Reading Blog & Presentations

READING BLOG

Instead of submitting individual critiques on Canvas, each student will maintain a running reading blog — a personal website where you post a short critique of the research paper before each class. Over the quarter, your blog becomes a cumulative record of how your understanding of the field develops.

Why a blog?

A blog post is not a homework submission — it is a piece of writing with an audience. The format encourages you to think more carefully about what you write, and the running nature of the blog lets you draw connections between papers as the quarter progresses. By Week 9, you will have built a personal map of the research landscape.

Setup

We provide a GitHub Pages template you can fork and have running in five minutes:

cs440-reading-blog template

  1. Fork the template repository (or click “Use this template”).
  2. Rename your copy to cs440-blog (or any name you like).
  3. Go to Settings → Pages and set the source to the main branch.
  4. Edit _config.yml — change author to your name.
  5. Add the instructor as a collaborator: Settings → Collaborators → add fabianeb.
  6. Your blog will be live at https://<your-username>.github.io/cs440-blog/.

Your repo may be public or private — that is up to you. GitHub Pages works with private repos on free student accounts (via GitHub Education). The instructor will see your posts as a collaborator either way.

Post structure

Each post should address three things:

  1. Key idea. What problem is the paper solving and what is the core contribution? (2–3 sentences)
  2. Critique. What is convincing, what is not, what is missing? (2–3 sentences)
  3. Connections. How does this relate to earlier readings? Link to your previous posts where relevant. (1–2 sentences)

That’s it — roughly 150–200 words. The template repository includes an example post on Misa et al., “There is More to Internet Invariants Than Meets the Eye” (NINeS 2026).

Logistics

  • Due by 9:00 PM the evening before class.
  • One skip allowed per quarter without penalty.
  • No blog post is required for background papers — only the research paper marked [R] on the calendar.

PRESENTING

Each student presents one or two research papers during the quarter. A good presentation motivates the problem, explains the technical approach, presents the evaluation, and leads a discussion.

Your presentation should include:

  • Introduction: Context and motivation for the work. Any background the audience needs.
  • Methods: The technical approach — how did they do it?
  • Results: The main contributions and findings.
  • Discussion: An interpretation of the results — what does this mean for the field?
  • Critique and class discussion: End with two to three questions or issues worthy of further discussion. Your job as presenter is not only to explain the paper but to lead the class conversation.

Today, many papers have a video of the author’s conference presentation. Take advantage of this and watch it before attempting to read the paper.

Recommended resource: S. Peyton Jones et al., How to Give a Great Research Talk, SIGPLAN Notices, 1993.