Doing Research


Talk to master students at the department of computer science, Kasetsart university.
30 June 2005
I shall give you an overview of the research process in the context of doing a research towards master degree thesis.

Research

Definition

- Careful or diligent search
- Studious inquiry or examination; especially : investigation or experimentation aimed at the discovery and interpretation of facts, revision of accepted theories or laws in the light of new facts, or practical application of such new or revised theories or laws
- The collecting of information about a particular subject

Motivation

It is very important to appreciate the value of research.  If you value it you will motivation yourself to do it.

I view research along the time axis:

short term    1 year
medium term   2-5 years
long term     > 5 years

There is no doubt about the correlation between scientific development and wealth of a nation.  Scientific development is mostly driven by research.  Most everyday products are the result of some fundamental discovery in science.  Technology is the fruit of scientific discovery.  

Let us do some excercise in "valuating" research work.
What is the value of theses done in Thailand.  In most library, there are a lot of theses in the shelves.  How can we say these theses are useful?  Who use it?

During postgraduate study, we are reading a lot of other people work.  What is the value of the material we are reading?  Why are we reading it?

Method

What should be the topic of research?
In the context of master degree in computer science, how can we "create" a suitable topic?
I will say, almost anything to do with computers can be suitable as a topic of research.  The important things are

1  the "newness" of the subject.  
2  the "value" of the subject.  

There are many ways to create a topic:

1  from the real-world problems
2  from the boundary of current knowledge
3  from imagination

Excercise:  

Imagine how can you add "value" to your favourite subject, such as, "I like programming".  How can you make that valuable in term of academic.  

- You may ask "what is the smallest program that can solve the problem?"
- You may ask "Is this first program to do this job?"
- You may ask "Can I write a program to solve the problem with the least energy?" etc.

Imagination is the most important skill for research.

To do your research

1  Post a problem statement
2  Design a method to solve the problem
3  Negotiate the expectation of the result
4  Do it

A supervised research, which is the type you will do in master degree with your thesis advisor, needs good communication between you and your advisor.  Expectation is the most important element in successful collaboration.  Work out what will be the result of your reseach.  Discuss it with your advisor.  You must convince yourself of the "value" of your proposed research.  Then you must also convince your advisor.  The duty of your advisor is the guide you through the jungle of difficulty.  (and not to tell you really how to do it, I believe!)

You will:

read a lot, to know what is the current state of the art
talk a lot, to synthesis your idea
write a lot, to make your idea concrete and to communicate your idea formally.

Evaluation

In research, we control the quality by "peer review".  That is, we believe that the best person to "valuate" our work is the person who is knowledgable in the field, our "peer".  The impact of a research work and its indicator are as follows:

Conclusion

It is very important to appreciate the value of research work.  Your imagination can create a good research topic.  To make it acceptable, the discussion with "authority", i.e. the thesis committee, must be done to find the common expectation.  The usefulness of research work for the industry in three categories are:


Avoid pit falls in doing a master thesis

  1. Don't choose the topic that requires new skill.  For example, if you are proficient C programmer, use C.  Don't try to learn a new language for your thesis.  The time is too short.
  2. Get the scope of your work right.  Most oftenly, you underestimate the amount of work required and overestimate your ability.  The time is too short.
  3. The time is always too short.  Don't postpone any work, do it now.

Enjoy doing research!

END

last update 1 July 2005