Thu 9/10, 2020

• Goals
• Organization
• Schedule
• Summary of class
• Research contributions, Marching Cubes paper, 2018 course abstracts, 2014 course abstracts.

Tue 9/15, 2020

• Open problems in Visualization
• What makes a good problem?

Logistics

• Send Fumeng (fumeng_yang at brown.edu) a small photo of yourself to include on the website.
• Make sure you can use the shared google drive. Email Fumeng if you need help.

Reading

Read, with an eye toward your essay (below) and also to discuss in class:

• Toolsmith II paper (Brooks) - this describes how to do computer science, which is the “home” discipline for scientific visualization.

• Top Scientific Visualization Research Problems (Johnson)

• one of the following:
  • Visualization in Scientific Computing (McCormick, DeFanti, Brown) - set the stage for scientific visualization and its funding back in 1987. Read the executive summary and sections I-III. Skim through appendix A and read the sections that are most interesting to you. Read section A.3. Skim through appendices B and C so you have some idea of what’s in them when you need the information there later.
  • Computational Science: Ensuring America’s Competitiveness (President’s Information Technology Advisory Committee), also CRA NIH Workshop Recommendations and http://www.nitrd.gov/pubs/
  • Top 10 Unsolved Information Visualization Problems (Chen)
• suggested reading
  • Part of a lobbying effort for national funding, the Data and Visualization Corridors gives a 1999 perspective on what was limiting progress in high-end visualization. Read the executive summary and quickly flip through the rest of the document to get a feel for more research topics.
  • Bill Hibbard’s vis viewpoints column The Top Five Problems that Motivated My Work.
  • Another vis viewpoints column by David Duke et al. Do You See What I Mean?.
  • Research and Development Agenda for visual analytics developed to define the directions and priorities for future research and development programs focused on visual analytics tools. Illuminating the Path

Deliverables (9am)

• Personal background handed in as yourBrownShortID.txt
• A fictional essay, 250-750 words. The setting is 5-20 years in the future, and the story should describe how CSCI2370 will have influenced that future you. In particular, it should describe a plausible way that you will have solved or addressed one or more of the visualization research topics from the readings. Hand in as yourBrownShortID-2.txt, as described for personal background handin.

Thu 9/17, 2020

• Review and discuss NSF ITR proposal: Understanding Unsteady Bioflows through Simulation, Modeling, Visualization, Art, and Psychology (Laidlaw et al.)
• Evaluating project possibilities

Reading

These readings will give you a feel for what goes into a research grant proposal:

• Watch this animation on YouTube about NSF’s review process
• NSF Grant Proposal Guide (2004) describes how to write a grant proposal. While some of the instructions are specific to NSF, much of the document gives good advice on how to write any proposal. Note that this is the version that was in effect when this proposal was written. There have been several versions since then, so refer to the latest when you write your own NSF proposals!
  • Skim: whole thing
  • Read: I.B, II.C.2.a-f, II.C.2.h-k, III (intro), III.A, III.E-F, VI.G

• Guidelines for proposal writing

• NSF Information Technology Research (ITR) Program Announcement. Typically, NSF accepts both unsolicited grant applications (for whatever a proposer thinks is worth doing) and solicited applications. Applications are solicited via a Program Announcement (PA), sometimes called a Request for Proposals (RFP). This is one example of what they are looking for.
• Read proposal: Understanding Unsteady Bioflows through Simulation, Modeling, Visualization, Art, and Psychology (Laidlaw et al.). This is a proposal in response to the ITR solicitation. It was successful and was partially funded September 2004. You don’t need to understand all, but try to get the big picture as an example of a multi-disciplinary research project.
• AFTER writing your own review (see Deliverables), read NSF reviews of the proposal and add any new discussion questions to your review.
• Read the RFP for class projects
• Consult the list of project ideas

Deliverables (9am)

• Hand in your own review for the ITR grant as yourBrownShortID.txt
• Hand in a list of three possible collaborators for your class project as yourBrownShortID-2.txt. The collaborators can be from class or from other disciplines. The RFP for class projects will help you understand more about the criteria for judging a project idea. Possible collaborators can be from the class, the list of project ideas suggested by various researchers around campus, and any personal contacts you have. Describe the discipline of each possible collaborator and how it is distinct from your area. At least two must be contributors to the list of project ideas or established researchers.

Collaborator’s list - You will need to meet with at least three possible collaborators and report on those meetings on 9/29. These meetings will help you develop the interdisciplinary part of the project. Get started scheduling these meetings and look at what you’ll need to hand in as a report. Coordinate with other class members for interviewing to avoid duplicating collaborator effort.

Tue 9/22, 2020

• Review of NSF CAREER proposal Shape Capture and Modeling for Wrist Dynamics and Ancient Pottery Analysis using Manifold Surfaces and Signed-Distance Volume Images (Laidlaw)
• Evaluating project possibilities

Reading

• NSF Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) Program Announcement
• Read annual status report to NSF. Once again, this gives a feel for what NSF is interested in.
• Shape Capture and Modeling for Wrist Dynamics and Ancient Pottery Analysis using Manifold Surfaces and Signed-Distance Volume Images This is a second example of an interdisciplinary visualization proposal. The application areas are quite different and the proposal is more focused on visualization. Skim the whole proposal, then read the Project Summary and Project Description.
• AFTER writing your own review (see Deliverables), I would have had you read of the proposal, then add any new discussion questions to your review. But somehow the file with the reviews in it has disappeared. They are even missing from the NSF website, so I can't regenerate them as of 2020. Sorry...

Deliverables (9am)

• Write your own review ( using this form) of the CAREER proposal and hand it in as yourBrownShortID.txt. Do the review before reading the NSF reviews.
• Continue interviewing possible collaborators.

Thu 9/24, 2020

• Discuss project ideas

Reading

• Read Request For Proposals (RFP)
• Browse previous CSCI2370 proposals linked on the Ideas page

Deliverables (9am)

• Three possible proposal titles and summaries as yourBrownShortID-2.txt. For each, include a brief description, a list of participants, and your evaluation of the proposal you imagine. Use the RFP to guide your project ideas and to self-evaluate them. Clearly identify the research contributions.

Tue 9/29, 2020

• Review and discuss NIH proposal Quantitative Inverse Electrocardiography (Johnson)
• Discuss interviews
• Searching literature for related work

Reading

• Read Quantitative inverse electrocardiography (Johnson). This proposal is more than 15 years old, so the work is not current. It does show an excellent example of a successful non-clinical NIH grant proposal. Non-clinical work is often quite difficult to get funded by NIH. Note the structure of the proposal, with well-formulated hypotheses to test. Skim the whole thing and read the four sections starting with Specific Aims.
• Read partial list of resulting papers
• Read Visualizing bioelectric fields, MacLeod et al. (sorry about the pictures...)
• Read NIH guide to proposals, skimming over the structure of a submission (pg. 1-15), the nfocusing on the research plan details (pg. 15-18), review criteria (pg. 34), and other interesting and relevant parts you find.
• Read this PowerPoint presentation about the NIH proposal review process

Deliverables (9am)

• Interview reports as yourBrownShortID.txt
• Your review of Johnson’s NIH grant as yourBrownShortID-2.txt

Thu 10/1, 2020

• Review and discuss additional NSF proposals
• Proposal needs?
• Visualizing multi-dimensional data
• Research contributions, yes again!

Reading

The following proposals give a flavor for different styles of proposal, and some of them were not funded. You do not need to read them carefully, but skim through them looking for new and interesting observations to share with the class.
• MRI: Development of a Next-Generation Interactive Virtual-Reality Display Environment for Science (Laidlaw et al.) and its reviews.
• HCC: Small: Collaborative Research: Immersive Visualization and 3D Interaction for Volume Data Analysis (Bowman, Socha, and Laidlaw) and its reviews.
• Here is one that was not funded: CHS: Small: How Much Virtual Reality is Enough and its reviews.
• I have many more proposals that you can read, particularly unfunded ones :-). If you are interested, reach out!

Deliverables (9am)

• A list of at least five interesting and reaonably rich sharable observations for the class. Hand in as usual. Do not duplicate observations already handed in. I suggest editing your observations in the handin directory to avoid duplication. If you have less rich observations, include more!

Tue 10/6, 2020

• Visualization tools
• Paraview volume rendering
• Proposal challenges

Reading

• Read Visualization Handbook's table of contents. For the class, see if the topics in the book suggest some readings related to your project. Are there any new ideas in there for a different project? Google for the authors' web pages and see what other stuff they are working on. If you're interested in reading more, the book may be available at the Sciences Library (SciLi) -- it was at some point :-). Some chapters are likely available online. Many topics will have Wikipedia pages or other tutoial-level pages that will help you become visualization experts.
• Read The Value of Visualization, and The Value of Infovis. Look for ways to understand and motivate the contributions of your proposed projects. Can you find papers that cite these that are helpful? This could lead to some things for your literature review and related work sections.

Deliverables (9am)

• Hand in results from literature search as yourBrownShortID.txt

You should do this search on the project you are most seriously considering doing out of all the ideas you have. Google Scholar is the main place to search for research papers, but there is a list of other options here (Question 3 Where do I search for research papers?). Continue developing your project proposal, filling in any weaknesses, fleshing out the related work section, etc. Be prepared to briefly describe the project idea you are most seriously considering and any issues, concerns, problems, etc. that we can discuss in class.

• The first item in your literature search should be the paper you think would be most valuable for the class to all read and discuss. Clearly label it as such.
• Install Paraview on your computer from the first step in the tutorial. Also download the tutorial.vtk file. Bring to class.

Thu 10/8, 2020

• more "Visualization Handbook"

Reading

• Read the three papers listed in in your co-students' literature review handins from last class. Make a list of five discussion observations or questions, just as you did for the three proposals last week. You should be focused on finishing your proposal drafts, so if you need to do these readings quickly that is ok.

Deliverables (9am)

• Sign up for a presentation time in the spreadsheet posted in the Google drive Collaborators Meetings & Proposal Presentations (top-level, the same file used for collaborators meetings, but use the second tab.)
• Preliminary proposal handed in as yourBrownShortID.pdf. This should be a full draft, ready for comments by reviewers.
• A template for your proposal can be template for your proposal can be downloaded here. See the README inside for more instructions. The overleaf read-only repos can be found at proposals and final reports.

Tue 10/13, 2020

• Proposal presentations, 5 minutes each

Reading

• Begin reading proposals from the shared Google Drive folder

Deliverables (9am)

• Presentation slides handed in as yourBrownShortID_slides.pptx or pdf. David *much* prefers pptx with all videos and images embedded in the file. Google slides is not ok... (you can create in it, but convert and submit as pptx and make sure that everything plays correctly without the presenter being you.

Thu 10/15, 2020

• Improving proposals and examples
  • Insight-based evaluation: what is it, and should you use it?
  • Evaluating visualizations

Reading

• “An Insight-Based Methodology for Evaluating Bioinformatics Visualizations”, Saraiya et al., TVCG, 2005.
• “Empirical Studies in Information Visualization Evaluation: Seven Scenarios”, Lam et al., IEEE TVCG 18, 9 (September 2012).
• Read proposals from the shared Google Team Drive 10-11/Preliminary Proposals

Deliverables (9am)

• Find your review assignment within the same folder / the top level of the shared drive.
• Review of the first-draft proposals assigned to you. Use a separate form for each review you write, and name the file proposer_by_reviewer.txt when you hand it in. For instance, if David reviews Fumeng's proposal, he should hand in a file called fyang7_by_dhl.txt.

Tue 10/20, 2020

• "Walking > Walking-in-Place > Flying"
• Walkthrough of a project budget

Link to paper for in-class activity:

• “Walking > Walking-in-Place > Flying, in Virtual Environments”, Usoh et al., In Proceedings of SIGGRAPH, 1999.

Deliverables (9am)

• Final proposal handed in as yourBrownShortID.pdf

Thu 10/22, 2020

• Study section (evaluate, score, “fund” proposals)

Link for in-class activity:

• Table of linked reviews and NIH-style proposal scores: {TBD}

Reading

• Read final proposals from the shared Google Team Drive /10-18/all_proposals.pdf
• Find your in the spreadsheet posted within the same folder / the top level of the shared drive.

Deliverables (9am)

• Review the final proposals assigned to you. For the final proposals, you only need to hand in reviews for the three proposals where you are R1, R2, or R3. You must read the proposals for which you are R3/R4 and be prepared to discuss them in class. Use a separate form for each review you write, and name the file proposer_by_reviewer.txt when you hand it in. For instance, if David reviews Fumeng's proposal, he should hand in a file called fyang7_by_dhl.txt.
• Respond to the quick questions in this form as yourBrownShortID.txt

Tue 10/27, 2020

• IEEE Visualization Conference online

• Start the CITI online course, which will certify you to perform “human subjects research”, like user studies, at Brown.

Thu 10/29, 2020

• IEEE Visualization Conference online

• Finish the CITI online course and send your passing Completion Report (pdf) to the TA. If you do not pass on your first try, you must retake the quizzes until you receive a passing grade.

Deliverables (9am)

• Hand in a summary statement on your “Primary” proposal. Try to capture all the discussion points for the proposal. The length should be however long it takes for you to adequately summarize the discussion. Name the file proposer_by_yourBrownShortID.txt.

Tue 11/3, 2020

• ELECTION DAY -- Brown Holiday

Thu 11/5, 2020

• Check-in on projects
• Review VIS 2020 program
• Relate your project to the VIS conference

Deliverables (9am)

• Be ready to explain and discuss your project progress with others in class. A Gantt chart can be a good way to show/explain progress.
• Mega-sheet with Related Work and VIS paper scores Vis '20 items start on row 1209, so be prepared to do some scrolling.

Tue 11/10, 2020

• Vis '20 Redux
  • Discussion with Fumeng and David about Vis Conference.
  • Where would your project fit at the conference?
• Read VIS 2020 papers

• review IEEE VIS 2020 Program (may need login) and papers with your project in mind
• bring any questions about the conference

Thu 11/12, 2020

• Project checkins
• Read VIS 2020 papers

• prepare for project checkins
• continue thinking about final presentations and reports