Ten virtues of structured graphs

This paper extends the invited talk by the first author about the virtues of structured graphs. The motivation behind the talk and this paper relies on our experience on the development of ADR, a formal approach for the design of styleconformant, reconfigurable software systems. ADR is based on hierarchical graphs with interfaces and it has been conceived in the attempt of reconciling software architectures and process calculi by means of graphical methods. We have tried to write an ADR agnostic paper where we raise some drawbacks of flat, unstructured graphs for the design and analysis of software systems and we argue that hierarchical, structured graphs can alleviate such drawbacks

Using Open Access Peer-Reviews and Pre-Printed Submissions to Improve Students’ Comprehension of Academic Writing

One of the most difficult challenges that novice learners face is to read and assess verbose, complex journal articles, filled with a mix of subject-specific jargon and intricate analyses, challenged with understanding the terminology as well as the general concepts of the work. A recent blog captures this frustration, stating, “Nothing makes you feel stupid quite like reading scientific journal article” (Ruben, 2016); whilst a follow on looks to alleviate this issue by offering insights from experienced professionals on how best to approach articles (Pain, 2016). Yet while numerous rubrics exist for improving general structuring and writing (Derntl, 2014; Hillier et al., 2016; Kording and Mensh, 2016), few if any exist on how to improve conceptual understanding; a key skill required for students to support their own academic writing with evidence-based literature. We looked to address this issue by creating a mock ‘peer-review’ assessment as part of a portfolio of skills in our Masters-level conversion course; a cohort faced with the stern challenge of having to rapidly, and independently, learn to read and comprehend academic writing from a novel discipline over a relatively short time-span. Our approach involved three stages. First a brief explanation of the peer-review process using freely available online materials from publishers (e.g. Wiley, PLOS). Next an analytical discussion of open access peer-reviews of published articles (via PeerJ, Royal Society Open Science); i.e. a learn-by-example approach. Finally, the student’s own mock peer-review of one of three open access pre-printed journal articles (via PeerJ, PsyArXiv, etc) with specific guidelines to focus on the key aspects of theory, methodology and readability. Here we present qualitative and quantitative feedback from the students as regards to how this task improved their ability to understand complex academic writing, and how it has altered their approach to reading such articles in future

Why You Don’t Get Published: An Editor’s View

The definitive version is available at http://www.wileyonlinelibrary.comThis paper uses content analysis to examine 66 reviews on 33 manuscripts submitted to Accounting and Finance. Selected extracts from reviews are provided to illustrate the issues considered important to reviewers. The main message is that papers need to be work-shopped and more care taken over editorial matters. A checklist for prospective authors is provided

The University as Publisher: Summary of a Meeting Held at UC Berkeley on November 1, 2007

With the advent of electronic publishing, the scholarly communication landscape at universities has become increasingly diverse. Multiple stakeholders including university presses, libraries, and central IT departments are challenged by the increasing volume and the rapidity of production of these new forms of publication in an environment of economic uncertainties. As a response to these increasing pressures, as well as the recent publication of important reports and papers on the topic, the Center for Studies in Higher Education (CSHE) convened a meeting of experts titled, The University as Publisher. The event was sponsored as part of the A.W. Mellon Foundation-funded Future of Scholarly Communication project at CSHE.Our goal was to explore among stakeholders -- faculty, publishers, CIOs, librarians, and researchers -- the implications of the academic community, in some structure, taking over many, if not all, aspects of scholarly publishing. Two themes were the focus of the public panels: Institutional Roles in Evaluation, Quality Assessment, and Selection and Structuring and Budgeting Models for Publishing within the University Community. Our discussions included the importance of distinguishing between informal dissemination and formal publishing and the challenges that each presents to the university community. The harsh economic realities of high-quality formal scholarly publication, not least of which are managing peer review and editorial processes, were emphasized. Understanding disciplinary needs was cited as paramount throughout the discussions; the needs and traditions of scholars in the sciences and humanities, as well as among myriad disciplines, will likely demand different dissemination and publishing models and solutions. An additional theme that emerged was acknowledging the diverse forms electronic dissemination takes in the academy and the need to foster a spectrum of alternatives in publication forms, business models, and the peer review process. Budgetary and academic freedom concerns were explored as well. Regarding the expensive infrastructure required for electronic dissemination and publishing, it was agreed that there is enormous duplication among the university press, IT, and the library

Revisiting Sovereign Bankruptcy

Sovereign debt crises occur regularly and often violently. Yet there is no legally and politically recognized procedure for restructuring the debt of bankrupt sovereigns. Procedures of this type have been periodically debated, but so far been rejected, for two main reasons. First, countries have been reluctant to give up power to supranational rules or institutions, and creditors and debtors have felt that there were sufficient instruments for addressing debt crises at hoc. Second, fears that making debt easier to restructure would raise the costs and reduce the amounts of sovereign borrowing in many countries. This was perceived to be against the interests of both the providers of both creditors and major borrowers. This report argues that both the nature and our understanding of sovereign debt problems have changed, over the course of the last decade, in a direction that creates a much stronger case for an orderly sovereign bankruptcy regime today than ten years ago. Pre-crisis policy mistakes are now recognized to be a much more severe problem for borrowing countries than the costs or limited availability of private financing. Recent court rulings – particularly a recent U.S. ruling that gives holdout creditors that decline a restructuring offer the right to interfere with payments to the creditors that accept such an offer. This will complicate efforts to resolve future debt crises on an ad hoc basis. Finally, sovereign debt crises are no longer just a problem in emerging markets, but a core concern in advanced countries as well – particularly in the Euro area. If the Euro is to survive, this will require both better ways to resolve debt crises and stronger, market-based incentives that prevent debt problems from occurring in the first place. To address these problems, policy proposals are presented at two levels: for the Euro area, and globally. A Euro area sovereign debt restructuring regime could be developed by amending the Treaty establishing the European Stability Mechanism (ESM). This would both restrict the scope for lending to highly indebted countries without also restructuring their debts, and protect Euro area members receiving ESM financial assistance from legal action by holdout creditors. At the global level, a number of proposals are discussed, ranging from a coordinated introduction of aggregate collective action clauses that would allow a supermajority of bondholders across all bonds to amend bond payment terms to an amendment of the IMF articles that would limit the legal remedies of holdouts when a debt restructuring proposal has been accepted both by a majority of creditors and endorsed by the IMF