== Scientific writing ==

The skills required for science and writing -- are they different? 

"The best science is based on straightforward, logical thinking, and it isn't artistic prose that we expect in [scientific texts] -- we expect clarity." [Writing for Computer Science, J. Zobel]




- Be simple
  - do not divagate
  - do not pad
  - no run-on sentences
  - one idea/fact per sentence, one line of thought per paragraph
  
  - Be concise and precise
  - be unambiguous (e.g., are back references such as "those" or "it" clear?)
  - concrete statements instead of vague descriptions such as "many", "good", "quite" etc.
  
  
- Avoid:
  - abbreviations. If used, use them consistently.
  - footnotes, because they interrupt the reading flow.
  - parentheses. Either it is important to say/read -> write it, or it is not important -> do not write it.

  
- Tense
  - facts: present tense
  - Observations (in own experiments, previous studies): Past tense
  
  
- Technical terms:
  - introduce (\emph{...})
  - re-use consistently
  - use existing terms instead of inventing new, own terms

  
- Thread
  - vary connecting phrases (many authors overuse "However, ...")
  - introductory sentence per section
  - Refer to each figure/table. Refer at that point where reader should switch from main text to figure/table.


- Be critical on your own text.


"... following elementary steps: create a logical organization, use concise sentences, revise against checklists of possible problems, seek feedback. Like many skills, writing improves through practice and a willingness to accept and learn from criticism."  [Writing for Computer Science, J. Zobel]


"There is no excuse for a report that contains spelling errors." [Writing for Computer Science, J. Zobel]



== Citations ==

- Why to care about previous work?
  - do not invent the wheel a second time
  - appreciate previous work
  - demonstrate your knowledge of the research area
  - provide links to other relevant, interesting, background literature

  
  
- What should you cite?
  1. books, book chapters
  2. review articles
  3. journal articles (peer-reviewed)
  4. conference articles (peer-reviewed)
  5. avoid: PhD theses, posters, personal communication
  - if you have several choices: primal publication, most recent publication, most important publication, most elegant publication?

  
- How?
  - name-year system: "BLAST (Altschul et al. 1990) and FASTA (Pearson 1990)  are based on pairwise alignment."
  - number system: "BLAST [11] and FASTA [17] are based on pairwise alignment."
  - Emphasize others work by stating authors and year of publication: "In 1990, two methods based on pairwise alignment have been introduced: BLAST by Altschul et al. [1] and FASTA by W. Pearson [17]."

  
- Where?
  - as close to the statement as possible
  - directly after naming a method/algorithm/tool
  - in case of several statements, after the last

  
- BibTeX
  - blabla~\cite{KEY1, KEY2}
  - blabla~\cite[Chapter 3]{BOOKKEY}
  - \nocite{*} for test usage
  - \bibliographystyle{abbrv, alpha, ...}