Projects and teams
Operations Research is a part of mathematics that is concerned with the solution of industrial problems. Thus, a very important part of an Operations Research Education is an exposure industrial problems together with a development of the teamwork, written and oral presentation skills and time-management skills that are required in industry. As mentioned above, such skills are developed through project work, in which teams of three of four students collaborate on the solution of actual industrial problems.
To choose a project, please download the project briefs.
The project talk timetable is up! Make sure that you can make it to your allotted time. We recommend that you test out the AV facilities beforehand.
We have put up Latex templates for the project report and presentation. Apologies for the delay!
Project talk timetable
Note: these talk times are not set in stone. If you can convince another group to swap with you, or simply absolutely cannot make your allotted time, then they can be changed. Furthermore times within a session are not fixed at all - there will be 2 groups per session, but the starting time of the second depends on the finishing time of the first.
| Team leader |
Other team members |
Project |
Time and day (in May) |
Location |
| Lorand Szilagyi |
Katie Drover
Fen Niu Lim
Arthur Quek |
Gold prospects |
2:15pm
Friday 23rd |
Russell Love |
| Marc Eames |
Michael Crocker
Gordon Leslie
Jason Yang |
Gold prospects |
3:15pm
Friday 23rd |
Hercus |
| Simon Jung |
Muhammad Abdwahab
Alex Ngo
Derek Whitten |
Rosenbrock function |
3:45pm
Friday 23rd |
Hercus |
| Thomas Huynh |
Kristy Le
Sonya Nguyen
Cassie Sui |
Gold prospects |
3:15pm
Monday 26th |
Old Geology 2 |
| Will Howson |
Sam Abousaid
Charles Hu
Rosie Rice |
Newton methods |
3:45pm
Monday 26th |
Old Geology 2 |
| Peter Hickey |
Juny Kesumadewi
Ruby Yao |
Newton methods |
3:15pm
Wednesday 28th |
Laby |
| Lucien McCarthy |
Kathryn Kerwick
Michael Mattvey
Sarah McCluskey |
Gold prospects |
3:45pm
Wednesday 28th |
Laby |
| Jarryd Mills |
John Brown
Alan Chang
Fei Ding |
Satellite location |
2:15pm
Friday 30th |
Russell Love |
| Jess Perlen |
Rochelle Best
Richmond Tan
Shamini Vimalanathan |
Gold prospects |
2:45pm
Friday 30th |
Russell Love |
Latex files
If you are interested in using Latex to produce your presentation, a quick demonstration is here. Advantages to using Latex for presentations are numerous - we use it for the lecture slides each week:
- equations are easy to type
- you can hyperlink images or text to go to other slides
- you can easily include pictures and diagrams while maintaining a relatively small presentation file
If you like the style we use for lectures, the templates are here: main Latex file, header file, content file, and the resulting pdf.
Compile the slides_main.tex file up to three times to ensure all the hyperlinks and contents page have linked properly.
For the project report, we have another Latex template: the Latex file, three example pictures here, here and here, and the resulting pdf. As with the presentation files, compile the Latex file up to three times to ensure all the references are working.
Example project proposal
You can find an example project proposal here.
Latex template for project proposal
Latex is typesetting software that is widely used in the mathematics community for two reasons: (i) you can easily create a beautiful publication from scratch and (ii) it handles mathematics equations without crashing.
To install Latex on your computer follow these steps:
- Download and install "Miktex 2.7" from http://miktex.org/
- Download and install a Latex GUI - I use TeXnicCenter on my PC and TexEdit on my Mac, but you can also you emacs, vim and loads of other editors. To use TeXnicCenter, download 'TeXnicCenter Setup, Version 1 Beta 7.01 ('Greengrass')' from http://www.toolscenter.org/downloads.html. As a beginner it is best to choose to install all packages, or select for the GUI to install them on-the-fly. This way you don't have to worry about finding packages and installing them yourself. There are lots of packages available for Latex which help you to add embellishments to your document.
- Download the template and additional pdf file (which is just an example picture). Open the template in your GUI and compile Latex -> PDF. You may also compile it to DVI or PS format.
For more help on Latex, see the Latex reference, or A not-so-short guide to Latex.
Project information
These projects are an excellent opportunity for you to develop valuable project skills for those considering Honours and those considering a career in industry. You will be assessed on your ability to
Aims:
1. To gain experience collaborating in a group of your peers.
2. To analyse the algorithms in the course in detail.
3. To gain computational experience and confidence in implementing algorithms.
4. To develop a scientific document and oral presentation.
Requirements:
(a) Proposal - this document should provide a plan for your research and a base for your final report. The important aspects of proposals are (i) they get you to do the relevant research for background prior to actually starting the experiments; (ii) they get you to think about what you would like to achieve with your research; (iii) they get you to think about what sort of research would be useful to you and to others; (iv) they get you to plan your work.
The research proposal could include:
Title - create a title for your project... this part is unassessed.
Objectives - think about what your goals can be as both students and researchers... you don't need to come up with anything new, but you do want to learn something interesting. If you come across a journal article that performs the comparisons required for your project, you may consider trying to replicate or extend their results.
Research Method - here you simply explain your methodology. For example, if you want to compare several algorithms with respect to their convergence rates, you might first compare the rates theoretically. Then you might think about particular cases that both support and refute the theory - even though one algorithm has a better theoretical convergence rate doesn't mean it will outperform the others in all cases.
Timeline - this is a basic project management task to help the group realise deadlines and allocate tasks.
References - you are welcome to build on other people's research, so long as you give them credit for their work. Never copy wording or phrases from people's work without specifying which parts are due to them.
The length of your summary may be up to 5 pages. We will provide a Latex template.
The proposal is due on Friday the 4th of April.
(b) Report
We will provide a Latex template for your report, which should be a small version of a research report or dissertation. We do not wish to limit your scope for this project, but rather wish to encourage you to extend your learning as much as you can. In keeping with the objectives of this course - to learn about OR nonlinear techniques and algorithms - our assessment of your project will be based on the following criteria:
- demonstration of a thorough understanding of a number of algorithms
- demonstration of scientific thinking when comparing algorithms or discussing the suitability of an algorithm in a particular application
- demonstrated ability to implement a number of algorithms in the programming language of your choice (we recommend that you place your source code into the appendix of your report)
- clarity in the production of a scientific document.
You will be given a mark that reflects the level to which you have achieved the four aims of the project, listed at the top of the page. You are allowed to use other people's programs so long as you give them credit and show that you understand the underlying algorithms. Not giving credit where it is due it deemed to be academic misconduct, and you will be ineligible for a grade for this assessment. The safest way to credit other people when you use their code is to place their name and the source (such as the url and download date) at the top of the program. For example:
% The following program is adapted from Costa, A., (2004), Available online: http://www.ms.unimelb.edu.au/~s620361/programming/fibonacciSearch.m
% with some contributions from C. Burt and Y. Chan.
The final report is due on Monday the 26th of May.
(c) Presentation
Each group will have to give a 10-15 minute presentation of their work. The purpose of your presentation is to share your results with the class. Therefore, they will want to know your research objectives, some basic background, your results, and how these results are relevant. You will be assessed according to the following criteria:
- the clarity of your presentation
- the effectiveness of your delivery
- the content that you and your group present
Each member of every group is expected to front some portion of the presentation, and that portion will be more heavily considered when it comes to determining marks for that person. We will provide a Latex template for your presentation.
The talks will be scheduled during the final week of semester.
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