Description
The goal of this assignment is to write a proposal that investigates a clear, novel, and interesting hypothesis. Your proposal should be as detailed as possible, particularly with respect to the research method(s) you are planning to use.
The project proposal should include:
1. Title, authors, and affiliations: Title of project, your name, id, and affiliation. Every student has affiliation. If you are working, you can put your company as well.
2. Abstract: A brief summary. Should be (roughly) two paragraphs, one describing and motivating the problem, and another summarizing the proposed solution, the methodology, and expected results and impact.
3. Introduction. What is the problem (high level, with minimum, if any, technical details)? Why is it important? What is your basic proposed solution? A short discussion of how it fits into related work in the area is also desirable.
4. Problem definition. Precisely define the problem you are addressing (i.e. formally specify the inputs and outputs). Elaborate on why this is an interesting and important problem
5. Proposed solution. Describe in reasonable detail the idea/algorithm/technique you are using to address this problem. In most cases, it is useful trace through a concrete problem instance, showing how your idea solves this instance. The simpler the example, the better, as long as it clarifies the challenging (non-trivial) aspect of the problem and the solution.
6. Related work. Briefly explain who else worked on related problems in the past and what methods they used. It is crucial to compare your proposal to each related work (do not mention any other paper without relating it some how to your work).
7. Research Methodology.
What are the criteria you are using to evaluate your method? What specific hypotheses/claims are you testing? The claims need to be non-trivial and interesting.
If you use experimental analysis, describe the experimental methodology that you plan to use. What are the dependent and independent variables? what is the data you need and how are you planning to collect it? Comparisons to competing methods that address the same problem or to variations of your own solution are particularly useful.
8. References. A list of all books, articles, and web pages you used in your work. Every reference must be cited inside your report. When citing a URL, include date visited. When citing a commercial product, list the company.
9. Acknowledgements. List any people who helped you with your project (e.g. people you consulted with or had useful discussions with (say in a word or two what they did), people who proofread your report, and any external code you used (libraries etc)).
