Saturday, March 24, 2007

My research life approachs complete one more step

From winter break, I am doing on something which I feel very good. And I spend a lot of time to do literature survey to make sure no one did similiar thing before. Then I began to do proof and write a journal-like notes with 20+ pages. But yesterday, I read a paper published in top journal which is a special case as my idea. Although I did something else and proof is different, I still feel very very frustrated. I received Larry's comfort email. After one night sleep, I feel a little bit. And I also chat with my college friend who is top researcher in my mind. It makes feel better also. Our chat history is attached in the comments. Chinese is mine and English is my friend.

3 comments:

Ying said...

昨天暴不爽
?
最近在做一篇paper,感觉不错
之前做了好长时间的literature survey
hehe
一直觉得定位不错
that's common
结果昨天发现一篇很类似
tnnd
it has happended to me many times
关键这paper的名字太不common,根本就没有用这个领域常用的keyword作为主题
不过我做的东西是他的generalization,而且还有些提高
他们基本上就证明special case里面的unique NE。我做了general的case,而且还作些许comparative study。我都已经写了近30页了
en
现在不知道怎么定位了
but they might say the generalization is straightforward
也不想就放弃了
是的,就是这样的
depends on the reviewer leh
不过他们有些步骤就想当然,我还证明了一把
they might think it's obvious
it's really hard to say
esp. if you reference their paper
they might be your reviewer
侬有碰到写到一半然后发现类似的paper么?
yeah
quite many times
你怎么处理那?
either give up
or try to get more results
there are so many people
我大概应该会选后面一种,觉得还是有东西可以squeeze
it is not very likely that you can get a brand new idea
even if you feel it's a new idea now
我用了将近一个寒假做survey,不过Literature那么多
you might realize that there are some similar ideas later on
关键我的风格不是钻一个地方,而是四处播种。
看来以后还是要focus
the only safe case is that you solve an open problem
呵呵,是的
if you try to formulate a new problem
with high probability, it's not that new
但是solve open problem好处和坏处太大
我不知道EE领域如何,我们这个领域感觉大家都是一窝蜂
there are some central problems
which might have been open for quite some time
I got frustrated by this kind of thing so many times
esp. when you enter a new area
我以前本科修EE,感觉EE还是有个体系在里面,就是说有点金字塔的感觉。但是IE或者特别是OM,感觉特别零零碎碎。即使在修课的
没有什么先后次序
yeah, maybe
不过侬起码现在还是克服过来
我老板有可能让我四年毕业
it still happens to me
oh
that's good
其实我自己感觉交流很重要,特别在fomulate idea的时候
then you should start to look for job now
不过四年找faculty以我现在水平肯定不行
do finance bah
但是我这行又没啥post-doc
其实我还是蛮喜欢我现在做的东西
做finance太累,而且就是人赚人的钱
没啥意思
hehe
the road to faculty might not be smooth
是的
我觉得我这个本身还是喜欢和别人讨论。可是我们系培养phd,不是以培养faculty为主。没啥人可以讨论
自己闭门造车总会出现这种情况
yeah
不过侬不是喜欢自己thinking的么
right
discussion sometimes help
s
two years ago
when I was discussing with my friend at Cornell
I suddenly realized that I could solve an open problem in their area
that lead to a nice paper
but in general, I rely on myselft
修行还是要靠自己,但是generate idea以后,还是能够多聊比较好。而且很多时候idea能够在聊中不断完善。anyway,每个人总是有自己的做事方法

Anonymous said...

There are many outlets for publication. You don't need to worry too much, if you are not solely targeting MS or OR.

I agree that discussion is very important in concreting ideas. Unfortunatly, it is not easy to find good partners.

Keep in touch!

Ying said...

That's my original targets. :(

It is no easier than finding a wife. :) It requires not only good researchers but not matching researchers.

I try to generate a list of things I want to do the future. Let's see whether we can find common interest in the future.