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A good fraction of the freelance work I have done has required looking up papers (eg the current implementation for https://github.com/jamii/texsearch https://g

by jamii 15y ago

A good fraction of the freelance work I have done has required looking up papers (eg the current implementation for https://github.com/jamii/texsearch https://github.com/jamii/texsearch is based on a bioinformatics paper). It's fine when you only want a single specific paper but when I'm often looking for a solution to a problem I don't know the name of which means scanning through a couple of hundred papers an hour to see which ones are relevant.

Radim 15y ago
But paper abstracts are always free (even with paid journals). If you have to scan random papers to find a solution to a problem you cannot name, I fear for your well-being :-)
- jamii 15y ago
  > If you have to scan random papers to find a solution to a problem you cannot name, I fear for your well-being :-) The disadvantage to being a generalist is that I don't know the terminology of the field I need to research. Take the texsearch example above. Given a LaTeX string I want to find similar strings from a large corpus so I start by googling things like "code search" and "syntax tree search". After scanning a few dozen papers and following links I find that the magic search term is "approximate string matching" which nets me an overview paper. I scan through the links from that paper and dismiss most of the algorithms as unsuitable for my particular problem until I'm left with a few candidates for prototypes. Back then I had access through my university. Today I wouldn't be able to read half of those papers. For recent math/CS papers I can usually find a preprint but anything else is a struggle.
roel_v 15y ago
OK, so how did you do your research in the end? Do you think you missed much because of not being to access certain papers? I mean, it seems that you found a way to access at least that paper, or did you pay for a subscription to a certain journal?
- jamii 15y ago
  At the time I had access through my university. Since leaving research has become much more time-consuming. My local library doesn't have any subscriptions. If I really need to find something I can take a two hour round-trip to the British Library, although its opening hours align neatly with office hours. In an age where the worlds information is at our fingertips its ridiculous that I have to take time away from work and get on a bus just to do basic research.

by jamii 15y ago

Radim 15y ago

But paper abstracts are always free (even with paid journals). If you have to scan random papers to find a solution to a problem you cannot name, I fear for your well-being :-)

jamii 15y ago
> If you have to scan random papers to find a solution to a problem you cannot name, I fear for your well-being :-) The disadvantage to being a generalist is that I don't know the terminology of the field I need to research. Take the texsearch example above. Given a LaTeX string I want to find similar strings from a large corpus so I start by googling things like "code search" and "syntax tree search". After scanning a few dozen papers and following links I find that the magic search term is "approximate string matching" which nets me an overview paper. I scan through the links from that paper and dismiss most of the algorithms as unsuitable for my particular problem until I'm left with a few candidates for prototypes. Back then I had access through my university. Today I wouldn't be able to read half of those papers. For recent math/CS papers I can usually find a preprint but anything else is a struggle.

roel_v 15y ago

OK, so how did you do your research in the end? Do you think you missed much because of not being to access certain papers? I mean, it seems that you found a way to access at least that paper, or did you pay for a subscription to a certain journal?

jamii 15y ago
At the time I had access through my university. Since leaving research has become much more time-consuming. My local library doesn't have any subscriptions. If I really need to find something I can take a two hour round-trip to the British Library, although its opening hours align neatly with office hours. In an age where the worlds information is at our fingertips its ridiculous that I have to take time away from work and get on a bus just to do basic research.