How to give a Seminar Talk

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How to give a Seminar Talk

• Daniel Kroening
• ETH Zürich

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Why?

• So your Professor does not get embarrassed!

• Its 50 of the grade!

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Outline

• Organization of a talk
• Common pitfalls
• Fonts, Colors, Diagrams
• Number of slides?
• How to talk
• About this seminar
• Contents
• Topics
• Administrative stuff

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Content

• Goal present research results
• Think of the audience!
• Knows foundations of computer science
• Does not know specific research
• Focus on concepts, not details!
• Point out advantages/disadvantages

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Organization of a Talk
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Giving the Talk

• Allow at least two minutes per slide
• Not enough time? Cut it!
• Keep introduction and motivation short
• Use less than a minute on outline
• Use time for complex topics instead
• Repeat if really important
• Use examples

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Slide Layout

• Keep it simple!
• Use Diagrams
• Try to keep it in one line
• Many topics cannot be explained fully with a few
  bullets. In such situations, one is frequently
  tempted to write a full definition of the
  problem, usually in a very small font, which is
  read aloud while looking at the slide when giving
  the talk. Instead of this, a diagram together
  with a few key words would always be more suited
  to showing the context, which can then be
  elaborated on in more detail orally, in the talk.

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Diagrams
TOO FANCY
TOO ANNOYING
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Diagrams
Think about the people in the back row!
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Structural Figures
Better than long text
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Formulas

• Use only when needed
• Use descriptive variable names
• Powerpoint equation editor is bad
• Consider Latex Acrobat Reader
• Consider Texpoint

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Colors

• Avoid too many colors
• LCD ? Projector
• Background colors Yellow, orange, green, light
  blue
• Text colors Blue, magenta, red, dark green
• Avoid distracting bitmap backgrounds

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About this Seminar

• Topics
• Power consumption
• Timing
• Verification
• 40-45 Minutes for each talk
• English

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About this Seminar

• Papers
• We have a selection
• You will pick next week(see webpage Wednesday)
• But feel free to suggest one

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Administrative Things

• We will give you plenty of time to prepare
• You MUST email draft of slides to assistantone
  week before talk
• You should meet with me or assistant
• Grading
• We consider difficulty level of paper
• Presentation (slides, talk)

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Presentation Skills

• Presentation skills will be graded
• Thus, must attend Bertrand Meyers classon how
  to give technical talks
• Mark your calendars28 November, 1515-1630
• Room will be announced