NAIC Visiting Committee Meeting · February 19-21, 2007

Some Presentation Suggestions

T. H. Hankins,

with some parts from

Mihai Budiuhttp://www.cs.cmu.edu/~mihaib/presentation-rules.html

NAIC Visiting Committee Meeting · February 19-21, 2007

The Golden Rule

Human attention is the scarcest resource.--Herbert Simon [Nobel 1972, Turing 1975]

NAIC Visiting Committee Meeting · February 19-21, 2007

Attention Span

Standard deviation for typical listener is about 15 minutes.

QuickTime™ and aTIFF (Uncompressed) decompressor

are needed to see this picture.

NAIC Visiting Committee Meeting · February 19-21, 2007

The Bottom Line:

PracticePractice

NAIC Visiting Committee Meeting · February 19-21, 2007

1

• Idea per slide (i.e., KISS = Keep it simple, s…)

NAIC Visiting Committee Meeting · February 19-21, 2007

Memory Limitations

• Short-term memory: ~ 7 simple things

•Audience may get 1 or 2 from your talk.•Reinforce the core message, not details.•What is your “story line”?

NAIC Visiting Committee Meeting · February 19-21, 2007

Use Pictures as Visual Metaphors

A picture is worth 1000 words

This thesis presents a compilation framework for translating ANSI C

A comparison of Spatial Computation and superscalar processors highlights some of the weaknesses of our model

of computation, such as the lack of branch ack of branch prediction and register renaming.prediction and register renaming.

this is one word that I am writingThe first part of this document describes Pegasus, the

internal representation of CASH, and a series of novel program transformations performed by CASH.

Low-level simulation however suggests that the energy efficiency of

Application-Specific Hardware is three orders of magnitude better than superscalar processors, one order of magnitude better than low-power digital signal processors and asynchronous processors, and approaching custom hardware chips.

The second part of this document evaluates the performance of the generated circuits using simulation. Using media processing benchmarks, we show that for the domain of embedded

computation, the circuits generated by CASH can sustain high levels of instruction level parallelism, due to the effective use of dataflow software pipelining.

The most notable of these are a new optimal register-promotion algorithm and partial redundancy elimination for memory accesses based on predicate manipulation.

NAIC Visiting Committee Meeting · February 19-21, 2007

Notes from AUSAC

• Limit detail on all slides. 20-30 words max.

• Make plot linewidths extra fat.

• Incorporate ALL movies and simulations into Powerpoint/Keynote, etc.

• Look at audience.

• Never read slides. Audience listens and reads at different rates.

NAIC Visiting Committee Meeting · February 19-21, 2007

More Notes from AUSAC

• Explain ALL your slides.

• Never underline. (Use bold, CAPS, italics, color)

• Stick to one font family. Kerned fonts clearest.

• This is 32-point Times New Roman font.

• Slide change gimmicks: yecch!!

• Use the spelling checker.

• Explain ALL your slides.

• Never underline. (Use bold, CAPS, italics, color)

• Stick to one font family. Kerned fonts clearest.

• This is 32-point Times New Roman font.

• Slide change gimmicks: yecch!!

• Use the spelling checker.

NAIC Visiting Committee Meeting · February 19-21, 2007

Even More Notes from AUSAC

• Laser pointer: – Use a . (What is s/he pointing at?)– Use very sparingly.– Don’t wave it around! (Makes me seasick.)– Steady it on the podium if necessary. (Who’s nervous?)

NAIC Visiting Committee Meeting · February 19-21, 2007

Time

Always end on time.

Even if you have to cut.

NAIC Visiting Committee Meeting · February 19-21, 2007

Rehearse and Repeat

The talk will only get better

NAIC Visiting Committee Meeting · February 19-21, 2007

Questions• Listen very carefully.• Repeat the question.

– To be sure you got it right– So that the rest of the audience

can hear it, too.

• Answer succinctly and clearly• Most people answer different

questions than are asked!

NAIC Visiting Committee Meeting · February 19-21, 2007

Figures, graphs, diagrams

• Fat lines essential.

• Label axes clearly (i.e., big enough to read.)

• Maximize figure size on slide.

• Figures should be self-contained; no short-term memory required.

• Beware of low-contrast projection: washes out color.

Intensity and spectrum of a Main pulseIntensity and spectrum of a Main pulse

NAIC Visiting Committee Meeting · February 19-21, 2007

A “Megapulse”A “Megapulse”

2.2 Mega-Jansky pulseDuration: 0.4 nanoseconds2.2 Mega-Jansky pulseDuration: 0.4 nanoseconds

0.4 ns0.4 ns

NAIC Visiting Committee Meeting · February 19-21, 2007

Interpulse spectral band spacing proportional to frequency

NAIC Visiting Committee Meeting · February 19-21, 2007

Quotes: Leslie Lamport

• “Don't give your paper; the audience can't take it. If someone can understand in thirty minutes what it took you weeks to develop, then you're in the wrong business.”

• “Time your talk. Running over your allotted time is a mark of incompetence.”

NAIC Visiting Committee Meeting · February 19-21, 2007

More from Leslie Lamport:

• You are now thinking: "All those dull speakers I've listened to should use these rules, but I don't need them because my talks are interesting." All those dull speakers are now thinking exactly the same thing. Read the rules again with the proper humility. They apply to everyone.

NAIC Visiting Committee Meeting · February 19-21, 2007

Conclusions

• Conclusions: what one should remember.

• Conclusions: not the same as summary.

• Optimize talk for audience.

• You can always improve a talk.

• People may remember the impression you make far longer than the contents of your talk.