CPE/CSC 481-W09 Knowledge-Based Systems Term Paper

In place of the midterm and final for this course, we decide to do a written term paper on a topic related to knowledge-based systems. The term paper may be on the same topic as the AI Nugget presentation (it doesn't have to, however). The paper can be done individually, or by teams of students. If you do it as a team, the length of the paper should be expanded accordingly. I will use the paper for individual evaluations, and may assign different scores for co-authors. You need to state who is responsible for which parts of the paper.

Topic

The topic for the term paper must be pre-approved by the instructor. A topic proposal must be submitted via Blackboard.

You topic proposal should include

• proposed title
• proposed abstract (a two or three paragraph explanation of the topic and your perspective on it)
• outline of your approach to the topic (list the big issues and how you want to look at them, maybe a note about why this is an important or timely topic)
• a short bibliography (three sources minimum; books, papers, Web pages or other sources)

Deadlines and Due Date

Topic Proposal

Thursday Week 4

Draft Version

Thursday Week 6

Final Version

Thursday Week 9

Late submission may be subject to a penalty of 10% per business day.

Format

The paper should follow the requirements for submissions to one of the following publications:

• IJCAI 2009 formatting guidelines; includes links to LaTeX and Word templates that adhere to those guidelines
• ACM Crossroads student magazine; see their Writers' Guide for more details.

I expect papers to be 4,000-6,000 words long, which corresponds to roughly 5-10 pages (depending on formatting).

Structure

You paper should contain the information listed below.

• Cover Page: Title, author, affiliation of the author, date, and abstract (5 - 10 sentences, less then 500 words is typical)
• Introduction Section: a rough overview of what issue you are writing about, and your own evaluation or resolution of the issues.
• Facts Section: This section should have no opinion or slant, just give the basic facts that give rise to the issue of interest. Any evidence must be supported by citing your sources.
• Statement of Issue: This contains a few sentences (preferably one!) specifying the issue of interest.
• Arguments about the Issue: This will probably be two (maybe more) subsections detailing arguments about the issue. If your issue is mainly two-sided, you may have one subsection advocating something, then another subsection giving the opposite arguments. This section should not hold your own arguments or judgments; it's purpose is to list and explain the arguments that other people have proposed (even those you do not agree with.)
• Analysis: Now is the time for you to analyze, synthesize, argue, support or attack others' arguments about the issue. This is the main part of the paper. Show what you think, reason out a resolution and show why you believe it works. I do not have to agree with you, just make a good argument.
• Bibliography and Citations: It is imperative that whenever you make reference to a fact of some sort, you cite an authoritative source for that fact. (Ex: "the internet now makes up 4% of the Gross National Product of the USA" [cited source goes here and in your bibliography.]) This is very important. Whenever you use ideas of others, you must give the reference. It is good to use ideas of others in your analysis, but you need to acknowledge it by citing the source.
  When you use Web pages as a source, try to provide at least the following information in addition to the "naked" URL: Title, author, affiliation, date of publication (or date of viewing). And of course you should be especially careful with the reliability and trustworthiness of Web pages.
• Statement of Contributions: For papers co-authored by several people, you need to state who contributed what. This should include the responsible persons for different sections or parts of the paper, but could also state additional roles like proof reader.
  

Draft and Final Version

The draft version should be "content complete"; this means that all parts and sections of the paper should have text, figures, diagrams, code, or other content elements you may plan to use. It may have deficiencies in the formulation, formatting, use of citations, or accordance with the publication guidelines.

The final version should not have any of the above deficiencies, and respect all the publication guidelines that are provided by the editors or publishers. For professional publications, this is also often referred to as "camera-ready" version, indicating that the appearance of that version is almost identical to the one that will appear in the publication (the publisher typically adds headers and footers with information like running titles and page numbers.

The Role of Peer Reviewers

In addition to writing a term paper, you are required to act as peer reviewer or commentator on two papers written by other students. In this capacity, your task is to make sure that the material is presented in such a way that it is as easy as possible for readers to benefit from the paper. This includes, but is not restricted to the following:

• Verify the facts. Make sure that the sources cited in the paper exist, confirm the facts, and are reputable.
• Check the arguments, and the conclusions derived. Try to ensure that the reasoning employed in the paper is consistent and sound. Point out if there are gaps, inconsistencies, or other problems.
• Ensure balance and fairness. Especially for controversial issues, authors may get carried away by their own preferences and viewpoints. Look at the arguments presented for or against different perspectives, and point out omissions or biased presentations. This is of course less relevant for the sections where the authors present their own, subjective opinion. Opinions and personal preferences should be clearly identified, and there should be a clear separation between facts and issues on one hand, and the subjective opinions on the other.
• Do a consistency check between citations and the list of references in the bibliography. Every citation in the text must have a full listing in the bibliography, and ideally each source listed in the bibliography should be referenced at least once in the text.
• Point out spelling and grammatical errors.
• Phrase your criticism in a professional and positive way. Your job is not to "trash" the paper, but to help the author improve it.

The issues above are typically addressed when professionals review articles submitted to academic journals, and are usually followed by a recommendation to publish the article, reject it, or to ask the author for modifications. To this end, the evaluators fill out a review form, and return it to the editor of the journal, who then makes the final decision about publication, rejection, or a request for modification of the paper.

The identity of the reviewers is usually only known to the editor; otherwise, authors who are unhappy with the evaluation of their paper may be tempted to retribute against the reviewers. In order to keep the administrative overhead low, we will conduct open reviews, where the authors know the identity of the reviewer.

You can find further information on the reviewing process, in particular for Computer Science publications, at http://web.njit.edu/~bieber/review.html http://www.eng.unt.edu/ian/pubs/referee.pdf

Specifically for this class, you need to complete a peer review form for the draft version, and submit it to the respective BlackBoard Wiki or discussion forum (as a reply to the posting of the paper). After the final version is available, the reviewers will check if the authors fixed any errors, and addressed the concerns brought up by the reviewers. This does not necessarily mean that the authors will have to adhere to all the suggestions made by the reviewers, but they should make a conscious decision to address or not address every issue. Some professional publications require authors to submit additional statements explaining the changes made in response to reviewer suggestions, and justifying their decisions.

Term Paper Writing Tips

• Do a spell check!
• Check the grammar!
• Remember the Writing Lab in 10-138.
• Use a clean, clear format, with descriptive headings.
• Number the pages.
• Do not use long quotes; cite the ones you use.
• Cite all "facts" you state by listing a reference to the sources of those facts (this is important!)
• Link citations to your bibliography in a reasonable way (author and year, or numbers are fine); journals also often specify explicitly how citations must be formatted.

Grading Guidelines

The overall score for writing the paper and the reviewing activities is 100, distributed as follows:<\p>

• 10% Proposal: Title, abstract, and citations.
• 20% Draft Version: Content-complete, formatting and formulation may be imperfect
• 50% Final Version: Ready for publication
• 20% Reviews: Review of two papers: draft version, check of the final version.

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