In this assignment, you will write a position paper. You must choose from from the possible position topics, or clear your topic idea with the professor. Note that you can also take the opposite position from those described below.
You will also evaluate one of your classmate's position papers, and then revise your paper. Your evaluations should be about 1 page each.
Above all, try to have some fun with your position --- invoke some reaction in your classmates (from awe at your genius to anger at your toeing the party-line).
First Draft Position paper: Friday, March 8th, 11:55PM
Upload your papers in the Canvas Assignments page.
A good review of writing style can be found here: Strunk and White, Elements of Style, 4th edition
Although system designers often reference elegance and consistency, backwards compatibility, and portability, and extensiblility trump those metrics for many real world systems and development environments.
Generality, simplicity, speed and reliability are at odds. Too do one well requires sacrificing some of the others, and these trade-offs are fundamental.
There always exists and elegant design for a problem that is simple, functional, fast and reliable. If a system appears to sacrifice one of those metrics for another, you have not worked hard enough or smart enough.
More position topics will be listed soon!
This
paper has some good guidelines in for position papers in general.
Two sample “good” position papers from past courses can be
found here
and here.
Two newer position paper examples can be found here. and here.
First, make sure to articulate your position clearly. Second, for a good computer science paper, you should have some quantitative arguments. A list of anecdotes is not a persuasive way to support of a position. Sometimes, you can't directly measure something, but an indirect observation might support your argument. For example, some people have made the argument that performance isn't as important as it used to be because the difference between the average selling price of a PC and the most expensive PC have diverged over time. While not proving the argument, the thesis fits the facts better than many alternative explanations.
Third, be careful of using counter-examples to argue against a position. For example, a position of the form "X implies Y" and then coming up with an example of "not Y" doesn't say anything about statement X. Counter examples can be quite useful, but make sure the position is clear enough that the counter-example is meaningful.
Please us the following evaluation scheme on a scale from 1-10, where 10 is the highest quality and 1 is the lowest:
10. Excellent: The paper could be submitted as a "letter" --- a short position paper-- to a journal as is.
8-9. Very Good: The paper has some problems, but nothing that couldn't be fixed without a quick clean-up.
6-7. Good: The paper has some problems, there are some gaps in the overall positions, counter-positions, or supporting evidence.
4-5. Fair: The paper has more serious problems. These may include (1) ill-defined position, (2) elements of the evidence are missing, (3) counter positions are not addressed, (4) really bad grammar, or (5) poor organization.
2-3. Poor: The position in not well explained or defined. The paper is confusing or internally inconsistent. The evidence is non-existent or very poor.
1. Atrocious: What a piece of junk! I'm surprised this was turned in at all.