives. If you have applied, say so.
A week isn't a long time for academics, but it is long enough that a follow up won't be insulting. I wouldn't even mention the earlier mail.
This might not work everywhere, but I think Australia tends to have a fairly informal culture, like the US.


After emailing a professor and getting no response from him, how long should I wait before sending a second email?

It all depends on the professor, but in general I believe you might get the same result with the second or third email attempt.

I would suggest you try another method to reach the professor. Maybe see if he has allocated to receive students, for questions and guidance. If not, you can try approaching him after a class (be that class yours or not).
The main point is that you try a physical interaction, after all your professor must have hundreds of students and most with issues and concerns. The email is a fast communication lane, but it is still dependent on a persons availability.

Don't discard going directly to his office and asking if he has the time to see you for a quick question. A professor is there to help you and, I like to believe, they take gratification in doing so.


Is it a good idea to join a second group as an undergraduate researcher if I don't feel challenged enough?

Is attempting to join another group a bad idea? Should I instead tell the group head how I feel, and see where to go from there, or would that be far too disrespectful?

These two options are not mutually exclusive. You can do either, both, or none of them.

As you see it, you believe your choices are

Talk to your current supervisor - You should absolutely do this, regardless of what you decide to do with respect to the other group. Your mentor has no way of knowing what you're thinking unless you tell him; it's up to you to let him know if you need more from the supervisory relationship. Of course, you should do this in a respectful and adult way.
Join a second research group - You should consider doing this if you're interested in the research the second group is doing. As an undergraduate, it's to your benefit to experience different kinds of research, different advising styles, etc, to help you understand what you need when applying to graduate school. Note, however, that research is very time- and energy-consuming, and if you spread yourself too thin, you will experience "research" only on a superficial level and won't get much out of it. Only you can determine whether you really have enough free time and energy to participate in two research groups in a meaningful way.

Finally, I'd like to comment on your statement

  ... all of this was essentially on my own. As a result, I feel that any average joe with minimal work-ethic and intuition could thrive in a group like this.

You seem to think that because your mentor gives you a lot of independence and doesn't tell you exactly what to do, that standards and expectations in the group are pretty low. That's not necessarily the case.

The ability to work independently is a highly valued skill in supervisees, and it's great that your advisor has given you the chance to show your capabilities in that respect. This means that he'll be able to write strong recommendation letters for your graduate applications - much, much stronger than a supervisor who could only speak to your ability to follow focused, specific instructions.

Research is not like coursework. It's supposed to be highly self-directed. If somebody is telling you exactly what to do and what to learn next at every step, you're not doing research. If you feel like you're not sufficiently challenged by what you're doing now, you are supposed to take the initiative to speed things up.

In other words, don't confuse a hands-off mentoring style with low standards. If the group in general is productive, does good science, and writes solid papers, then standards are what they're supposed to be. From your description, you are learning a lot of new things, starting a new experiment, finding out how research works, and overall describing a pretty excellent research experience.


How to have several subjects when submitting an article to arXiv?

I would like to submit an article to arXiv and I have chosen a primary category so that the article is listed in that category. But I also would like to have another category in the list "subjects" when the paper appears on arXiv. For example, a paper is published on arXiv with "Subjects: Analysis of PDEs (math.AP); bla bla bla". I am wondering how to add "bla bla bla". Should it be done while doing cross-list?

Yes, the additional categories you see for an arXiv paper comes from specifying them in the cross-list. This can be done while submitting the paper. This help page provides further details.

If so, does the paper also appear in the second category mentioned? I do not wish to have the paper in several categories.

The paper will be announced to all the categories it is listed in, i.e., the primary category as well as the cross-listed categories. This is mentioned in the arXiv moderation page (emphasis mine):

arXiv moderation may result in the reclassification or removal of a submission. Reclassification by our moderators helps make sure that submissions are posted to the most appropriate archive. Cross-lists may be added to other related archives, or they may be removed by moderators when the classification is deemed inappropriate. A submission that is cross-listed to a category will still be announced in the mailings to that category.

However, it is possible to distinguish between primary and cross-listed categories when looking for a paper. In "Advanced Search", it is possible to specify if papers cross-listed in the category being searched should be included in the results.
Image for reference:


Asking authors for details of algorithm implementation when no explanation is provided

This is a perfect example of a case in which one should:

contact the authors with a polite request for additional information, and
fiercely and privately curse to yourself about the inadequacies of peer review.


If I have a low GPA in undergrad, and want to get into top PhD programs, should I do an MS degree or redo my undergrad degree?

As others have said, getting a second undergrad degree is a waste of time.  Don't bother.

The unfortunate truth is that your undergrad GPA may keep you out of top PhD programs even if you have a Master's degree with a perfect GPA and multiple journal publications.

Top engineering graduate programs receive hundreds or even thousands of applicants every year.  Despite what others may tell you, they're not looking for an excuse to reject applicants because it keeps their US News rating high.  They're looking for excuses to reject because there are far too many applications to judge each one on its merits, and far too many highly qualified applicants to admit them all, and the committee members are faculty who have many other demands on their time and who want sleep occasionally.  In some departments, applications are filtered by GPA even before the first human committee member reads them.

By far the best way over that hurdle is to cultivate a champion -- a faculty member who is active and visible in their research community, who will write you glowing letters describing your strong potential for independent research (in personal, technical, and credible detail), and who will call up their colleagues in other departments to tell them to watch for your application.  The goal here is to interest someone in your target department enough to rescue your application from knee-jerk rejection and evaluate it on its own merits.

And then your application needs to shine on its own merits.  It must provide compelling evidence of your strong potential for independent research.  Yes, your graduate GPA is a (small) part of this, but you need to sell yourself primarily as a future researcher, if not a current researcher, not just someone who excels at classes.  Moreover, this evidence needs to be stronger than for other applicants with higher undergraduate GPAs.  Do not assume that one first-author publication is enough.

All that said... Focusing on research and finding a champion will improve your chances of being admitted to a top program, but they will not guarantee anything.  In particular, even with a strong research record and vocal champions, you may still be rejected because of your undergrad GPA.  Admissions is best considered a random process; the most you (or anyone) can do is improve your odds.

Incidentally, the same advice goes for your longer-term goal of getting a faculty position.  Yes, having a degree from a non-top-10 department makes it harder to get an academic position, but you can work against that disadvantage by developing a killer research portfolio and multiple champions (not just your advisor).  Conversely, a PhD from a top-10 department will not guarantee you success on the faculty job market; you also need a killer research portfolio and multiple champions (not just your advisor).  Start developing that now.


In many fields, it is common practice to look up the original publication in which a concept/algorithm was introduced, and to cite that. Many courses will give some literature pointers to help you with the search for it.

The reason is that citations are also meant to distribute credit for novel findings, so in this way, the researchers who came up with the algorithm get the credit.


Rejected article submitted to other journal?

Yes, one you've been rejected, you can submit elsewhere.

The best way to proceed is to take the feedback you got in the rejection letter seriously, which will usually lead to one of two actions:

If you got an editorial rejection without review due to problems in scope or significance, then pick a better suited journal (usually more narrowly focused on your area).
If you got a rejection with review, then improve the article to address the objections of the reviewers.

Good luck, and know that even good research can sometimes spend years in the cycle before it finally is sufficiently well improved and targeted that it can find a good home.


SCI/other credible journals for low budget authors

Many journals do not charge any publication fees at all.  For example, subscription journals often fall into this category, and in most fields there are plenty of subscription journals.  If all the journals you are finding charge fees, then I'd imagine you aren't searching broadly enough (although maybe publication fees are particularly common in your field).

Furthermore, journals that charge publication fees ought to give fee waivers to authors from developing countries.  Their web sites often explain the details, and if they don't you can write to them to ask before submission.  They might in principle say no, but it can't hurt to ask.


What is the significance of the Master thesis (topic and quality) when you apply for a job in the industry/academia?

Does the topic that you work on as a master thesis affect your future job if you apply to a position that is not that much related?

By applying to a position you are not that familiar with, you will compete against people who know more about the job than you do, starting with a disadvantage. However, as AJed said, companies are sometimes looking for potential rather than technical skills and showing other skills during a job interview can prove really useful.

  What about the academia?

To answer this question, I will assume that you mean "looking for a PhD position". I think it will be even more difficult to find a PhD position if you change field (please correct me if I am wrong). Indeed the ultimate goal of a PhD program is to make the student an expert in his domain and the commitee might prefer choosing someone with little experience than no experience at all in the topic.

Finally, there are plenty of applied research fields related to Human-Computer Interactions so before you switch topic I advise you to check some of them in-depth.


Potential conflict-of-interest: Submitting a paper to a conference with advisor (and co-author) as keynote speaker and on the advisory committee?

Maybe if the aim was to be completely pure, then this would be considered a conflict of interest.  However, it's unlikely that your advisor would have any role in the reviewing of papers, though I suppose it is theoretically possible he could put unfair pressure on the program committee.
In fact, it is quite common for conferences to allow authors to submit papers even when there is someone on the program committee with a genuine conflict of interest.  They put in place measures that try to keep program committee members from participating in decisions on those papers.  Generally, program committee members with a conflict of interest on a paper do not even see any discussion on that paper, much less participate in any decisions on them.  (In the old days, they left the room if that paper was discussed.  Now they simply do not have access to the reviews of that paper or the discussion thread concerning that papers.)
This became necessary because no one would serve on program committees if it meant none of their advisees could submit papers.  Many conferences have had to further relax this rule and allow program committee members to be non-presenting (non-first) co-authors of papers.


Is it okay to ask a supervisor for the email addresses of their current students?

In many places it would likely be viewed as improper. I suggest that you don't do that. Instead, ask the supervisors to pass on a note from yourself to their advisees/students/whoever in which you describe what you want to do and providing contact information for yourself. Make a plea for participation, if you like.
But giving your contact information indirectly to others is vastly different from "harvesting" contact information indirectly.
I would treat your request as stated as improper and wouldn't comply. But I'd be happy to let people know of your project.


Should I take OSAP (student loans) even if I can pay for my tuition?

I also considered doing this, though I didn't (more from sloth than anything else).

As I understand it, from other students in Ontario, you can pay back the entire OSAP loan in a lump sum at any time. Since the loan is interest free, a rational investor would take out the maximum amount allowed, put it in a risk free asset, and pay it back as late as possible, pocketing the interest.

Now, interest rates are low right now, and OSAP needs a lot of paper work. Being in debt can also be stressful for some people. If you are sure that you won't need any OSAP money, then perhaps the $100 or so you'd make per year in interest is not worth your time.

Also, note that borrowing money now, and then paying it back early will often cause the provincial government to lower your future OSAP payments - since you clearly didn't need the whole amount.


Is there any way to only do research after getting a Ph.D.?

Yes. There are national laboratories like the US DOE labs (Sandia, Oak Ridge, Los Alamos, etc), non-profit independent labs, industrial labs, and even university labs like the one I work at. You will find that many of these kinds of labs have some sort of service mission instead of teaching, but others are purely research focused. For example, researchers in my group also support users of our supercomputers when they run into problems. There are lots of these non-academic research opportunities out there in the STEM fields. I think there are probably many less in non-technical areas.


That depends on one question: If we assume that the original paper would not contain this error, would your new related ideas be enough for a publication?

If yes then go ahead and publish it, including the correction (and of course notify the journal about it). If needed put a bit more research into the topic to get enough new results.

If no then this might seem like an excuse to get a new publication with content that is not worthy of publication (yet), so it might look like you try to cheat on your paper count, which is of course bad for your professional reputation.


How to get teaching evaluations for a course as a TA / Co-instructor

With the instructor's consent, create your own evaluation form and hand it out to students on the last day of class. Make it similar to the one they are filling out for the instructor. If possible, ask the same person who  anonymizes the other evaluations do so for you. At a minimum, leave the room and provide an envelope for them to be submitted.


Should I not hire someone who does not get along with me?

This question is fascinating to me on many levels. It shows a weird tendency that we have in academia to equate job offers to something like awards, where the decision for or against a candidate has to be based on scientific (or educational, or whatever) merit alone. I argue that if you posted the question "Should I not hire someone who does not get along with me" over at Workplace.SE, you would get very confused people asking you why you would even consider such a thing.

To answer this very frankly - no, you should not hire a person that you suspect you will not get along with. Not over an equally qualified person  that you might get along with better, and arguably not even over a slightly less qualified person that you might get along with better. Your main metric for deciding for or against a candidate should be how good you think he will be able to do the job. For a postdoc under your guidance, your suspicion that he will not get along with you means that he will likely not do a good job. That he might do a good job working under somebody else is not relevant to this decision.


Can we submit our research paper for review at two IEEE conferences simultaneously?

No.

It is considered unethical in the academic community to submit a paper for simultaneous review at multiple venues (unless it is explicitly permitted by the publications, and you disclose this on submission).

The IEEE guidelines on multiple submission prohibit multiple simultaneous submissions:

  Authors should only submit original work that has neither appeared elsewhere for publication, nor which was under review for another refereed publication.

The guidelines further specify that failure to disclose, on submission, that the work is under review for another publication, can result in (after multiple offenses)

  suspension of publication privileges in all IEEE Publications for 1 year and rejection and return of all papers by the author(s) that are currently in review or in any IEEE publication's queue (papers may be re-submitted after suspension term has expired).

In addition, engaging in this practice can irreparably damage your reputation in the academic community.


The multitude of dates that would make sense is not at all specific to Oxbridge, and many funding bodies will clarify which date they want in the fine print.
If they don't specify otherwise, then the graduation date is a safe bet, as this is the date written on the certificate. In my experience, "at most x years post PhD" restrictions are far more common, and for those the graduation date will be the most beneficial one for you anyway.
If its not specified, and if the graduation date would disqualify you, but one of date of defense and submission date for the final version would work, then it makes sense to get in touch with whoever is in charge to make the case that they should consider you.


Actually, it is both better and worse than you describe. The substitute faculty member is unlikely to get $10K to teach the course. Probably closer to $2k.

Even if the professor doesn't teach as much and spends more time on research, he/she is also expected to advise and guide graduate students in their own research. This also benefits the university, of course.

But the overhead reimbursement is to reimburse real costs. When the professor/university get the grant it is up to the university to verify that the funds are properly used. This means that people are paid a salary to manage the grant and report to the funding agency periodically. It isn't just a "gift" as it entails real responsibilities (and potential liability).

But if you are thinking of the university as a profit center you are mistaken. The university benefits both from good teaching and from good research (and advising). But most universities are not-for-profit and whatever revenue comes in from whatever source goes back into the system, not to owners/shareholders. Some money is put aside for future needs and uncertainties.

If there is abuse in the system it is that there are probably too many administrators, but that is a different issue.


Should I post my PhD Thesis on arXiv, if I intend to make a paper based on it?

I'll offer a counterpoint to the answers which advise against posting to arXiv.  I have posted my PhD thesis (in math) to arXiv, as well as the papers that I published from it.  I feel good about this decision and haven't had any problems, and I disagree with most of the objections that have been raised.

Here are some reasons why I think it can be advantageous to post:

Convenience of access.  Sure, my PhD university does have an online thesis repository that contains mine, but it isn't so easy to find and access.  I just tried, starting from a Google search, and it took me at least five minutes to get to the PDF (the first few hits all led me to an alternate paywalled repository).  You might like to try finding my thesis in this repository for yourself, starting from scratch, and see how long it takes you.  (Post your time in comments!)  As an added handicap, you don't know off the top of your head the name of the university; and my username below is my real name, but not my full name.   Then see how long it takes you to find it on arXiv.

Of course, the thesis is also on my professional website (well, the arXiv link is there), but we all know how those tend to move around and vanish.  It'd be worse if I had a common name.  So for the challenge, assume it isn't there.
Archival.  In 300 years, will my university's repository still exist?  I guess the data will still be around somewhere, but will it be in a location that people can readily find, and in a format that they can use? (Brain implant uploads?)  The university may not exist anymore; for that matter, the country where it was located may not exist anymore.  I have quite a bit more confidence that arXiv will survive into the future.  I'm not really arrogant enough to think that people will be clamoring to read my thesis in 300 years, nor even 3, but I wrote it as a permanent document and I'd like it to be one.
Updates.  In the arXiv version of my thesis, I've included an addendum correcting some errors and mentioning some additional citations that I've discovered since graduating.  I can't do that for the institutional repository version.

Some other remarks:

My thesis has a fair amount of additional expository material that isn't in the corresponding published papers, so I think there is some added value in having it available.  This might not apply if you have a "stapler" thesis.
I posted the thesis on arXiv some years after the papers were published (simply because I never thought of doing so until then), so there wasn't really any risk of it "overshadowing" the papers.  If you're concerned about that, you could also wait to arXiv the thesis.  In the short term, your professional web page should be a reasonably good way to find it.
My thesis didn't get flagged as having "overlap" with the papers, which are also on arXiv, although there is a lot of overlap.  Anyway, if it had, the fact that I posted the thesis later should mean that it would be the thesis that would have been flagged, not the papers; and I think people would understand why.
Coauthors: I agree that if your thesis contains joint work, that would be a reason to hesitate.  But I would downgrade Anonymous Mathematician's "really unfriendly" to "ask your coauthors for permission".  And make sure it is clear that the thesis contains joint work and that the coauthors are credited.  I would probably list them in the arXiv comments field, and maybe put an extra page at the start of the thesis PDF with the same info.
The thesis is less polished than a paper: True, but I also have on arXiv my undergraduate thesis and some lecture notes which are even less polished.  I guess it's more important to me to have these writings available, in case someone finds them useful, than to reserve arXiv for only my very best work.
arXiv has hosting costs: I don't really understand this objection, since the marginal costs of hosting one more document are surely extremely small.  But you can always make them a donation if you want to help defray those costs.  (Based on a quick back-of-the-envelope calculation, I estimate that a one-time gift of US $0.30 is sufficient to cover the storage and hosting costs in perpetuity.)


What is a good process for developing a new course from scratch?

I strongly recommend backwards design as a way to plan and build a course. The key idea is to start out by clearly laying out for yourself what results (skills, concepts) students in the course should end up with, then figuring out the assessments that will assess this, and then course activities, assignments, etc., that will feed into this. This works very well, in contrast to the "standard" approach of focusing first on content -- making a bunch of readings, slides, etc. -- and then asking later what sort of tests one can make, which invariably leads to the realization that the assessment gets at peculiarities of that particular content rather than the goals you really wanted. With backwards design, things make much more sense. There are a lot of good references on backwards design (just google it), e.g. this.


Universities have procedures for that. Moreoever, universities are run by people who have lives, families, friends in such situations and who can understand and sympathize. It sounds very much as if the people in your department fall into this category and are supportive of you.

What matters is that you get your footing back and get healthy again. If that means taking a leave of absence, then that is what you should do. If there ever comes a need to explain what you did for the semester or year that you took off, you can always say "for health reasons" -- which is true, and which everyone will understand is an important and legitimate reason to take time off, and which nobody is going to count against you.

Of course, the reasons you cite against it are all very good as well. I don't think anyone here can suggest useful strategies other than finding some low-stress job that helps you pay the bills, get you back on your feet, and allow you to come back to the program in better shape and with better prospects. The alternative, however, is not all that appealing either: as you state in your post, if you keep doing what you're doing, you may fail out of the program and then you're in no better situation either. In fact, the situation may be worse since it's easier to come back after taking a year of absence than come back from being kicked out of the program.

Ultimately, what matters is that you get healthy again. Everything else should be a secondary consideration.


Is it a bad idea to send an article under review as a writing sample? (faculty job application)

First, From a legal point of view I do not think you will have any problems sending out a pre-review version of your manuscript since your have the intellectual rights to your own work. Usually most publishers' copyrights start when they have processed the material in some way but even then, if you are not using the material for any commercial purpose or for being reproduced publically, I cannot see any problem.

Then, I cannot really see any problems sending a pre-reveiw manuscript to a search committee unless it is of poor quality. Sending your work allows people to see what you are doing and a manuscript (in very good shape) will allow people to see your latest work in detail. Naturally a manuscript will not carry as much merit as a published paper since it has not been through peer review. But, if it is interesting, well written and in impeccable order you will be showing your skills in some way.

So it could provide a slight positive in a search situation if good but be very negative if bad and your judgement is what will be at stake.


How can I find papers that are not sponsored by industry?

If you have access to Web of Science, there is an option to sort by funding agencies. Clicking the "more options" link also allows you to exclude funding agencies. It's not perfect since the last time I used it there were quite a lot of false positives & negatives, but it's better than nothing.


How to communicate achievements on the StackExchange network in an academic CV or job interview?

I routinely mention my participation in cstheory as a moderator on grant applications (under Broader Impact). I also mention it as part of 'synergistic activities' in my NSF 2-page bio.

For departmental review, I'd view this as external service.


We do not call them "vanity journals."  We call them "predatory journals."  They make their money from people who do not understand how journals work.  Their customers do not know that anybody can set up their own fake journal website.  The person who is fooled by the predatory journal might be the author, or it might be the person responsible for evaluating the author's publication record.  Ego stroking is not as relevant.

They continue to exist because they are profitable.


Is it a good idea to have a departmental problem database?

I'd consider three key factors.

Are there many faculty members who want to use such a database?  It's probably not worth the effort unless it reaches critical mass.  Taking a survey is a little awkward, since some people may make polite comments that sound more enthusiastic than they really are.  One option would be to ask something relatively demanding.  For example, how many people would be willing to commit to seeding the database by entering all the problems they assign in suitable courses for the next year or two?
Who will serve as system administrator?  Unauthorized access is enough of a cheating risk that it's important to take precautions.  It could be better not to have such a database than to have one managed by an inexperienced system administrator.
Will you be able to work on a scale that doesn't just enable students to cheat by building their own database?  Student groups (such as fraternities) sometimes maintain archives of old exams and even problem sets, nominally for use as practice materials but often in the hope that problems will be repeated.  If you can build a big enough database, then this sort of cheating will be ineffective, but it will work very well for smaller databases.  I think this would be a big problem unless you achieve extraordinary growth, and I'd guess you'd need to work on a far larger scale than a single department.

My take is these are major problems and I'm skeptical about overcoming them.  However, perhaps your circumstances differ from mine.


Why subscribe to printed versions of math journals?

Ok, as a paper fetichist, OA activist and former scientific advisor for a mathematical library, I cannot not answer this. But I must distinguish several perspectives.

What I like about paper journals

I like to hold them, and let the paper smell and nice typography sink in in the background of my mathematical immersion.

Unfortunately, most large commercial publisher are doing such an awful job that this emotion is barely possible anymore with many otherwise great journals. Come on: GAFA allows an article to start on a left page, in Advances you see both recto and verso superimposed because of the low-quality paper, even Inventiones has too light or too bold printing making papers sometimes difficult to read. Thank goodness there are still Acta with large yellow pages, the Annals, the journals of MSP and a few others that stand out, but unfortunately I lost my library when I got my current position.

I like that I get to know about what is done outside my fields

When I still had a great library with many paper subscriptions, I would look at all abstracts in certain journals, and when an abstract seemed interesting I would read the introduction. It would very rarely result in a direct connection to my own works, but I think I got several research ideas that way and more importantly, it would enlarge my mathematical culture constantly.

This point could be emulated in an electronic format (and is partially, through e.g. arXiv email alerts), but it is not the same at least for me, and in the current state of affairs.

I like the calm and solemnity of a library

I enjoyed very much to go from volume to volume following citations and knowing that I would get in a few minutes almost all I needed, while benefiting with the almost monastic atmosphere of a library. Being out of my office, this also meant no interruptions.

This was only possible because the library I had was really great.

What are reasons to keep paper subscriptions outside of my own experience

To hold what we buy

For some time, electronic subscriptions gave permanent access to the period that was subscribed, but this seems to become the exception rather than the rule, and in any case might turn difficult to enforce (if you need a trial to get access, that is an issue). Once you buy a volume of journal, the publisher will not get in your library and take it back. There is a great safety in this, that electronic subscription cannot provide completely.

In France, we are devising a plan to have every significant mathematical journal identified and subscribed to by at least two libraries, in paper version, with a pledge to take good care of them (have them binded, indexed, etc.), mainly as a safety net.

Not much more

Honestly, the use of paper versions have declined so much that it is often difficult to argue in favor of paper versions, and I totally understand the choice to transform libraries into learning centers and concentrate on electronic subscription. It makes me a bit sad, but I get it.

One thing that has not been considered enough until now, is how to get electronic version better. They are still too close from scanned papers, which makes the situation far from optimal. My bet currently is that the energy needed to defend paper would be more useful in pushing for better public scholarly communication infrastructures (hat tip to Björn Brembs).


I'm affiliated with two universities: do I need ethics approval from both?

Yes.

Or at the very least, check with both Universities' ethics boards.

I know of one instance of a post graduate student who in a similar situation got clearance from one university, but not the other, and was forced to discard their results.


ORCID and its QR-code on business card back cover as a researcher?

It is not necessary.

It is not too much.

Note that the back of your business card might be occupied, though:

Multilingual business cards sometimes feature another language on either side. (Although this approach is obviously limited as soon as you want to include more than two languages.)
Business cards sometimes feature a QR code with all the business card information in vCard format on their back side. (IMHO, all business cards should have this. There is no real excuse not to.) If that is the case, it depends on your stylistic preferences whether or not to add one or more smaller QR codes next to the vCard one.


Etiquette for declining a tenure track job offer

I would say that the most appropriate medium would be to send a written communication, either as an email or as a letter. This carries much more weight than a phone call, as you actually have something resembling a paper trail that you can provide.

Although there is a certain wisdom in the advice "contact them as they contacted you," this is an exceptional enough situation that deviating from that rule seems more appropriate.

The route that I would use is to write a formal, signed letter, then scan it in and send a copy of the scanned letter as a PDF to the intended recipient. The scan will reach them more quickly, and you'll still have the formal communication sent by regular mail.


Career advice: How can I move on from my probable PhD flop?

I am going to answer from a rather different perspective, that of someone who has been involved in technical hiring, the sort of person who is going to be looking at your job application and possibly interviewing you if you go into industry. I'm a retired computer programmer and computer architect, and have spent many hours trying to pick the right people to hire.

I had a colleague who started on a PhD. and decided after a few months that he was not suited to that path, and would do better in industry. That was absolutely no problem.

On the other hand, quitting at this point, or later, in a 4 year project is a potential red flag. It would make me worry that you may throw up your hands and quit a few months before a deadline if the going gets tough, rather than rising to the challenge. That would be a serious negative for most technical jobs. Moreover, even if you think you know what went wrong, why you did not complete the PhD., you would have nothing to show that would give me confidence in your analysis.

On the other hand, suppose you continue with the PhD. through September, putting together the best thesis you can in that time. If it is accepted, great, carry on with the academic path.

If it is rejected, you still have something to show a potential employer. You would need to analyze what went wrong, and understand your strengths and weaknesses. You either need to correct weak areas, or pick a job that plays to your strengths and does not need your weak areas. For example, if your thesis has insufficient original results but is well written and presented, you could apply for jobs where original research is not required, but organizing and presenting technical information is important. There are plenty of those.

In a comment on another answer, you say "my supervisor has had a lot of successful PhD candidates". That means he is both good at picking students, and good at shepherding them through the thesis process.

I think the time to start looking for industry jobs is after the very best thesis you can write by the deadline, taking full advantage of your supervisor's advice and shepherding skills, has been rejected.


Should I email my professor about a recommendation letter if he has offered me a job?

As you seem to have a good relationship with that professor, I think it is wise to ask for his recommendation. In some context, the absence of a recommendation from the former advisor could be frown upon.

I think any normal researcher will understand why you are applying to other positions, especially if you mention that his offer is your number 1 choice. In short, yes, ask!


As it is mentioned in the comments, we have no access to your paper to determine whether it is a perfect paper to be published or the content is of value to be published. Also, reviewing papers are off-topic to this website.

But, if you are looking for answers regarding [you are] a Junior year student and I did this work without any adviser; my answer will be YES.

There is no obligation for anybody to send his paper for a journal to be peer-reviewed or even to publish his research. The content of the paper is more important than the education level of their writers.

However, I would recommend you to show your research paper to a faculty member. He will review your paper scientifically besides to the review he will do on the academic writing of your paper.

Also, if you want to apply for a masters or PhD program or even if you are seeking for a job; you will need recommendation letters from the faculty members (and showing your paper to a professor is one way to show that you are eligible to get one). The professor whom you will show your paper to may be so glad to write one for his smart student who has worked upon Schrödinger's equation.


Does it make sense to pay tuition fees for a PhD degree?

Nobody will ever know. In fact, nobody will likely ever ask you about this.

At the end of the day, for an academic career, what matters is that you have a PhD and have shown an ability to do independent research. Who paid for the PhD never enters these sorts of considerations: You may have been funded on grants and only done research, or you may have been a teaching assistant to get a salary and have tuition paid, or you may have paid for the tuition yourself. It really doesn't matter, and nobody will care. What people do care about are your qualifications.


Sending my research proposal for a professor or offering to work on their project?

Professors can get funding for projects if they write proposals for funding and the proposals are accepted. There are sources for funding for student projects in many places. I do not know about your specific situation, but I don't see why you wouldn't be able to approach the professor about your idea. If it's really good, the professor will help you find funding for it. If it is just good, the professor may have you find funding for it.

Full disclosure - I am a professor. :-)


Resources to improve presentation skills

I recommend Presentation Zen, especially the book. Even though it stays on a fairly high level (and is definitely tailored towards business & marketing), its main ideas are very useful for academic presentations.


Can I update my DBLP profile, or connect it to Google Scholar?

DBLP has two FAQ entries that roughly correspond to your question:

Correcting inaccurate entries: you can submit error reports
Updating information (new entries): you can't enter publications directly, but the DBLP team is open to suggestions

The latter also describes how their indexing process works in general, which indirectely explains why it won't be possible to synchronize your Scholar profile with DBLP automatically, In essence, they consider a much more restricted set of sources than Google does.


How to reference a technical document (like an RFC) in APA style?

The APA Style blog walks you through citations with missing info. There is also how to cite a book with no author or editor. You seem to be using DARPA as the author, but from the title page, it seems mote likely that ISI/USC is the institutional author. If you dig deeper, the linked document lists Postel as the editor. In that case you just do a book without an author, but with an editor: https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/reference_list_books.html

Edited Book, No Author
Duncan, G. J., & Brooks-Gunn, J. (Eds.). (1997). Consequences of growing up poor. New York, NY: Russell Sage Foundation.


Should I apply for the scholarships if I currently have a RA position in my supervisor lab?

You should get scholarship if:

You want more money
You want to make your supervisor happy
Self-esteem (because you can self-fund yourself)
Something to put on your resume
Easier if you want to change supervisor
The scholarship is guaranteed (if offered) whereas your lab's yearly stipend is not. Your supervisor only gives you verbal agreement, but she might change her mind. Do you have a contract with her to guarantee your payment for the next 4 years?

Generally, PhD student is expected to secure a scholarship. Your supervisor is responsible to guide you for your PhD with or without your scholarship.

You may ask your supervisor to give you top-up.

You should not get scholarship if:

Your supervisor wants to employ you and pay you salary
You want to work while doing your PhD

Otherwise, why not?


Should I make project report public before publishing journal article

Check the rules of your intended target journal(s) about their rules for posting to a preprint server. Many journals will exempt posting to a well-established preprint server from their rules about pre-publication.
If the rules allow it, post the report to the preprint server (preferably in a form close to that expected for an academic paper, but you can always call it the "first draft"; most preprint servers allow posting of updated versions).


Is it okay for a PhD student to devote substantial work time to projects the advisor is not involved in?

It really depends on the funding source.

It is fairly common for researchers in industry to get a Ph.D. "on the side" as part time work away from their full-time job.  Many professors are OK with this because 1) an industry researcher often has more maturity in their approach to a subject than a student fresh out of undergrad, and 2) The professor is likely not required to provide funding for the student.

A professor who is funding a student to work full time from their grants, however, will be rightfully angry if the student does not work full time for them.