Tips for giving a research paper presentation. Useful for graduate students and early career researchers.

1. 1
How to Give a
Good Presentation?
Cliff C. Zou
CAP6135
01/2011

2. 2
Outline
 How to Read a Research Paper
 Prepare Presentation Slides
 Give a Presentation
 Follow up
 Online Resource

3. 3
Find Good Research Paper
 Find papers in high-quality conferences
 There are too many conferences/workshops!!
 Security research conferences:
 Top ranking conferences:
 IEEE Security & Privacy, ACM CCS, Usenix Security
 Other good conferences:
 NDSS, RAID, ACSAC, SecureCom, AsiaCCS, DSN, ESORICS….
 Conference papers are grouped into sections according to topics
 The section title will tell you the research topic
 Help you quickly find papers you are interested

4. Find Good Research Paper
 Good security research journals:
 ACM Transactions on Information and System Security
 IEEE Transactions on Dependable and Secure Computing
 IEEE Transactions on Information Forensics and Security
 Problem for journals:
 They are slow in publishing, usually will be two years later than
conference papers
 Good resource to find security conferences:
 http://faculty.cs.tamu.edu/guofei/sec_conf_stat.htm
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5. 5
How to Read a Research Paper
 Glance through abstracts to find interesting
ones
 Read introduction and one more section to
get the big picture
 Understand the novel idea(s) provided by a
paper
 Read “related work” and glance over several
related papers if not familiar with the topic
 Read the whole paper if the paper is worth it

6. 6
How to Read a Research Paper
 Ask questions actively when reading:
 What is the novel idea(s)?
 Can I do this research, too?
 Some research are not doable by yourself
 E.g., require specific hardware, software, data
 Then they are not much helpful for your own research
 What can I learn from this paper on my own
research?
 What are the weaknesses of the paper?
 Which point(s) can I do further research on?
 Important to conduct your own research

7. How to Read a Research Paper
 Write a brief notes on each paper you just
finished reading
 Refresh your memory (important!)
 Will not forget the paper’s idea half year later
 Have a better/clearer understanding of the
paper after you write down your thoughts
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8. How to Read a Research
Paper
 Keep a record for you to quickly find the paper
later
 Better put notes into computer files
 Each file contains:
 papers of a conference, of a year
 Papers of a specific research topic
 Use clear file name to show the content
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9. 9
Outline
 How to Read a Research Paper
 Prepare Presentation Slides
 Give a Presentation
 Follow up
 Online Resource

10. 10
Prepare Presentation Slides
 Create examples/figures/animations to
explain
 May not in paper, create by yourself
 Animations or step-by-step figures are best in
explaining a system, architecture, algorithm
 Not in paper, must be done by yourself
 Do not only put words in slides
 Boring, too abstract

11. 11
Prepare Presentation Slides
 Be focused
 Success if you pass ONE single central idea of a paper
 Audience cannot understand everything in 30 minutes!
 If you cannot explain a point clearly, skip it
 Some ideas/algorithms are complicated to explain
 Only use a sentence to say the name, and results
 In most case, a complicated idea is not the novel point of a paper
 Not too colorful Powerpoint template
 Readable text: big font, clear color
 e.g., no green/yellow text on white background
 Readable figures
 A project usually has fewer color, smaller resolution than a
computer screen!

12. 12
Prepare Presentation Slides
 Concise, self-explanation text
 Not too abstract, contain concrete information
 No need for complete sentences
 Some people prefer to read slides than listen!
 Good acknowledgement
 For others’ papers, put author names, publication place,
time in the first page
 Then, “presented by: your name”
 Copying others’ slides must have acknowledgement

13. 13
Outline
 How to Read a Research Paper
 Prepare Presentation Slides
 Give a Presentation
 Follow up
 Online Resource

14. 14
Give a Presentation
 Dry run before presentation
 Test timing
 Get familiar (bad impression if you do not know what you talk!!)
 Remember important words to say, be concise
 But do not recite every word in speech!
 Monotone, no personal attachment to what you say
 Especially important to non-English speaker
 Less grammar error, fluent, clear and concise
 Intense dry run for important presentation
 Write down talk notes for each page and remember them
 Video tape yourself: body language, wasted words (tag)
 Ask friends to listen your dry run, get feedback

15. 15
Give a Presentation
 Speak loud
 Force you to speak slow, looks confident
 Force you to remove murmur, be clear & concise
 Most murmur are wasted words, not confident words
 Audience cannot hear your murmur
 Emphasize
 Pause after an important point
 Even slower, louder on important point
 Do not read slides
 Slides are for audience to read

16. 16
Give a Presentation
 Figures
 Need to explain X/Y-axis; Don’t rush
 Timing
 Pay attention to time (put a clear clock in front)
 Prepare to jump slides for timing
 Don’t be frustrated for questions or your
mistakes
 Be friendly to audience, show confidence
 Your mood affects audience’s mood!

17. 17
Outline
 How to Read a Research Paper
 Prepare Presentation Slides
 Give a Presentation
 Follow up
 Online Resource

18. 18
Follow Up
 In job interview, always send “thank-you”
notes to interviewers
 A brief email is good
 Online tutorial: google “thank-you notes”
 Thank, acknowledgement
 Explain unanswered questions
 Provide paper, reference information promised by
you

19. Follow Up
 For this class, send your ppt file to me!
 I will collect comment on presentation from
online students and publish the collected
comments on course webpage
 Everyone should read the comments
 You will benefit even if you are not the presenter
 Remember, giving a good, clear talk is
important to your career!
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Online Resource
 How To Give A Great Presentation
 http://www.to-done.com/2005/07/how-to-give-a-great-presentation/
 Presentation Skills
 http://lorien.ncl.ac.uk/ming/dept/Tips/present/present.htm
 Advice on Research and Writing
 http://www.cs.cmu.edu/afs/cs.cmu.edu/user/mleone/web/how-to.html
 Western New England Editorial Freelancers' Network
 http://www.editorsplus.com/members.html
 For copyediting your thesis, paper
 Best writing guideline book:
 The Elements of Style by William Strunk
 Google: “resume”, “job hunting”, “give presentation”, …
 You can find tutorials, samples for any topics through web search