Analysis of processes for extraction and decoding of textual and graphical information through document image analysis

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Writing Your Dissertation

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Today’s Agenda

• Guidelines

• Structure

• Managing references

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Guidelines

About time to write

Dissertation writing is a continuous process throughout

the project

• Do not wait for the end of your project to start writing

• Writing helps to structure your thoughts

• Writing facilitates the communication with your

supervisors/researchers

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Guidelines

Writing style

Be precise in description

� Avoid vague or ambiguous description – be clear and to the

point

� Avoid unnecessary complicated terminology

Avoid unnecessarily long sentences

Be concise in description

� Express arguments as efficiently as possible

� Delete unnecessary redundancy (e.g. needless words, phrase,

paragraphs)

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Guidelines

Writing style

Be structured in your presentation

� Have a distinct outline for the whole dissertation

� Give an outline of each chapter/section at their very

beginning

Well written

� Use specified template for typesetting/formatting if

available

� No spelling, grammatical or other language errors

� Good writing strengthens your dissertation

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Guidelines

• Make your dissertation focused and concise

� Include only what is necessary to your research

� Truthfully and objectively report both expected and

unexpected results

� Include all significant results even if they are

unfavourable ones

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Structure

Title page

Abstract

Acknowledgements

Table of contents

List of figures and tables (optional)

Part 1: Introduction and Background

Chapter 1: Introduction (Background)

Chapter 2: Related work (Literature review)

Part 2: Main body – Describing your work

Chapter 3: Approach and method(s)

Chapter 4: Result analysis

Part 3: Wrap-up

Chapter 5: Conclusions

References (or Bibliography)

Appendices (optional)

Example of

a basic outline

of a dissertation

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Structure Title page

Specify the title, author, date, degree awarded,

school/university, etc.

Title - a short and descriptive phrase indicating the

most distinct features of your work

� Does the title indicate the general subject area?

� Does the title indicate the problem within the subject area?

� Does the title given an idea of your approach?

� Does the title distinguish your work from others’?

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Structure Title page

• A title should be

� Unique

� Concise

� Clear

� Informative

� Specific

� Honest

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Structure Abstract

Abstract - the whole paper in miniature � What you did (background & problem)

� How you did it (methods)

� What are the results (results)

� What do they mean (implications)

• The purpose of writing an abstract To enable readers to quickly and accurately identify the substance

of your work

To advertise your work (to encourage readers to obtain and read

the full article, and to be available on online databases).

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Structure Abstract

• An abstract is NOT

� A Table of Contents / organization of your dissertation

� A summary (a summary appears at the end of the work, and

is a restatement of the important findings and conclusions)

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Structure Abstract

The essential elements of the structure of an abstract:

The background the problem the methods

the results the implications

Background � Briefly set up the background and context to the study, its rationale and

significance

Within this background, you need to couch the problem

• Problem � Identify the particular research problem under investigation, the purpose

of the study, and any specific research objectives or hypotheses.

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Structure Abstract

• Methods • Outline the approach you took and the methods you used to investigate the

problem.

• Describe the extent of the study, what you did or measured, and how you did

it.

Results � Give any important data. Be specific, not vague.

– State the major interpretations and findings

– Discuss how the findings relate to the original research problem Explain any

limitations on the results.

• Implications

� State the contribution of the work and its implications

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Structure Abstract

� A abstract is a condensed format which contains

often about 250 words only (10 -20 sentences)

� Choose your words very carefully

� Exclude any general and obvious statements

� The phrasing must be concentrated and compact

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Structure

Table of contents

• To inform about the organization /

structure

• To help locate sections of interest

• To help the reader identify your

contribution

Provide a list of figures & tables for a long

dissertation

Use software tools to

generate automatically!

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Structure Chapter 1. Introduction

Lead the reader into your research and give background

information

• Set the scene for the dissertation by introducing a

relevant subject, and its general knowledge and issues

• Further state and define the specific problem/issue in the subject

that the dissertation is trying to address/solve , making the reader

understand your research problem and its meaning

• Outline the organisation of the dissertation

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Structure Chapter 2. Literature Review

Review existing work and address motivation

� Describe related work (what have been done and comparisons

of existing work in terms of advantages/disadvantages/gaps)

and hence sets a benchmark for the current project

� State the motivation – justify why the problem should be

studied and the importance of your work

� Declare the aims and objectives of your research

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Structure Chapter 3. Approach and Methodology

Present your research design and implementation

� Discuss the approach and method for how you will achieve

the aims & objectives of your project – How you conduct

your project

� Provide a rationale for the approach that you have chosen.

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Structure Chapter 4. Result Analysis

Present results and give analysis

� Describe your results and findings in enough detail for the

reader to judge them

� Present a detailed analyses of your findings

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Structure Chapter 5. Conclusions

Present conclusions and direct future

� Summarise the main findings of the research

� Claim the main contributions of the research, and stress the

meaningfulness of your work

o Compare with existing work, and emphasise its key features & advantages

o Put your work into a wider context and address its impact

� Recommend future work

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Managing References

• Why reference

• Proper referencing

• Harvard system

• Reference to figures and tables

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Managing References

• Show how your work extends the current

state-of-the-art knowledge in the area

• Show the originality of your work

• Give credit to other people’s work (and avoid

being accused of plagiarism)

Why reference – (1)

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Managing References

• Support arguments made in your report (any claim made

in the report must be supported either by your own

research or by citing the results published by other

people)

• Show that you are familiar with the work done in the area

Why reference – (2)

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Managing References

• In-text citation

• Reference list

Proper referencing – (1)

Includes two elements

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Managing References

• Harvard referencing (author-date style)

Reference style

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Managing References

Harvard referencing

• A typical author-date referencing system

• You should use this as referencing system in

your dissertation

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Managing References

Reference list ordered by last name of authors alphabetically References

Boehm, B. W. 1981. Software Engineering Economics. Prentice-Hall, Eaglewood Cliffs, New

Jersey.

Knuth, D. E. 1999. The Art of Programming. 3rd edition, vol 2, Addison-Wesley, Reading,

MA, USA.

Stankovic, J. A. 1988a. Misconceptions About Real-Time Computing: A Serious Problem for

Next-Generation Systems. IEEE Computer, 21(10), October, pp. 10–19.

Stankovic, J. A. 1988b. Real-Time Computing Systems: The Next Generation. In: Stankovic, J.

A. (ed). Hard Real-Time Systems. IEEE Computer Society Press. 1988.

Stankovic, J. A., Son, S. H., and Hansson, J., 1999. Misconceptions About Real-Time

Database Systems. IEEE Computer, 32(6), June, pp. 29–36.

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Managing References

• Use the form: author, date

� The surname of the author

� The year of the publication

� (Smith, 2001)

In-text citation

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Managing References

� Knuth (1999) showed that .…

� Gatziu and Dittrich’s (1999) overview of the project …

� Stankovic et al. (1999) identified common misconceptions …

� Locke (1986, 1992) showed that …

In-text citation – Two ways

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Managing References

� It has been shown that.…. (Knuth, 1999).

� The project investigated …… (Gatziu and Dittrich, 1999).

� Misconceptions have been identified (Stankovic et al., 1999)

� It has been shown that.… (Locke, 1986, 1992).

� The idea of simplicity has been used uncritically (Popper, 1992, p. 136).

In-text citation

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Managing References

Book

List of references

Knuth, D. E. 1999. The Art of Programming. 3rd edition, vol 2, Addison-Wesley,

Reading, MA, USA.

Author(s)

Year of publication

Title (in Italic)

Edition (if it is not the first edition)

PublisherPlace of publication

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Managing References

Journal article

List of references

Stankovic, J. A. Son, S. H., and Hansson, J., 1999. Misconceptions About Real-Time

Database Systems. IEEE Computer, 32(6), June, pp. 29–36.

Author(s) Year of publication Title of article

Name of journal (in italic) month

Volume number, issue number Page number of article

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Managing References

Conference paper

List of references

Stankovic, J. A. Mohan, C. 1999. Repeating History beyond ARIES. In: M. P. Atkinson, M.

E. Orlowska, P. Valduriez, S. B. Zdonik, M. L. Brodie, (eds) Proceedings of the 25th

International Conference on Very Large Data Bases, Edinburgh, Scotland, UK,

September 7th–10th, pp. 1–17.

Author(s) Year of publication Title of paper

Title of proceedings (in Italic) Location and dates of conference

Editor(s) of proceedings

Page number of paper

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Managing References

Web resource

List of references

Davison, R. and Kock, N., editors. 2004. Professional Ethics [online]. Available from:

http://www.is.cityu.edu.hk/research/resources/ethics/index.htm [Accessed 27 June 2007].

Author(s) Year Title

Available from (e.g. URL)

Type of medium

Access date