Course Description
for Seminar in Computer Science (CS 4960)

20610 CS 4960 002 Seminar in Computer Science 1.0 Thursdays 15:30-16:20 P-114

• To explore aspects of computer science beyond what you have encountered in your previous course work,
  
  
• To benefit from similar research done by your fellow students, and
  
  
• To present an important body of work in both written and oral form.

• Accept the presentation date I assign at the beginning of the semester.
  
  
• Choose a computer science topic to research and present to an audience. The audience will include, but not be limited to, the other members of the class.
  
  
  1. The topic must have significant scholarly, as opposed to merely technological, content.
     
     
  2. The research must draw on multiple sources, and embody concepts that may be expected to endure beyond any particular current technology.
     
     
  3. Your presentation must be different from all others, including those given in other courses.
  
  
• Propose your topic (use the e-mail form interface) and follow all the directions given there.
  
  The proposal must include:
  
  
  • full citations, in proper form, of at least two sources from which you intend to draw. For details about proper content and form for citations, see "Your List of References" and "When You Make Direct Use of a Source" below. When you submit your proposal, you must submit filled-out forms (see form #1 here) for two articles from scholarly periodicals. Additional requirements regarding those two articles appears below under the title "RESTRICTIONS ON SOURCES"
    
    
  • an abstract of up to 250 words, which describes the nature of the scholarly content that you will include in your presentation. You will enter the text of the abstract into form #2 found here.
  
  
• Your proposal must be satisfactory in order for you to pass the course. You must get my formal approval of the proposal by working out an agreement with me, which may mean that you will have to perform a series of revisions to your proposal.
  
  
• Create a balanced and unbiased written report on your topic. Base it on solid sources, including at least the ones you listed in your approved proposal. Your report must contain what the approved proposal says it will contain. You can add more content, but you aren't allowed to leave out stuff that you said you'd include. Synthesize and summarize the knowledge you gained from studying your source materials. Infuse the exposition of the report with freshness and originality. The report must tell what you learned about the subject matter - what you think, feel, and wonder about it. What interesting questions did your research answer? What interesting questions remain unanswered?
  
  How long does your written report need to be? The written report must contain exposition of everything you are going to say in your oral presentation, and your oral presentation has to run at least 40 minutes. By rehearsing and timing yourself you can figure out how long it takes you to present, say, a page of material. Once you figure that out, you will know how many pages you need. Do not fail to prepare a presentation that runs at least 40 minutes.
  
  
• Turn in your written report one week in advance of your presentation date.
  
  Give one copy of your written report to me, and a copy to each member of the class, so that all members can begin reviewing the information a week before your oral presentation.
  
  Your report must be double-spaced, have wide margins, and have a font size of 12 or greater.
  
  You will have the option of either giving each member of the class a hard copy of the report, or sharing a link with the class - a link to a PDF version of your report, published via the CS Department web server. "Sharing a link with the class" means you come to class on the due date and you share the link by giving each member of the class a piece of paper, on which is typed or legibly written the correct URL for accessing your report. That's how you have to do it.
  
  Whether or not you decide to give hard copies of your report to your fellow students, you must give me a hardcopy of the report.
  
  If you ask Marlys, the CS Department secretary, sufficiently ahead of time, she can help you avoid paying per-page charges for any printouts or photocopies that you need to make for me and/or the class members. Feel free to talk to me about this if you have any questions.
  
  
• On your assigned date, deliver an oral presentation of the content of your written report. Like your written report, your oral presentation must contain what the approved proposal said it would contain.
  
  I will publicly announce seminar presentations. They will be open to visitors who may wish to attend.
  
  You must speak for no less than 40 minutes and no more than 45 minutes. If not, you will have to repeat the presentation (during finals week) in order to get credit for the course.
  
  (To insure that your presentation goes well, it is essential that you rehearse it, and that you are prepared to make your presentation a little longer or shorter, if the need arises.) After your talk ends, we'll ordinarily use some of the remainder of the 50-minute class session for comments, questions, and your answers.
  
  When you make your oral presentation, you'll lose a lot of credit if you merely read your words from prepared text. That could also lead to me requiring you to repeat your presentation. (Whether the prepared text you read from is on a screen, on paper, or something else is immaterial.)
  
  It's fine if you rely somewhat on looking at "slides" on the classroom screen, or other kinds of notes, but you are not allowed to spend long periods of time reading stuff to the audience. Also, it will count against you if you remain seated for most or all of your presentation.
  
  Some people have significant special kinds of issues with public speaking. If that's the case for you, bring your issues up with me right away, and I'll see what I can work out with you. You can come see me in my office to discuss such issues.
  
  
• Attend all the presentations of the other members of the class. React to the presentations by asking questions and by filling in feedback forms, which I will collect after the presentation, record, anonymize, and give to the presenter. During the semester, each student must ask (out loud) presenters at least three documented questions, and receive their answers. Students will document questions by (accurately) writing the questions and answers on a special form.

1. the quality of your efforts during the topic selection and topic proposal phase,
2. your grade on your written report,
3. your grade on your oral presentation, and
4. your participation grade.

1. you receive a a score of 60 or above in each of the four components, and
2. your average over the four components is 70 or above.

How to Cite Your Sources of Information

It is very important to good scholarship and intellectual honesty that you accurately and fully report the sources of information you employ in preparing your report.

Your List of References

Make a list of references. In the list, cite all your sources of information whatever be their form: written word, audio, image, video, material artifact. Attach the list to the end of your written report. A report without such a properly-constructed list of references is unacceptable. The citations have to be complete and have a proper kind of format, as explained further on in this document, and in some of the documents to which this document has links.

The references in a list are always numbered or tagged in some way so that you can specify exactly which one you mean when you speak or write about them.

Each item in your list of references is a guide to your reader. The reader may want to examine your source material. You must describe each of your sources so that the reader will be able to find a copy of the source as easily as possible.

Here are some specific rules for citing an article, book, or web page:


1. For our purposes, a periodical is a scholarly magazine (also known as a journal) that is published, continuing indefinitely, at regular intervals (no less frequently than quarterly - four times per year).
   
   An entry in your list of references for an article in a periodical must include
   • the title of the article,
   • the name(s) of the author(s) of the article,
   • the page numbers where the article appears (or, if you read the article online and page numbers are not available, the full URL of the article),
   • the title of the periodical in which the article appeared,
   • the date of publication of the issue of the periodical in which the article appeared (along with any volume and/or issue numbers you can find), and
   • the name of the editor of the issue of the periodical in which the article appeared.
   If you accessed the article on-line, then you must also cite the full URL.
   
   Scholars are not normally required to cite the name of the EDITOR of a journal, but I require YOU to do that. I think it will help make sure that you pick the right kinds of articles. You may have to do some extra searching to find the editor's name, but it's usually pretty easy to locate it in the "about" information or a similar category. Where does the name of the editor go in your citations? Put it at the very end.
   
   
2. An entry in your list of references for an article from the proceedings of a conference will contain much the same information as a citation for an article from a journal. However there won't usually be volume or issue numbers, and instead of editor name(s), you may find only name(s) of conference chair(s).
   
   
3. An entry in your list of references for a book must include
   • the title and edition number,
   • author,
   • publisher,
   • date of publication, and
   • ISBN.
   Some books are on-line. For example, many books that are in the public domain are on-line. If you accessed the book on-line then you must also cite the full URL.
   
   Scholars are not normally required to cite the ISBN of a book, but I require YOU to do that. It may give me some needed help when I'm checking your references. Where does the ISBN go in your citations? Put it at the very end.
   
   
4. If you want to use a web page as a reference, rule 1 or rule 2 may apply. If not, then you must diligently search the web page and the appropriate related pages (e.g. a link to "home" or "about us") for the following information:
   • author,
   • date the page was last updated,
   • date you viewed the page,
   • the full URL, and
   • any additional information you think may help your reader find the information and/or get an idea of its quality.
   The URL should be "stable." If it appears that the page will only be available temporarily, then it is not appropriate to use it as a source.

Citations for other forms of writing, audio, video, images, and artifacts are to be made along the same lines.

Look here for a great deal of very useful additional information regarding how to cite various kinds of source material.



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RESTRICTIONS ON SOURCES:

Two of your sources - the ones you submit as part of your proposal, using form #1 here -- must be peer-reviewed articles from scholarly periodicals, citable as described above, of high quality, and published no more than five years ago.

See this information from the Cornell University Library for help understanding the difference between scholarly and non-scholarly periodicals.

To help insure that these two required articles are scholarly, you must verify that it is possible to find both of them using this search facility. Make sure of that before submitting your topic proposal. Of course, you can use that search facility to perform your initial searches for those articles.

Caution: An article appearing in the proceedings of a scholarly conference is not equivalent to an article from a scholarly periodical. A periodical is published at regular intervals - no less than four times per year. Therefore I will not accept an article from the proceedings of a conference as a substitute for one of the required articles from scholarly periodicals.



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WHEN YOU MAKE DIRECT USE OF A SOURCE

Direct use of source text means direct quotation or close paraphrase. The term also applies to other kinds of "art." For example, if you insert an image from one of your sources into your work, that is direct use of a source. If you slightly modify or copy someone's art and then insert it into your work, it is still considered direct use.

In the type of writing you are assigned to do for this class, it is permissable to make limited direct use of source material. However, it is very seldom appropriate to make extended direct use of source material.

For example, it is seldom appropriate to quote or paraphrase a long passage of text from a source. It is seldom proper to include copious numbers of diagrams and images from source material.

You must include acknowledgement with each direct use of a source, whether it be limited or extended.

It is dishonest to omit proper acknowledgement.

You must place quotation marks ("") around any text that you copy directly (quote) from a source.

You must place the acknowledgement in very close proximity to the location in your writing where you have used the source. The acknowledgement must indicate which source you used and where to find the material within the source. You may use an in-line comment or a footnote to identify the location.

For example, if you number the items in your reference list like this:

[1] Comer, Douglas E. 1999. Computer Networks and Internets, 2nd ed. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall. ISBN 0-13-083617-6.



[2] Sobell, Mark G. 1995. Unix System V: a practical guide, 3rd ed. Boston, MA: Addison Wesley. ISBN 0-8053-7566-X.

Then you can use a simple in-line comment within your text to acknowledge and identify the location of a direct quotation. The following text illustrates the idea:

As Comer states on page 158 of [1]: "To achieve high bit rates over conventional twisted pair wiring, ADSL uses an adaptive technology in which a pair of modems probe many frequencies on the line between them ..."


According to the free dictionary:

DEFINITION: To Plagiarize


• Transitive Verb:
  • To use and pass off (the ideas or writings of another) as one's own.
  • To appropriate for use as one's own passages or ideas from (another).
  
  
• Intransitive Verb:
  • To put forth as original to oneself the ideas or words of another.

If you make direct use of a source without acknowledgement, then you are plagiarizing, and that is dishonest.

Do not plagiarize any part of what you write for this class, or what you present visually or orally.

Penalties

If there is compelling evidence of plagiarism, I will withhold credit, in the manner I deem appropriate, including the possibility of assigning a failing grade to the offender.