A specific question on writing research statement

They don't only want to hear what they will be working on, and what topics this is related to.
They would like to see how hiring you would lead to new interactions, that is, discussions, collaborations, joint projects and papers, and so forth, in the department and at the university.
So you should outline your research interests and planned research, discuss how this is connected to topics covered by other researchers in the department/university, and highlight where you see possibilities for collaboration.
So no, just connecting to the field, not the person, is not enough.  You collaborate with people, not with fields, and this is what they would like to see.  (Note that this means that you should ideally have a specific look at the people you might want to work with, and make it concrete where you see room for collaboration ("this opens up the possibility for collaborations with Prof. X, e.g. on the topic of [specific idea 1 and 2}".), rather than staying very general. Ideally, i should be a statement tailored to those people, not a generic statement.)


How to make the most of an online research internship?

Keep a weekly (or even more frequent) meeting with the professor or supervisor to discuss progress, which will help keep you accountable. Furthermore, participate in virtual seminars, talks, and happy-hours that may be made available to you.
Most importantly, be persistent in your work. The high-school and undergraduate students that I work with who make the most of research opportunities do so by working hard and taking the opportunity seriously. The ones who do not tend to not put much effort into the experience. Additionally, unless the contrary is explicitly agreed upon, you will need to take initiative in your research. Do not just complete the tasks you are given; think about how your work fits in the broader research context, read papers and ask your supervisor questions, think about what additional experiments you can do, etc.


My MRes will be unclassified - will this make applications outside academia less competitive?

If you has a 2.2 or for some other reason did not meet the requirements for a position you are interested in, then having a classified MSc would be very helpful. Vary rarely do positions require a 1st. Automated culling of applications based on a 1st or 2.1 generally doesn't happen. Someone will still look at your application if you have a 2.1 and an unclassified MSc. If they see good research, the 2.1 will not matter anymore.

That said, a student with a 1st is looked at differently then someone with a 2.1. If at the start of the course, you were given the option for a classified or unclassified degree it would make sense for you to choose the classified degree. If you are choosing between equally ranked courses that will both offer you identical learning and research opportunies and one is classified and the other is not, the classified one has the potential to help you more. The benefit, however, is tiny and differences in opportunities, subjects, and/or personal preferences, will offset any benefit between a 2.1 and a 1st.


There is substantial divergence between fields and individuals to what extend twiddling with the original hypotheses post-hoc should be tolerated. Defensible positions range from "it's not a big deal if the experiment / write-up still makes sense with the new hypothesis" to "hypotheses shall never be changed". Only you can tell what your and your field's methodological stance on this is.

As Boris says, the main issue to avoid is "p-value hacking". That is, it should not be that the authors decide that whatever they find support in their data is redefined to have been their hypothesis all along - while exploratory research per se is not bad, it is distinctly different from hypothesis-driven research and should methodologically not be sold as such. You will need to evaluate whether this has happened for your manuscript. If the answer is "yes", this is certainly grounds for rejection.

However, from your explanation, it sounds to me like the authors did more of a technical refinement of their hypothesis, without changing the nature of it. If that is true, it sounds somewhat nit-picky to reject a paper on this grounds. I tend to be of the opinion that methodology should be considered a means to an end, not a strict rulebook that needs to be followed to the letter even if there appears to be no reason for some of its details in a specific case.


It can't be any more minimalistic than that.

Basically you have some metadata: title, citation, abstract, comment (your conclusion) and rating.

That fits every intellectual work, you could apply it to movies, songs or anything that has an author and about which you can have an opinion.

Then there are a few other fields that cannot be any more minimal:

issues: why is the paper written and published? There has to be a reason for that work to have been done, presumably people don't enjoy wasting their time.
approach: which is basically what they do. There was a reason to do something (and then publish it) an "issue" and something has been done about that "issue" so that it is less of an issue in the future.
conclusion: there was an issue, something has been done, is it still an issue? are there more open issues?

Quite simple if you think about it.

Survey papers and so on basically solve the issue of summarizing something, they cite other papers, so you should also fill this template for those other papers.

Are you having trouble with some other kind of papers? This seems to capture everything that is relevant. Do you miss something?


How do I tell my adviser that group meetings may be too time-consuming in my last year of my PhD?

You don't tell him that at all.  You go and contribute as best you can.

Even if the meetings are of no value to you, your presence may be very helpful to your adviser and the newer students. That alone should be sufficient reason to attend. It's not always about what you personally can get out of something. Sometimes it's about what you can contribute.  It's also sometimes about just doing things for people who've done things for you.

If you feel the meetings could be better run, consider what you might do to become a more helpful participant, facilitating discussions and consensus outcomes that don't take 3 hours to get nowhere.  Ask questions that invite others into the discussion, offer your own ideas, propose plans or assignments.  If you were there 3 hours and nothing happened, consider the possibility that may also have been 3 hours when you didn't do much either.


Should the marker be responsible for explaining assignments and exams or the instructor?

That depends very much on the type of questions.

Normally a marker who is not the course supervisor / instructor should be given a sufficiently detailed marking schedule. However, even for a very detailed  schedule there often is still room for a marker to make judgement calls, and the marker should clearly apply these as consistently as possible. When students simply want to understand why they got the marks they got, then that question should be answered by the marker, in particular when such judgement calls are involved. When a student does not agree, this should be escalated to the instructor.

Other questions, for example whether the marking schedule itself is correct, or whether an alternative answer got the right number of marks, should in my view be answered by the supervisor / instructor -- any dispute over such a matter will in the end involve him/her anyway.

And as a student, If I have reason to believe that the marker is not too familiar with the material, I would go straight to the instructor.


PhD in mathematics, science communication jobs

A PhD is only "wasted" if you believe it is wasted. If you enjoyed your research, and it's helping you to engage in a long-term career you enjoy, why would it be wasted?

However, there is a very clear need for people with solid scientific backgrounds who can clearly communicate complex mathematical and scientific ideas to the general public. People who can bridge the gap—for example, explaining concepts like "herd immunity" or "cryptocurrency"—in ways that the public can understand, are valuable in the scientific community, and we should be encouraging people to make that kind of outreach. It's not as popular as it should be in academia, but I believe that as more people engage in such careers, we will see room for growth.

So if it's something you really want to do, go for it!


Vacation for Summer Graduate Research Assistantship

Two one-week vacations during a calendar year is completely reasonable.

That said, it's possible you work for an advisor who would find this lazy. In my opinion, that makes them an insensitive jerk, but my opinion won't help you graduate no matter how many times you link to this post.

I really don't think this is something you should need to "explain" to a human advisor. Give them warning, let them know your plans, be flexible where flexibility is possible and firm where it is not.

I asked in a comment about funding - it might be more complicated if you have different funding sources throughout the year (for example, if you teach fall/spring and have an RA for the summer). I still think a reasonable advisor should consider that you are working year-round regardless of funding and give you a break, but it might be a harder sell if your RA is summer only to take two weeks. In that case, I would just suggest to be reasonable - if the summer RA is the same kind of work as what you do during the rest of the year, it shouldn't really be an issue. If you are doing different work as an RA (which is quite common outside STEM but shouldn't be common in CS...) than your normal year-round research work, then I think you should either try to align your vacation with other breaks that are available during the rest of the year or work out an informal arrangement that is fair to you and your funder.


If your goal is to have a way to include this in your graduate applications, you can certainly talk about this project in a statement of interest.  Search this site for "statement of interest" and you will see many have no idea what to put there.  You have something concrete to talk about!  Did this experience make you want to study more algebra, or are you ready to switch to analysis?  Do you want to look at applications, or more theory, of matrices over finite fields?

It is a slight disappointment that you did not do this as an independent study, which is what someone my age would have done.  On the other hand, you did get feedback on MathOverflow.  Graduate admissions committees can take into account interactions like this.  I would say this shows independence and a willingness to learn by whatever means available.  You cannot say that in a statement of interest, but you can talk about how you enjoy having Denis Serre answer a question of yours.  (Name-dropping is best done shamelessly.)


Do published papers have to contain original work?

The "mathematics" tag leads me to think that by "original work" you mean new theorems or at least new proofs of known theorems.  It's entirely possible to publish purely expository papers that do not contain original work in that sense.  Of course, such papers still have to make an intellectual contribution that is not already in the literature. That contribution might, for example,  be an improved arrangement of the material, highlighting connections that were not evident in earlier work.  Or it might be reformulating some known results in a way that facilitated applications.


How to find only the papers that cite a particular article in an important way?

1) Ask your advisor.

2) Scanning 180 abstracts to find the most relevant ones can be done in under a day if you're efficient about it (most can be excluded within the first two sentences of the abstract if they are not relevant).


GRE scores per section and their importance for PhD admissions in CS/E.Engineering

My top-10 CS department does not require GRE scores at all.

For applicants that send them in anyway, the only scores that provide useful information are low scores.  Anything below about the 50th percentile is a red flag.

You are aiming at the wrong target.  Top grad schools are looking for strong evidence of promise as an independent researcher.  Test scores do not provide that evidence.


Harvard referencing: order of sources with same authors and same years in the bibliography

What you need to do: Find out the rules of the journal. For many journals, your paper will not
even be sent for review until the production staff has checked that the
references are in exactly the required format.

What you may want to support: Some journals in my field have started a policy to list all authors (up to three or four)
in the text of the paper: so it might be 'Smith, Zelda, Yates (2001)'.
The idea is that this gives name recognition to young, minority, and women
authors, who tend to be less often listed first.
This policy evolved as influential
authors (some of whom serve on publication boards) began to insist on a change toward listing multiple names.

It helps
that papers with long lists of authors are not especially common in my field.
Also, 'Smith, Hernandes, Chan (2013)' doesn't take much more space
than 'Smith et al. (2013)' and no journal budget seems to have suffered from
the change.


Paper under review a second time without being sent back to author

This might indicate that the editor has decided that another review is necessary. For example, reviewers might have very different recommendations. It can also mean that some of the reviewers did not finish their review in time.
This happens sometimes and is not a cause for concern.


You are probably permitted to do this as long as you aren't creating a "product" for use with the trademarked logo. Generally speaking, trademark law is distinct from copyright law.
See a non legal description for example.
In your case you are using the logo for purposes of description and identification, which is normally permitted.
But note that the rules and laws aren't universal.


Academic Misconduct with alternate exam? Minimizing damage?

If the facts are as you report them, your "peer" has engaged in academic misconduct.

  I have fellow peers who have done the exact same thing and not face a single threat of being reported to the academic board.

Your "fellow peers" didn't get caught.

  Is it not the instructor's responsibility to prepare a different version of the exam for both the individual and rest of the class?

No, the instructor is not responsible for preparing a different exam; the professor should be able to rely on the integrity of university students.  In any case, a fair separate exam would necessarily cover the same material.

  Furthermore, is it not also the university's and/or the instructor's responsibility to highlight the confidentiality of an alternate exam and notify the possible consequences? In all the rules and regulations, there are no clear cut rules for alternate exams or any offences that can take place.

Probably the the professor should have told the student with the advance exam to keep it confidential, but I'll bet if you look in your student handbook, you'll find a statement about illicit knowledge of exam contents.

  Does this just come down to miscommunication and failure to provide reasonable notice?

No, it comes down to someone revealing the contents of an exam to students who have not yet taken it.

  From the rumours going around, the evidence gathered is a screenshot of a facebook conversation, is this even enough evidence?

See Anonymous Mathematician's answer concerning Facebook:  "Why not?"

  And if so, would it not be a breach of privacy?

See Anonymous Mathematician's answer concerning Facebook: "Only if the Facebook account was hacked."

  The individual did not know that it was going to be the same exam.

Then he couldn't know it wasn't, either.

Your "peer" knew what he was doing was wrong and he did it anyway.  Now he must accept the consequences of that action.

The question was updated to ask about how to minimize damage.  That will depend heavily on the individual's history of conduct, any circumstances not brought out in the question, the institution's rules of conduct, and how tough the misconduct board is. However, I can tell you how not to minimize the damage: approaching the professor, dean, or misconduct board in a way that is obnoxiously defensive and argumentative.  If, for example, the individual says, "Nobody told me, and besides it's the professor's fault for not writing a new exam.  A screenshot is not evidence and it was an invasion of my privacy to rat me out!"  That will almost certainly lead to the worst possible outcome.

While not a prediction for the case in question, a similar case where I teach, if a first offense, would lead to a penalty grade in the course and a one-semester suspension from classes.  Second offense?  Dismissed from the university.

Note: It has been pointed out that this answer is generally in the context of higher education in the United States.  Given that a professor accused a student of academic misconduct for breaching the integrity of an exam, I expect it applies in the context of OP's question even though the institution is not in the U.S.


Can I demand re-submission of a manuscript that has an odd document layout?

No. It is not your job as a reviewer to demand things. You can inform the editor that given the format of the manuscript that you will not review it. The editor will then likely look at the manuscript and either decide that you are being a pain and find a new reviewer or that the manuscript format is ridiculous. In that case, they will apologize to you and tell you that they are requesting a reformatted version.

Unless the format is really awful (like less than 10 lines a page or greater than 100 characters per line), the editor will probably conclude you are a pain.


Will an undergraduate math or economics degree better position me for a top economics PhD program?

I've heard people say that your math education is more important than your economics education at the undergrad level if you're interested in going to grad school for econ.  Is this true?

Yes, it is definitely true.  Almost everything in graduate level economics involves real analysis and optimisation conducted at quite a high level of proficiency.  Now, obviously there is a trade-off here, but generally students who come in with a solid mathematics education are at an advantage, even if this additional mathematical knowledge comes at the expense of an absence of previous exposure to economics.

One of the difficulties that most students encounter in graduate level economics courses is that they have to learn two things at once.  Most students struggle with the mathematics, and so they are trying to learn real analysis and various optimisation methods.  At the same time they are trying to learn the economic reasoning and intuition for the material they are studying.  Often the difficulty of the mathematics obscures economic understanding of the material, which creates learning problems.  If you are one of the lucky students who finds the mathematics easy, you will be able to turn all your brain-power to the task of understanding the economic principles and intuition of what you are being taught, and that is a major advantage.


In case of multiple job offers, should school name or offer letter be revealed?

I do not see any reason to show the offer letter. If the school you are negotiating with does not believe you, then that is not a good sign. As for mentioning the other university, it depends on if you can pitch it as a selling point that makes the other offer better. While you should always tell the truth, you can be somewhat selective and play both sides of the coin.

For example, if you get offers from both Stanford and Harvard and you grew up on in the Bay area, but are currently doing a post doc at MIT, you could tell Stanford that you have an offer from Harvard and that you are really happy in Boston, so they will have to beat Harvard's offer. Similarly, you can tell Harvard that you have an offer from Stanford and that your family is in the area so Harvard will have to beat Stanford's offer.

Alternatively, if you have offers from both Stanford and Bunker Hill Community College and you grew up, were educated, and are currently in the Bay area, you would not want to mention the name (bunker Hill) when talking to Stanford, unless you can explain to Stanford what benefits Bunker Hill uniquely provides. You probably want to specifically mention Stanford when talking to Bunker Hill.

If, however, you grew up, were educated, and are currently in the Boston area, then you are in a gray area and may want to mention Bunker Hill to Stanford. Given the difference in the ranking of the two universities, it might be a hard sell to convince Stanford that the Bunker Hill offer is really competitive to the Stanford offer.


How to convince my supervisor that he is wrong?

The whole point of scientific debate is to refine our knowledge. Go into the discussion with a mentality to learn, not to win. Keeping this in mind will help you keep the discussion not adversarial and not emotional. On unresolved disagreements, try to find a way to falsify either hypothesis. If it is not possible, consider that which option is correct is probably not that important.

Listen to what they have to say about the criticisms, maybe they disagree with them, maybe they agree (and maybe even that is why the brought new people in). Probably, it is somewhere in the middle.

If (or when) your relationship is good, and you have a good understanding of their position, you can even propose playing devil's advocate.

Of course, I am assuming that they are decent people and not tyrannic professors. You should assume the same until proven otherwise (and if so, consider if you want to shut up and obey, or walk away).


TBH, I never heard of such a minimum for rows, columns or cells for a thesis. I suppose it would be same for any other table.

If you really believe that the table doesn't look so neat with only a few columns for too many rows, then transposing the table would be a good idea (as @Wrzlprmft suggested). If the amount of data looks unworthy of being depicted as a table, then you may you any other sort of graphical presentation such as a chart. This might help you with more innovative ideas for presentation.

Having said the above, this really is a question for your thesis advisor and would depend on any guidelines referred by your institution on writing a thesis.


How to cite a table that has been significantly modified (see example)?

What you do is create your own table, and not display an existing one in modified form. Thus, I would cite the contents taken from the other publication just like any other source you refer to.
I would suggest the following: indicate the rows of the table taken from the source in any way (e.g. put an asterisk at the end of the rows, make those rows a different color, ...) and at the end of the table add a footnote stating: "information in marked rows taken from [cite source]."


Applying to do a PhD after a(n unsuccessful) period of job hopping

Job hopping is potentially a problem in getting into a PhD program.  The fear of admissions, obviously, would be that your lack of commitment to one thing will show up again in your studies, and you will tire of this quickly, too.

However, it may be less of a problem here than in looking for new employment in industry.  Some reasons:

You are making a category shift, and as such all of your previous jobs may be seen as "one thing", and you are now switching to a completely different thing.
There is quite a bit of anti-industry bias in some parts of academia.  Therefore people considering your application might be more sympathetic to your work history.  They might think "of course this person couldn't make it in the soulless, evil corporate world, but they will flourish in the academy."  (Of course this is a bit of a caricature, but you get the idea).
You are more likely to have a chance to tell your story.  As discussed in the linked question, a "job hopper" may have their CV rejected well before they get to interview, having no chance to explain the circumstances.  But when applying for a PhD, it is quite likely you will get far enough to have some personal interaction and explain your circumstances.
They may be making less of a commitment to you than an employer would be.  Particularly if you are looking at unfunded PhDs, they may be more willing to take you on, even if they think you are a risk, since you are paying them (not the other way around).

What should you do about it?

Contact some professors at programs you are interested in. Share your story and interest in graduate study.  This personal connection may help your chances as an applicant, and you can also get advice from them that will help determine whether (and where) you have a chance of success.
Work hard on your personal statement.  It should demonstrate clearly why you want to do a PhD, how you arrived at this conclusion, and show some commitment to this as your direction in life.
If going directly into a PhD program doesn't seem feasible, consider alternative options.  A master's program would be a lot easier to get into, and you can often then transfer into a PhD once there.  Or, consider employment at an academic institution (such as work as a research assistant) where you can build up some recent academic experience while also making connections that will help you gain admission.


Why would a senior PI need to take a part-time job at another university?

A senior professor works at one university, has his own lab and research group(s). Recently, he took another part-time job at a better university. So why do professors need to take part-time jobs?

Of course there's no way to say for sure based on so little information, but I wouldn't assume it has anything to do with finances, actually. The most likely explanation is that he wanted to be associated in some way with the more prestigious university. Maybe just because it sounds impressive (either to society at large or on papers/grants), maybe because he hopes to move there fully in the future, maybe because the association might help him attract strong students or postdocs, maybe because he is collaborating with someone there or managing a joint grant, etc.

  Does this professor reserve to right to ask the new faculty to employ or joint pay his research fellow?

There's no way of answering this without much more information. Some people have affiliations with other universities that consist of just a title (with no salary or research funding at all), others genuinely have part-time jobs, and some have negotiated deals involving all sorts of things. In general I wouldn't assume there's any agreement to provide joint funding for research fellows, but there might be.


Why would a grad school not want me to defer admission?

The MIDS program at Berkeley is an unusual special case among graduate programs.  One clue is the use of admissions counselors, which are almost unheard of in typical graduate programs but are widely used in for-profit education.  (This doesn't mean there's anything intrinsically problematic about relying on admissions counselors.  They are used because they are an effective recruiting technique and can genuinely help everything work more smoothly for applicants.  However, it's a cultural difference in how recruiting is done.)

In fact, the MIDS program is run by the I School at Berkeley in partnership with a for-profit company called 2U.  See here for a description of how 2U and Berkeley are collaborating on this.  In particular, the key sentence is "2U's marketing and recruiting team supports the I School's goal of finding students who are most likely to succeed in the rigorous Master of Information and Data Science program."  The admissions counselor you've worked with is presumably a 2U employee from the marketing and recruitment team, whose job performance is based on getting people to enroll. Deferring at least means you won't be enrolling now, and you might change your mind about enrolling at all in the meantime, so it would not be considered a good outcome by 2U.

So why is Berkeley working with 2U if it could lead to awkward situations like this?  One reason is 2U's educational technology platform, but frankly I think it's primarily the prospect of making money.  The I School is descended from Berkeley's library school, and this has never been a lucrative field.  I'm sure the idea of running a professional master's program (in which people's employers pay a lot of money) is very attractive to the I School, especially if 2U takes care of recruiting students and managing the online program itself.  This seems to be a common pattern in 2U's partnerships with universities.

This situation actually gives you a little more leverage than you might normally have:

Feel free to be firm (but polite, of course) with the admissions counselor.  This is someone who is trying to sell you something, and you don't need to worry that they have some wise but inscrutable motivation for trying to get you to enroll now.
The I School really doesn't want 2U to embarrass them.  If you have a bad experience with 2U, I'm confident that the I School would like to know and will try to keep 2U in line.
In the worst case scenario, you could try complaining to the Berkeley administration (outside of the I School), or even doing something like bringing problems to the attention of someone at the Daily Californian.  I'm sure many people at Berkeley dislike the idea of partnering with a for-profit company, and this gives the I School and 2U a strong incentive to address complaints effectively.

It sounds to me like you have a legitimate complaint.  Either the admissions counselor is trying to keep you from exercising a legitimate option, or they misled you about what your options would be.  It doesn't sound like a simple miscommunication, since the counselor could have easily addressed that by providing the correct information or context.  It's not clear how things will play out, but you shouldn't give up just because the admissions counselor is uncooperative.


Requesting a recommendation before the end of the course

I don't see how what you suggest isn't worth a shot, if you explain the professor your reasons? It's what I would naturally try. I would go further and offer to hand it in early. Just be ready to back off gracefully if you hear that he is too busy now or doesn't want to do it like this, in which case I would ask if he has suggestions how to handle this respecting both your schedules and commitments (after confirming that he is open to help in principle).


Who to cite if the original source of a citation does not contain the content that was cited?

One honest way to deal with it is to write something like that it is "attributed by X to Y", where X is the author who made the unclear citation and Y is the cited paper that does not seem to you to contain this information.  That casts some doubt on the attribution, since you are not endorsing it yourself, while giving the reader all the information you have.

One possibility is that the information really is there, but it takes some digging to extract it.  In that case, flatly saying that it's not there would be awkward.  On the other hand, you don't want to perpetuate a mistaken or dishonest citation without any warning for the reader.  (Of course, you could simply replace it with a correct citation if you have the relevant expertise to do that, but then you wouldn't be asking this question.)

If X is still active, you could write and ask whether he/she accidentally cited the wrong paper, or whether you are missing something.  That's the best way to find out what's behind this citation, since nobody else can really say for sure.  If you can't contact the author, you can try asking other researchers you know.

Sometimes it's a random error, and sometimes it comes from copying incorrect citations from elsewhere.  Occasionally there's a defensible historical reason for a confusing citation.  For example, maybe the original author had an idea and but didn't explain it clearly at all, and later authors expressed it more clearly but cited the original paper (since it contained the key idea).


How to respond a reviewer's reply when he is asking about much more to be discussed?

One thing to make clear at the outset: it is the editor who controls whether your paper is published or not. Your task is to convince the editor, not necessarily the reviewer, that your paper merits publication.

Most editors will not blindly require you to implement all the reviewer's suggestions to get the paper published. After all, it's not like the reviewer necessarily knows better than you do what is going to make your paper publishable. (If multiple reviewers all make the same suggestion, that's a different story and an editor will put more weight on that.)

If you have a good reason not to do something suggested by a reviewer, you can not do it and point out in your response to the editor why you made that decision. The important thing is to make it clear that you didn't simply decide to ignore part of the reviewer's report. If you're going to avoid implementing any of their recommendations, you do need to justify it. It then falls to the editor to decide whether the paper is still publishable without that particular suggestion being implemented.

I'd add that saying that an addition to the paper would be too large and would justify an entire followup study on its own is a valid response. Even a reasonably common one, I would think. Reviewers haven't done the research themselves; they don't know how much work an extension would take, and if you say it would be too involved, there's a pretty good chance the editor believes that you know better than the reviewer on that point.


Make the readers [supervisor] understand the effort I put on data construction in an academically sound way

You are running into the age-old problem that, in research, you are reporting on results, not effort. Your paper (or thesis) is not a time sheet that needs to accurately reflect how much time went into which activity, but it should discuss your approach, results, and conclusions.

Hence, making your supervisor understand the effort [you] put on data construction is not a sound goal for a formal paper. I am not saying that your supervisor should not know how you spend your time, but this is an item for face-to-face discussion, not your thesis. Describe the data source, describe its properties (and, as a sidenote, I would not focus on the "it's free" aspect, but comment more on the quality of the data set), and describe the necessary transformations if they are interesting (instead of straight-forward but tedious, which most transformations seem to be).


Should I cite the author of software tool or script that I use?

It is entirely appropriate to cite notable tools. How to cite, exactly, depends on the origin and nature of the tool.

If the software is closely tied to a scientific work, then you should cite both the website and the key associated paper. The website will typically instruct you on the preferred paper to cite.  If it is not tied to a paper, just cite the software.

Authorship of software typically falls into three cases:

A personal creation, by one or a few people: cite those people as authors,
e.g. Facade is authored by Michael Mateas and Andrew Stern.
An organization: cite the organization as author, e.g., Fortress is published by Sun Microsystems.
An informally organized open source community: leave author blank or put "X Development Community", as weight of authorship is unclear and the set of authors is constantly in flux.


Paper A that cited Paper B is found via GoogleScholar, yet the citation is not counted for Paper B. Why?

To determine that A cites B, Google Scholar parses the citation list at the end of paper A. There are a number of things that could go wrong there: bad OCR, use of ligatures in Latex, confusion between papers with the same title, a "references" section that Google does not identify as such...


Is it frowned upon to request solutions manuals from the author?

Your request, as a self-studier, to obtain the solutions manual seems perfectly reasonable, and I wouldn't hesitate to make it.

It's true that your request might not be successful, because, as some commenters suggested, the solutions manual may be kept away from students to prevent cheating.  It may be hard for them to verify that you are not a student trying to cheat.

However, I see no harm in asking.


What should a tenured professor do to move to a more research oriented school?

Its difficult, and rare for faculty to move from non-research oriented schools to research oriented schools, particularly at the senior level. To be hired as a senior faculty member, you generally have to be specifically recruited, and someone has to make a case that you, specifically, would substantially strengthen the department. This is because making an offer with tenure is a huge commitment for a department, and much more expensive than hiring a younger scientist.

So what you have to do is be a visible leader in your field. When people think of your field, they should think of you, and when their university thinks of expanding their coverage of your field, you should be one of the first people they think of.


Do I have to ask permission for a one day leave from graduate school?

In general, it is not a good idea to miss a meeting that you were expected to attend, without giving any notice. It looks unprofessional, and it is annoying and rude to people who made plans based on your attendance at the meeting.

Let your advisor know that you are planning to miss the meeting.


Is there a general rule for whether adjuncts who are regular faculty in other departments can supervise grad students?

In our department (Ohio, US) the rule is that to supervise a graduate student, you need to go through a certain "credentialing process" (should have a certain number of publications in the area, hold a degree in one of several possible fields related to mathematics, etc.) so if somebody from other departments wants to supervise our students, all he formally needs to do is to submit an application, have his credentials verified, and go ahead. It is not something that happens often but it does sometimes and right now I'm trying to figure out how it works with co-advising from a different country. So, it is nothing unheard of but the exact rules and procedures may vary widely, which means that your best bet is to ask the department chair or secretary. The department websites usually do not display such things. One should read thick regulation handbooks for faculty to find them out and there is no reason why you should dig into any of those yourself instead of asking people whose duty is to know all such stuff or exactly where to look for it.


Etiquette or useful guidelines while making video lectures

Do's:

Do your best to pretend there are students in the classroom. Obviously, don't ask questions to the void, but scan the room, move about as you might in a real classroom (but don't go off camera), and take "normal" pauses if you're writing on a board.  This is an example from a short video I made for some of my pre-algebra students, and there weren't any students in the classroom at the time:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=est2X6-BVkw
Write big enough and clearly enough so the video picks it up. In the video I linked to, I realized that the pen I was using was pretty crappy, so I switched to a better pen (although I probably should have redone the entire clip). Even better is the way Khan Academy does it, with a digital board that he writes on during the lecture.
Make sure you have a good microphone, preferably one that is wireless that you put on your shirt/lapel. There is nothing worse than trying to watch/listen to a video that has poor sound.

Don'ts:

Don't block the board!
Don't be afraid to make a few mistakes that remain on tape. You can spend too much time re-doing videos for simple mistakes. If you make a mistake and recognize it immediately, fix it as you would in a real classroom. If you find a mistake in post-processing, feel free to overlay the video with a text box that fixes the error -- no one will care. Obviously, you can re-record if you wish, but keep in mind what your time is worth.

  How does one assess how much to explain a topic?

This is one of those times you have to do the best you can and try to elicit feedback from the students after they watch the video. The reason I posted the video I linked above is because I realized that a number of students didn't get it when I first taught the topic.

  In real classroom scenario, it's quite easy to course correct if someone didn't understand the original thought, but in video, you have just one shot. The student either gets it or he doesn't.

Well, that's one difference between face-to-face instruction and online video instruction. This is what email correspondence with the professor is for. You can also consider posting response videos to frequent questions you've been asked via email.


Legal responsibility of a university for international students (Europe)

There seems to be no legal basis, yet something similar could be found, sort of Code of Conduct originating from the website of Die Österreichische Universitätenkonferenz https://uniko.ac.at/index.php?lang=DE.
My university would be the example of a university that follows the guideline poorly.
For the whole document, please search GUIDELINES for Academic Studies of International Students at Austrian Universities.


After with editor the current status is submitted to journal

Based on my experience, the review process in most of Elsevier journals are as,

Submitted to journal(Editor tries to find an associate editor or referees for your article)
With editor (Editor evaluation step)
Under review (Your paper is sent for referees (reviewers))
Required reviews completed (Minimum number of reviews for your article received)
Editor evaluation or with editor (Editor decision for your paper based on reviewers comments)
revised or rejected or recommended for resubmission based on reviews comments

This is the most common process for Elsevier journals. Also, the length of time in each step is totally dependent on the journal and especially on the editor in chief. You can find some info about the review process in the newly added feature in some Elsevier's journals named as journal insight e.g. see this one, Journal insight


The R language has a number of libraries to produce clean looking graphs, for example ggplot2.

The example below was made with the galluvial extension for ggplot2, one of many extensions that allow animation, interactive graphs, and more.


Is a self-taught person allowed to compete with other in a prize like Nobel Prize, Field Medal, etc?

Allowed - yes. Have any reasonable chance to compete - no.

(But to learn university-level things, given the determination - yes.)

There are two separate issues:

you won't learn stuff abut the current research lines and you won't be able to attract others to your results,
in academia things like degrees and university/advisor name do matter.

First, you can learn a lot of stuff by yourself. However, it is hard to get to research-level. Moreover, now most research requires a lot of collaboration. A century ago it may be still possible to invent something in one's private workshop (but still a lot of knowledge and infusion was required). Now it is not true anymore. Also, you need to know the tools and which problems are open, solved or seems to be dead-end. Moreover, you may end up solving problems which are difficult but not of the interest of other academicians.

See also from Gerard't Hooft, How to become a good theoretical physicist:

  It so often happens that I receive mail - well-intended but totally useless - by amateur physicists who believe to have solved the world. They believe this, only because they understand totally nothing about the real way problems are solved in Modern Physics. If you really want to contribute to our theoretical understanding of physical laws - and it is an exciting experience if you succeed! - there are many things you need to know. First of all, be serious about it. All necessary science courses are taught at Universities, so, naturally, the first thing you should do is have yourself admitted at a University and absorb everything you can. But what if you are still young, at School, and before being admitted at a University, you have to endure the childish anecdotes that they call science there? What if you are older, and you are not at all looking forward to join those noisy crowds of young students ?

Also: almost all Nobel prize winners had advisors, which were also well-know and are from first league universities.

Second, the academia is less meritocratic than it seems to be. While certain skills and knowledge are essential, they are not the only factor. It does matter if you have a certain degree*), from which university you are and who is/was you advisor. Many contacts are within a clique, were you need to have a recommendation by people they know.

*) In science no matter how smart you are, you won't have chance without a certain degree, while in programming your skills and experience are more important than if you have a PhD degree or not even a BSc.

Nevertheless, finding enough skill and determination to do experiments in one's own home may be a good predictor of later success in science or engineering.


Relative or Absolute evaluation for academic positions?

I don't think there's a single answer to this question. Ultimately, departments look for the candidate who will be the best fit for a given position, and for the department as a whole. If you also subscribe to the view that the department would rather choose a candidate who is more likely to accept a given position, then that also changes the decision calculus.

For the most part, however, I don't think hiring committees are doing "hard" comparisons of citations; that would just be foolish. Grant-winning experience also does matter, obviously, but that's also something that can be learned and developed over time.

So, ultimately, hiring tends to be a subjective process—you can view the data in whatever "objective" light helps you get to the conclusion you want.


Does it have a bad effect on my career if I publish in Frontiers journals?

The short answer is, you shouldn't be too worried, but you should make some deliberate choices with your next submissions.
As @BryanKrause mentions, the quality of Frontiers in depends on the specific journal. Some have better editors than others, who will/are able to recruit better reviewers, and therefore a better review/editorial process. I have heard Frontiers in Neuroscience maintains higher standards.
Frontiers seems to revolve around 'special issues', so you will always need to considder who the specific editors of the issue are. I have noticed in some cases, these special issues are used to create an 'easy' venue for a specific community to generate papers out of a workshop or symposium. In other cases, the special issues can be considered quite serious.
Overall, Frontiers in, and the open-access publishing model in general, is very young. They are also trying out some rather radical ideas for the review process. Many people will be skeptical for a while, regardless of the quality. Some will embrace it, and also have a better opinion of others who embrace it. My expectation is that in the long term, Frontiers (or some other open-access journals) will win out, but this will take some time.
As a consequence, I'd say it is unfortunate if you published your best work in a Frontiers in which isn't of the best quality. But if you have other publications in more established venues, it is unlikely to count against you with a future hiring committee. My advice is to make sure your next paper or two are in very established journals, after which it is up to you if you want to push the open-access model more again.


Difference between ACM's print and online memberships

ACM SIGs (Special Interest Groups) generally publish things like conference proceedings and newsletters. A print subscription implies that they are sent to you in print, usually a few times a year. An online subscription gives you access to the same materials only online with a login. Other than that, the memberships are the same.


How knowledgable do I have to be when I start a phd?

It is very appreciated for your honesty. In my knowledge, I have seen many students they join PhD courses having very little knowledge in their field. Also, many join in new fields without having any proper/concrete ideas. However, their interest to learn, hard work and self confidence all together help them to achieve a PhD and a great career ahead. It is also worth to mention that each PhD student must face lots of ups and downs. However, their self confidence and interest to do something new helps to overcome all the down situations.

So first of all, you should never loose your self confidence at the very beginning. It is very well said that "it is never too late to start". You will get enough time in PhD to learn many new things including your objectives. Moreover, it seems you have got a very good and inspirational professor. So there is no doubt whatever knowledge you have now, it is very much enough to pursue a PhD in your area of interest. Good Luck!!


As someone with low grades how can I prepare myself to study MSc in CS in USA?

Since you intend to do it on CS I want to point out that the GRE Subject Test on CS (the one usually asked) will not be administrated anymore.

According to the ETS website:

  The last administration of the GRE Computer Science Test will be in
  April 2013. The test will be discontinued after the April 2013
  administration. Scores will continue to be reportable for five years.
  (https://www.ets.org/gre/subject/about?WT.ac=grehome_gresubject_121017)

I wanted to say this in a comment (since it's not exactly an answer, but I think it's an important information to you), but I can't since I don't have enough reputation on this website to do it :(
Therefore, even though I think you wanted more a opinion from people already in academia, I feel obligated to put some more thought on my answer:

I'm a student, currently undergrad (will graduate at the end of this year) and I'm "kinda on the same boat" (from a third world country, wanna do a Ph.D. on in US in CS and I've being somewhat lost regarding what to do).
Here is a compilation about what I have found so far that may be helpful to you:

The notions of PhD and MSc in the US may be somewhat different from what you are used to. Quoting from something I've read in a university website (can't remember which one right now) "Masters is about breadth, PhD is about depth".
At least in my country (and I'm guessing it may be the same for yours), both are pretty depth-oriented. -> Keep in mind that, some MSc are breadth oriented, these may not be the droids you are looking for.

Also, the programs vary a lot from place to place... (And if you are used to the fact that you have to do a MSc prior to the PhD, this is not true for a lot of PhD programs in the US, you can join then directly if you have a bachelor's degree).
Example: At CMU, the masters degree is "breadth-oriented", meaning that you take a lot of advanced courses in various topics, and the PhD is totally research-oriented (average 6 years, in contrast to the average 2-year MSc + 4-year PhD in my country). But in MIT, as far as I've understood, you apply for grad school, if you are accept and you don't have a MSc, you are put on a MSc program, if you already do, you are put on the PhD program (so, seems to be a lot research oriented on both programs). -> Make sure you read thoroughly how the programs in the universities you intend to apply are, cause there's no "standard".

About the "money" part of your question, as far as I've seen, it goes something like this:

MSc: You have to pay for tuition, you may get a paid TA-ship
(Teaching Assitant paid position), you may get an RA-ship (Research
Assistant paid position), but nothing is guaranteed.
PhD: Top universities usually pay you monthly and if the professor    that is orientating your research doesn't have funding, you need to      get an RA or TA job. On other universities,you may need to narrow       your options to professors that have funding.

-> Keep in mind that, PhD is a better option money-wise, but harder to get in.

As pointed on the comments, research capability is a must (for the "depth" programs at least) and matters even more than grades. Quoting from a CMU professor on the "Grad School Talk" available at their website:

  It does not help you, in my opinion, to be closer to 4.0 [GPA] as
  opposed to 3.5. It’s a much better idea to spend your time on research
  than on optimizing your GPA.

- Keep in mind that proving your research capability matters a lot.
But another important quote from this same pdf regarding grades is:

  Your grades may be somewhat low – under 3.0 – because you were having
  a good time in college and you may therefore be having trouble getting
  into a Ph.D. program. In this case, you may want to do an MS and use
  the time to boost your grades and reapply after the MS.

Another important thing to note: The things that each program prioritize when looking at your application seem to vary a lot, even among programs at the same university/department. -> Try to figure out what the programs you are aplying prioritize. (eg: by reading their websites well).

About TOEFL: It matters a lot, but as far as I understand, it matters in a sense that it prevents you from getting in a program if you don't have the minimum score needed. *Each university asks for a different TOEFL score.*
The top universities (regarding CS programs) usually ask for 100 on the IBT (internet based test, out of 120), an exception being Stanford, that asks for 110.
Regarding IELTS: All universities seem to accept TOEFL, a lot of them seem to accept IELTS, but you need only one of them, so I suggest you go for the TOELF (for US universities).

As a plan of action, I suggest this one (which is kinda what I'm doing myself).

Boost your ability to prove "research capability": It's VERY important that you have some prior research experience. Have you ever done research as an undergrad? Do you have professors that can write a recommendation letter for you? If you don't, you are (probably) gonna need to pursuit this kind of stuff. My suggestions if this is the case: Pick a professor that does research in a area that you are interested (better if it's a professor that may remember you from university) and try to contact then to see if they can let you assist on any research projects (even if voluntarily), or take some time to read his recent published papers and understand then, then go talk to him about this. Also, try to see if getting a job at any private research company is an option (in case they exist in your country, in mine "private research" is pretty much nonexistent :( ).
Figure out what your "level" is: What universities/programs that you want to get into that you can realistically hope to get in. This can be done by reading the programs/universities' websites, search for some information about the qualifications of people that got in, etc.
Make a list about the programs you are interested in: After figuring out your "level", what universities from this set have programs that you are interested to?
Read everything you can about this programs and pick the ones you want to apply: Learn what these programs prioritize on applications, what options do you have regarding money, etcs. Finally decide which ones you are going to apply and see what each of then require.
Get ready for the aplications: Taking the GREs (or whatever they are gonna use, now that the CS subject test is gone), TOEFLs and bla bla bla takes a lot of time. Prepare for the stuff you need to take, search for example tests on the internet, study for them, etc... and take they as soon as you are ready.
FYI: As far as I've seen, the deadlines for applying for grad programs are usually in December, for pretty much all universities (they gotta have something in common, after all).

Some useful stuff to read:
 -

CMU's "Grad School Talk" www.cs.cmu.edu/~harchol/gradschooltalk.pdf -
The one I quoted a lot in this answer.
Demystifying the American Graduate Admissions Process: nlp.stanford.edu/~rkarthik/DAGAP.pdf - I found this paper extremely
helpful, it's written by a guy that worked on Stanford's admissions
committee, he also has a blog where he talks about this stuff (link at the end of the paper).

Additional Notes:

In case you are unfamiliar with how the GPA works in the US, here is
some explanation:
http://www.ehow.com/how-does_4619318_a-gpa-work.html
If your grades are low, it may be hard to enter the top universities (although I don't see it as impossible) but keep this in mind: A) A lot of "not the top, but good ones" are very good, and may even be very strong in research at an area you are interested in. B) I believe that any recommendation letter saying something like "This guy showed up out of nowhere wanting to assist in my research (even though he was out of academia for some years and was working on a regular job) and helped a lot" shows a lot of "research capability", a lot of self-motivation and can be VERY strong.

Good luck. :)


First, it is not quite a law yet as it still needs to go through conference and be signed by the president. Regardless, you can ask for a raise, but arguing for a raise on the basis that your personal situation has changed is not really a good strategy. Most people ask for a raise when they can make a case that they have been performing well.

Many advisors do not have spare money floating around. Stipends can be set at the department or university level. As I said in this answer graduate student tution is an odd thing. Universities may either automatically increase stipends or decrease tution. It is really too soon to know. Your best bet is to probably unionize and make sure the university begins treating students responsibly.

The issue, at least as I see it, is that advisors need to justify to funders why a PhD student is needed as opposed to a permanent RA or post doc. When PhD students are cheaper than the other alternatives, it is easy. In my field, the NIH post doc rate is about $40,000 a year. This means there is only a little gap in costs between a PhD student, after covering tuition and fees, and a post doc.

The problem is not really the change in tax code, but rather in the fact that full time researchers are being charged tuition. This is something, at least in my opinion, that needs to be addressed on a university/department level and not with the individual advisor.


Should Ph.D. students interested with research remain as research assistant until they find a research position or just find any job?

There is a delicate balance here: in certain situations, it may make sense to be strategic about your graduation date, especially in order to align yourself better with hiring cycles.  If you start stretching out your thesis work significantly, however, it will likely be noticeable and not to your benefit.

More to the point, any such delaying tactic will almost certainly require the consent and participation of your advisor in order to be effective: otherwise, you are likely to be pissing them off and making your chances worse rather than better.  Have a discussion with your advisor to see what their assessment of the tactical situation is, and their recommendation.

Finally, with your advisor's consent there is another option worth considering: a "transitional postdoc" in your current location.  In many institutions and/or fields (especially private institutions or expensive lab fields), the cost of a postdoc is not significantly different than a graduate student, since the higher salary is offset by the lack of tuition or made less significant by laboratory materials costs.  For a transitional postdoc, you graduate but you stay briefly as a postdoc (no more than a year or so) while you continuing working in your more independent role to increase your profile and position yourself for an external postdoc or long-term hire elsewhere.


What are the pros and cons of giving students assignments to write Wikipedia articles?

I have on several occasions given students assignments (in math classes I was teaching) to contribute to Wikipedia, either for bonus credit or in lieu of a traditional final paper. Both I and the students were very happy with the results and with the fact that our efforts (which included fairly substantial involvement on my part, see below) resulted in the creation of a valuable resource for the community. I am therefore inclined to view this idea very positively.

That being said, in my experience this type of project would definitely not be suitable for all students and in all circumstances, so one should consider carefully (as you are indeed doing by asking the question) the various implications and factors involved.

  For which types of courses does it work and for which it doesn't?

The idea is suitable for advanced classes where you cover topics that are not currently well-covered on Wikipedia. E.g., something like a calculus class is a bad idea, but a graduate class on differentiable manifolds would almost certainly involve several topics that Wikipedia needs help with.

  For which types of assignments does it work and for which it doesn't?

The first rule should be "do no harm". What I mean is that some students do not have the writing skills to make a positive contribution to Wikipedia with a reasonable effort of the sort that a course assignment should involve, and we certainly don't want them making negative contributions. Thus, my philosophy is that a Wikipedia assignment should be elective - i.e. either being for extra credit or being an option the student can choose instead of a traditional paper/essay.

Another reason for this rule is that some students would feel self-conscious about writing material for public consumption, and I think it's wrong to force them to do it, even if the contribution is anonymous. Finally, submission to Wikipedia requires agreeing to its Creative Commons license which means giving up certain rights to your creative work. For legal and ethical reasons I think it's untenable to make this a grade requirement unless specifically agreed to by the student who prefers this over alternative assignments.

  Will it improve students' motivation to learn?

I've definitely seen students who became very enthusiastic about the writing project and after creating a page on a new topic continued to expand it, which ended with them adding quite a bit more material than was the minimum I required. I'd also like to hope (but don't know if it's the case) that some of them might have caught the Wikipedia bug and continued contributing "for free" later.

On the other hand, some students were clearly just doing it for the grade and didn't do any more than the minimum, so I guess for them there wasn't any improvement to their motivation.

  How can one define a rubric for this type of assignment?

Good question. I was using my own subjective judgment to assign grades. Those were small graduate classes and in practice almost everyone got an A or A-, so that wasn't too much of an issue, but for a larger-scale project one might have to give this question some more careful thought.

Let me add a few thoughts about things you didn't ask about. A key thing to keep in mind is that writing for Wikipedia is very different than writing other kinds of content, both technically, stylistically and philosophically (in particular the collaborative aspects). Good Wikipedia content has to be extremely neutral, unopinionated, well-referenced, and written in clear and error-free language. Frankly, in my experience very few students would be capable of producing by themselves a draft for a new Wikipedia article that would not be either outright deleted or heavily modified (possibly to the point of becoming unrecognizable) very soon afterwards by other Wikipedia users/editors -- needless to say that would be quite bad for motivation... For this reason, in the projects I assigned I ended up taking on a fairly substantial role of reviewing and helping polish up the original article drafts before they were officially submitted. This was done in a sandbox page. It was practical for me to help out in this way, first of all because I was happy to do it, and second of all because only a small number of students were involved (4-5 in each of the courses I tried this at). At the same time, there is an obvious problem of scalability here, and I would be very reluctant to attempt such a project in a large class. The bottom line is be prepared to put in quite a bit of work yourself if you want the project to be a success.

A final thought (sorry for the long answer) to consider is that it would be wise for you as the instructor to propose to the students a list of possible contributions they can make (in the form of either new articles or new sections in existing articles). Some students can also come up with their own ideas for what to write about, but I feel that most would prefer being offered a list to choose from. Good luck!

Edit: as @Thunderforge helpfully pointed out in the comments, Wikipedia has a dedicated page with guidelines to students and instructors for Wikipedia-editing course assignments.


what to do for one who starts a faculty job before semester starts

At least for the US, the university generally has a specific date on which they expect new faculty to begin their employment - typically sometime in August for schools that are on semesters.  It's usually at least a week or two before the start of classes, to give time for various kinds of orientation / training / onboarding.  This start date is usually mentioned in the job posting, or during the interview process.

In principle you could negotiate an earlier date, but there'd probably have to be a good reason - something specific that you would be doing for the university during that time, beyond your usual research or course preparation.  The university has set their budget assuming that you will be paid starting on the designated start date, and is unlikely to be willing to start paying you sooner unless they are really getting something in exchange.  Indeed, most full-time faculty in the US are on 9-month contracts and don't receive salary during the summer months unless they are performing special services or have grant funding.

If you'll be arriving in the city earlier than your start date, it's reasonable to ask if you can start using your office, get a library card, etc, before your employment officially begins.  Your department will probably be happy to do little things like this as a courtesy to you.  And, of course, you can start meeting your colleagues and learning about the job.  You just won't be getting paid yet.


Is it rude to ask the associate editor about manuscript status for second time?

I think it should be fine to inquire (politely, of course) at this point. While it may be a minor irritant, it should not affect the outcome of the acceptance decision provided the journal follows ethical practice.

If you have a decision to make about the paper it is important to get the information. If it is just to ease your uncertainty then you could also let it go a bit longer. But there shouldn't really be a downside. Maybe a note would get the editor to prod the reviewers a bit.


Does every single table in a thesis need to be numbered?

If the tables are not referenced in the thesis text, why are they in the body of the thesis?

I'd put them all into an appendix, number them, and provide an appropriate, terse label.  If there are specific ones that are referenced many times in the body of the thesis, you should include these in the body. Duplicate the in-body tables in the appendix.

If all the tables are in an appendix, there is no need for an index of tables, but it would depend on the norms for your subject area.


Another late answer.

In undergrad, there is a maxim that you should "choose your professors as carefully as your classes." I think in hindsight, most graduates agree with this -- we've all had random classes taught by great professors that were meaningful, while great subjects taught by lousy professors were worthless.

How much more crucial, then, is the choice of your PhD advisor! An advisor in the right area but with the wrong personality is a terrible choice. An advisor in a merely acceptable subfield but the right personality is a much better choice.

Ideally, you will (a) find someone at your current school who will make a good advisor even if their research area isn't obviously aligned with your current interests, or (b) find that the professor in question is actually reasonable once you get to know him/her. But, I think transferring out would be preferable to working for an unreasonable person -- I've known multiple people who stayed in grad school for 10+ years, and the common problem was an unreasonable advisor.


Should I leave my area of interest as my supervisor advised?

I think you're too early in your career to say one way or the other. I had an undergrad prof say I should teach high school rather than pursue research based on my GPA halfway through undergrad, saying I'd never make it to grad school.
Now I'm a postdoc at a pretty nice institute in an extremely competitive field, and I've seen many other people who looked better on paper than I did at that point get weeded out of this career (not getting into grad school, failing prelim exams, not finishing the PhD, finishing the PhD with no postdoc offers, etc). Many people who have judged me as the stupider scientist and talked down to me couldn't make it in the field, so I wish I hadn't put so much weight on what they said at the time.
If you love the work, keep at it. Doing something you're passionate about for an undergrad degree is hardly a waste of time, even if you ultimately have to go a different route.
Keep a plan B in your back pocket. The nice thing about academia is the hiring timeline is usually a lot earlier than industry, so if you don't get into grad school/get the next level job, you still have a few months to pivot into an industry search. Depending on your financial situation, you may need to pursue both options simultaneously to avoid he risk of being unemployed, but it's doable. As long as you like the work/the lifestyle and you still have options, keep at it.
Also there are lots of professors out there with opinions, so don't just select one at random to decide your fate. Actually the bar is way lower: if you can find one person who believes in you at the undergrad level, that's enough, even if everyone else says you're no good. Later on in your career, shoot for at least three senior people who think you're great. Ignore the rest of the noise.
But an academic career can be hard at times, especially for the people that aren't flying through prestigious institutes with a ton of encouragement and no pushback. If you approach the career the way I'm describing, it will be really hard at times. If you find the work and lifestyle worth it, keep going, but the reality is that the lifestyle is not easy and there's no shame in leaving for a more comfortable life.


How can we help cope with sleep deprivation among university students?

Unless the university is requiring students to become sleep deprived in order to complete assignments (which i'm sure it is not), then changing the course structure, reducing the number of lectures, etc, will have very little impact.

Sleep deprivation is often actually a cultural issue. Cultural in the sense that every Institute/Company/University has a culture, and new students are always brought into that culture, taught "how things are done here", and in 3 years they teach it to the next intake of students.

If the culture at your university is to work all day and play all night, or simply just work all day and all night because to be seen working is to be a good student - then you need to change that culture.

Ideally try informing the students of the dangers of sleep deprivation. Try to promote efficient learning, and a balanced lifestyle of work and rest. Try to explain that being in the library 18 hours a day, does not make you a good student. Alternatively, if you play MMORPGs all night instead of sleeping, you will fail the course, and that is your own fault.


Is there a way to search for more recent papers than the one I'm currently reading?

A simple way that I usually follow to find newer papers about the same topic is using google scholar. Google scholar gives you the ability to find papers that cited the paper you are interested in, and those papers are usually published after the paper you are interest in has been published (i.e. more recent work).

For the example you provided in your comment, google scholar gives me 57 articles/results that cited your example


Tools for data organising and processing

I would store data in CSV (i.e. text file with a table, with values separated by commas) rather than XLS files (the first is easier to import from and export to anything). Otherwise many tools will do the job (if you are familiar with MATLAB - why not using it)?

For general data processing and manipulation, Python (with SciPy stack) is capable of everything you mentioned. In particular IPython Notebook is great for data exploration and presentation (you can use code, comments and LaTeX in such notebook - also for reports). For tabular data, use Pandas (R-like DataFrames).

For reports also you can create files in Markdown (with LaTeX), and then convert them to pdf with Pandoc - may be much easier than generation of LaTeX code. (To get you some taste what is Markdown - look at StackEdit.)

And alternative to Python is R, with knitr for report generation. If you are not sure, if to choose R or Python, then for your task R seems to be an easier and better way to start (especially with RStudio as an interface).

For a bigger list and links to tutorials, take a look at a list of software for scientists.


Should I highlight one of my old papers in my last 5 years research achievements, if the old paper got printed recently?

Unless the instructions say otherwise, the "last five years" means the publication date that is written on the published paper is in the past five years.  It does not matter at all how long the paper was under review or in press.

A selection committee may see when the paper is submitted if that information is written on the paper, but they will not need that information.

Submission and revision dates are used when two papers come out from different authors which say the same thing.  Then the dates can indicate who is first.  I wouldn't worry too much about being first, though.


As a presenter, should I attend all days of conference?

A conference is so much more than just an arbitrary concatenation of presentations. It is a place you can meet researchers from different places who usually work in a similar field to yours. You can use the time to get to know new people, get to talk about new ideas, find out what others are currently doing in your field, and much more.

Therefore, if you have the opportunity to attend the conference more than just the day of your presentation you should.


Every university I have been affiliated with (in the U.S.) has had an office of disability services, tasked with evaluating individual cases and making (binding) recommendations to instructors.

If your university has such an office, then you should refer this case to them and avoid judgement calls of the type you ask about.


Do Asian authors have a different style of academic writing from European authors?

No, this is absolutely not just your problem! I am also an ESL and this very comment has been given to me numerous times: Your writing is weird, but I can't really tell how. After many years of working on it (including reading many books about writing, joining a writing group, publishing some papers, and writing pretty much everyday), my writing is still, well, weird. I have come to terms that I will never be able to conceal my "Asian-ness," and I'm fine with that.

Though, in the process, I did learn some tricks. I hope some of them will be useful to you.

Have basic grammar all nailed down

I understand that you are not seeking for grammatical advice. But people don't just judge your work's structure and suspect its lack of European thinking style from the get-go. Small mistakes such as (taken from your question) "By 'us' he meant European," and " I do have problems with my writing,"  can prompt readers to think of you as a foreign writer. And once that thought is sparked, a lot of scrutinies will follow.

Side notes: Some friends did give me very thorough diagnoses on my writing style, which may be useful to you: Generally I suffer from: i) lack of agreement between subjects and verbs, ii) wrong use of articles, and iii) lack of conjunctions and connectives. I have been working hard on addressing those problems, and it's probably going to be a life-long project which is fine by me.

Have him rewrite it

  I'm an Asian student working with a European prof. My adviser told me
  several times that when he read my writings (our papers), he just
  wanted to rewrite it. He told me that my English was rather OK, but
  "the way Oriental people think is different from us". By "us" he
  meaned European.

Why not? Politely invite him to rewrite a few of your paragraphs. If he cannot name what is wrong, but he can rewrite it, then the solutions lie in the rewritten version. Schedule a meeting with him and go over the sticky parts. By that time he will have some ideas about your problems because after rewriting the piece, he will know what he has changed.

Even if he cannot give you any suggestion, with the two versions you can now easily show any writing coach what you wrote and what your instructor thought you wrote. The writing coach should be able to pinpoint the some basic stylistic differences.

Analyze articles' structure

When you read an article, read it a few times with different lenses. First, read for general sectioning, then read for information, and lastly read for its syntactic structure. A wonderful book that I have come across on this kind of analysis is Schimel's "Writing Science: How to Write Papers That Get Cited and Proposals That Get Funded." It provides tools and examples on dissecting an article from paragraph down to wording sequence in a sentence. There are many grammatically correct ways to put together a sentence, a paragraph, and an article; this book talks about the subtle effects of those different ways.

Do not start from your mother tongue

One old habit that I have successfully gotten rid of is to mentally draft a sentence in my mother tongue and then translate that into English. The process was counter-productive at best because the revision was quite time consuming and painful. A couple tricks helped me through the struggles:

Start from Subject + Verb or Subject + Verb + Object, then slowly add different modifiers. A wonderful book that teaches me most of these is Williams's Style: Toward Clarity and Grace. If you get a chance, please read it. I still read it time to time as a writing therapy.

Use a mind-map to gather ideas. Mind maps, in my opinion, operate very much in the way that scientists display ideas: using categories, hierarchies, relations, and lists. By focusing on this device, I could make the structure tighter and more coherent.

Other resources

I have also grown bold enough to answer some writing-related questions on this site. Here are a few that you may find helpful:

Any place for people with fear of writing?

How can I best edit a paper to help get it published?

Good luck and keep working on it! Your (and my) problem is something that will not totally go away, but can definitely be lessened. Just enjoy the learning process and don't care too much about sounding 100% like a European thinker.


Can Design & Implementation sections be combined in a project report?

It seems you were given an assignment to design and build a system and then write a report to document your work. However, you decided not to do that assignment and instead you decided to build a system skipping the design step.

I would expect the person marking your report would see it as you did not complete the task as assigned. As JeffE's comment implies, there is a reason why you were given a task that included designing first then building.

I think you should ask your lecturer if what you have done is acceptable or if you must restart your assignment.


How to give a short talk at big math conference (section talk)?

The advice is the same as for any talk, only moreso: Think of your talk as an advertisement -- your goal is to get people interested enough so they will look up and read your paper (or, in this case, invite you to their seminar to talk about it in more detail). Specifically:

Assume no one in the audience is an expert on your topic. (Seriously. It's hard to underestimate how much everybody else knows about something you spent years studying.)
The most important question to address is why should the audience care about your work? This question needs to be answered by slide 2 at the latest, and it doesn't hurt to remind them on the last slide as well. This is easy if you solve a long-standing open problem, but anything in the direction "if you have such-and-such a problem, my result will help you" will do. (If you really cannot come up with something, at least tell them why you care about the work -- presumably, some aspect of it was fascinating enough to make you finish it.)
Skip the details. Honestly, if in doubt, leave it out. Focus on a few core ideas, and try to get them across as plainly as possible. If your main result needs two slides of assumptions or notations before you can state it, see if you can find a more specific (non-trivial) setting where it will fit on one slide. Don't try to give a blow-by-blow proof, but stick with two or three high-level bullet points ("Proof uses Galerkin approximation, compensated compactness, and the embedding of X into Y").

(Also, since this is such an old question, you probably already went to the very big meeting. What did you hope to get out of hearing those talks? In hindsight, which ones did you take the most away from? Keep this in mind when preparing the next talk.)


What is the advantage of becoming a full professor if you already have tenure as an associate professor?

Why continue to write papers if you already have tenure? Can't a tenured associate professor not write papers and still have a job?

The general answer is simple: most of the people who would quit doing research after tenure in fact quit before tenure.  The ones who make it to tenure generally care about research and intend to continue at it for a long time.

In more detail:

Reaching an associate professor position in a research university is a long journey.  At this stage you could stop writing papers and lead a comfortable life, if you were willing to live with the disapproval of your department chair (which is not an easy thing: there are many ways they can make your life unpleasant even if they can't fire you).  However, if that's all you wanted, you could have had it with much less effort along the way.  By the time you reach tenure, you have let many opportunities to change your career go by, and you have repeatedly passed through filters intended to measure your talent and ambition.  This selection process means tenured professors at research universities generally really want to do research.  Now, sometimes people change their minds or burn out, and a few might never have intended to maintain their research programs.  However, on the whole this is a group that has been selected for research enthusiasm and ambition, so it's no surprise that on average they maintain the desire to do research.


How to see peer review comments when rejection letter does not list them?

Well, there isn't really anything you can do except ask the editor, since he/she is the only one who has them (except of course the reviewers themselves, whose identities are not and will not be known to you).  So if you want those comments, that's what you'll have to do.

Of course, it is possible that:

the paper was "desk rejected" by the editor and never sent out for review at all; or
this journal has a policy of not sharing reviewer comments; or
the editor has decided for some reason that in this case it is not appropriate to share the comments with you.


Can my choice of co-authors affect how often my article is cited?

First of all, let me make it clear that I'm addressing your question with the hope that you tacitly mean co-authors who made significant enough contributions to deserve authorship, and not talking about gifting co-authorship to people who haven't. Ethically, the latter is wrong, even when the person in question is the PhD supervisor, and hasn't contributed enough to deserve authorship. Thus, what I'm referring to below is the issue of publishing with or without co-authors who deserve to be co-authors.

In an ideal world, what should matter is only whether the content of article is scientifically sound, and not the brand value of the authors. What is wrong does not become right when stated by a bigshot. But in parallel, there is a question of credibility, and that is generally higher for people who are known to have done some good work in the past, as opposed to a newbie. But even with that, it is not that people do not read the works of newbies, just that in the real world, people are less likely to be as critical of a bigshot, as they would be of a newbie. That's just to say that we do not live in an ideal world. However, if the science in the newbie's work is accurate, it will fetch respect too. That's how eventually everyone grows in stature.

However, we should distinguish between exposure and citations. Even with my arguments above, being on the same wagon as a bigshot may ensure more exposure (i.e. more people look at it, even though it may not go any further than that), citations are not really entailed by a greater exposure, but are more reflective of the utility of the article. Thus, a useful work is going to get cited irrespective of who is on the author list, and exposure only increases the odds of the same.


How and if to advise editor about suitable referees for my paper

This certainly sounds like it could be communicated through a cover letter. This does not guarantee that your comments are actually being read by the associate editor, though - at least in my field, cover letters are uncommon enough for journal papers that I typically don't even check if there is one if I get a paper to handle. However, it is unclear to me what practical other ways you have to communicate with a handling editor where you don't know yet who it will be.

That said, you never have a guarantee that the editor will take your input on reviewers into account. Personally, I tend to be fairly sceptical about "suggested reviewers" or anything that approaches this - maybe I am too suspicious, but whenever authors suggest a reviewer, especially when not explicitly asked to do so, I immediately assume that this reviewer will be in some way positively biased, even if no conflict is obvious from the outside.

So my summary is - sure, (briefly) explain your reasoning in the cover letter, but don't get your hopes up too much that this will change substantially how your manuscript will be handled.


Mathematical equations are not normally considered subject to plagiarism, since there are only so many ways they can be written, and because they represent ideas rather than material that can be "stolen" without proper attribution.

So long as you cite the material you are drawing from, and explain the equations in your own words, you should be fine.


What incentives do professors have to increase the PhD completion rate in their department?

In the United States, the National Research Council (http://www.nap.edu/rdp/) regularly ranks university departments. One of the criteria by which departments (and thus universities) are ranked is the "Average of Median Time to Degree" with the presumption that lower is better.

In my university, this results in the provost's office putting pressure on us to reduce our time to degree through a number of measures, some coercive and punitive. Most of the time, the coercion and punishment is directed towards the graduate students (i.e., after the sixth year they lose their rights to certain fellowships, they have to pay more for their gym and library memberships, etc.).

But the department as a whole gets some attention. Our chair has been regularly sending out lists of our orphaned and missing ABD candidates (some now in their 12th year) and asking us to find and terminate them (either through graduating them, or formally asking them to leave the program).

I've also been putting some pressure on my peers through the admissions system by suggesting (since they are my colleagues, I have no power) that people with many students on the books should refrain from taking on new students until they clear their backlog more a bit.

I should note that I'm in anthropology where: 1) students tend to go into the field and disappear for quite sometime; 2) doctoral students are mostly useless to faculty for slave labor as most of us work individually and not in labs (with the exception of some of our archaeological / biological colleagues).


The good news is that once you've got a text in one eBook format, it is relatively painless to publish it in additional formats (PDF being the notable exception, though it is generally easy to get a document into PDF format--you can do a decent job with a converter such as Calibre--see below--but translating the format properly is sometimes tricky).

At the very least, you should publish in PDF format.  While not a particularly good format for reading on portable devices, it is a universal format that can be read on any any modern eReader, and, of course, on a PC screen.

I would also suggest formatting the book in the open EPUB format, and in a Kindle format (either .MOBI, AZW, or .KF8).  I would then link to all of the formats on your web page, possibly with instructions on how to get the volume onto a particular device.  You could also consider self-publishing the volume to the Kindle store, but bear in mind that there may be restrictions, and I believe you will be forced to charge for the volume.  The iTunes Store is another possibility, but comes with its own restrictions and formatting / conversion guidelines.

You should definiltely download the fine E-Book manager, Calibre, which can convert between formats and is free.

In the end, there isn't one true standard for eBook formats yet, but it is not difficult having a few different formats on your web page.


Best practices for dissertation committees to review chapters?

The policy is straight forward but an open question is what use a complete reject means if the advisor has deemed the chapter as passable. As I see it the advisor has (should have) both the insight into the details of the problem and research as well as general knowledge of academic expectations to deem when a manuscript is in shape for passing on. If a committee member does not think this is right then the question still remains who may be right and who may be wrong? Is the decision by vote in the end since there will likely be three or five persons involved in reading the chapters? In my system it is possible for a student to defend even if the advisor or committee member advise against it. Only fools do but it is possible. It is however, still possible for committee members to disagree but usually when issues arise it is because the student-advisor communication has failed for one or the other reason.

So in my view the "journal review method" is a good start but you also need to consider what will happen if there is disagreement and how to possibly weigh the input. Do all committee members have equal weight in all aspects or are they experts in some parts and therefore carry more weight in those chapters than in others. I think the system requires some tweaking in order to accommodate the clear differences that exist between a journal publications and a thesis (sensu monograph) where a thesis typically contains larger quantities of more detailed information than would be possible in a published paper.

As a side point, in my system where paper based theses are the norm, it is hard to "reject" a published paper; one can disagree but something that has passed peer review (albeit a poor one) has still passed. The key pint is thus the overall quality of the work and of the emerging scientist behind it. This i snot necessarily covered by the "journal review method" alone.


Are there any issues with submitting conference papers in one language and publishing them in a journal in a different language?

As stated in the comments. It is totally irrelevant if they are in two languages. If it would be ethical to do this one language then it will be ethical in two. If it is unethical in one language then it will be unethical in two. In my field presenting at a conference and then submitting a paper to a journal is just fine, as long as the conference does not publish a proceedings or similar. In other fields, it is not acceptable. Again, the language matters not.


Is there any chance for a person with BSc in mathematics to get into good graduate level theoretical physics program?

There are students with math major (and other major) go to physics graduate school, but I think all of them have taken physics courses. The first question you should ask yourself is that why you are interested in theoretical physics. If you were the admission committee and see an applicant said that they are interested in physics but taken no physics courses, what do you think? You must explain it in somewhere in your personal statement.

The first thing you should do is to take physics courses and get good grade on all of them. Also, you should try taking few graduate courses. There are no need to take courses on all topics, you should only have strong interest in few topics such as QM, EM, SM, QFT and string theory. Some of them are very mathematical (that good for you). Doing so can demonstrate your interest in physics.

Second, you might try to apply for master program in physics. It is easier to get in and after 1 or 2 years you can apply for PhD in physics to continue your study.

One more options is to apply for math department, in particular, you should look for applied math. There are usually few professors studying mathematical physics. It is particular true for some countries that the theoretical physicists stay in the math department and experimental physicists stay in physics department. Assuming you have good background in mathematics, it should be the easiest option for you to get in those school and start studying theoretical physics.


How to deal with unwanted physical contact, presents and attention by a postdoc supervisor?

This might be more of a Interpersonal Skills question, but:

don't take any action on your own
do support your GF in any way she asks, including (1) being supportive and helping her deal with the stress (2) being present as a third party at meetings or (3) in conversation as a reminder that she's unavailable or (4) as an excuse ("oh, sorry, I have plans with my boyfriend (cough) so it'll be inconvenient to meet in person this weekend, but we could communicate via Zoom/Slack/e-mail ...") — not that it's OK that any of these are necessary in the situation.
after the submission deadline passes, it's a judgement call (depending on personalities, relationships, etc.) whether it's best for her to try to work things out with the postdoc supervisor or go immediately to the professor

@Buffy correctly points out in a comment (I should have included this) that the highest priority is for your GF to stay safe by making sure never to be in a private/one-on-one meeting with the postdoc: if you're not available or she doesn't want you there and she can't set the meeting for a public professional space, ask her to ask a friend or colleague (especially female) to be there (mentioning this advice to your GF would be the one possible exception to "don't give her any help she doesn't want"). If your GF and the postdoc need to work together to take measurements on some equipment, do whatever you have/she has to to make sure there's a third person present.


Is a "Scientific Journal Impact Factor" of around 4 or 5 good for a philosophy journal?

Why not check the impact factor (or similar metrics) at a well-known, reputable source, and then compare it to the rest of the field? I've never heard about Scientific Journal Impact Factor (this one: http://www.sjifactor.inno-space.net/?), but it sounds suspicious and it doesn't list several well-known journals (at least in biology). The "original" impact factor comes from Thomson-Reuters, but in case you do not have access to it (you library should have it though), there are also free reputable services that offer similar metrics. SCImago journal rank or Journal metrics from Scopus comes to mind. Compare the journal you are thinking about with others in the field using one of these services. If the journal you are considering cannot be found there, I would consider this a red flag.

A journal ranking list in philosophy from SCimago can be found here. If you order that list by "Cites per document (2 years)" you will have a very close approximation to the Thomson-Reuters impact factor. From what I can see, an impact factor of >4 would be off the charts for a philosophy journal, which makes me even more sceptical about the metric that you have been looking at.

What's the name of the journal you are considering?