text:
How do you credit people who review your paper before submission?
How do you credit people for reviewing a manuscript prior to submission? I am referring to individuals with more knowledge and experience than myself, such as a professor. Where in the manuscript do you list their names? Is this good practice or frowned upon?
I was thinking maybe under the title such as:

Prediction of new active COVID-19 cases using regression analysis
Authors: ..., ...
Peer-reviewed by: person1, person2, ...

Also, I was wondering if "peer" review has to be from people of the same age as you. In case of them being older than you, do you just call it a review and not a peer review?

I think you should change "review" to "proof-read" or "give first feedback". Review is a coined term and means the (in most cases not known) reviewer named by the editor of a journal or conference.

@usr1234567 I use terms such as "Thank you J. Doe for feedback on on previous version of this manuscript." in the acknowledgments.  I would not use "proof-read" because that implies the helper missed something. I would not use "give first feedback" because it reads strangely to me.

@RichardErickson Sure. I was talking about the question and especially the title.

You can thank the anonymous referees if they were helpful.  In that case, there is no need to ask them for permission as they are anonymous anyway.

Acknowledgments

Meaning of peer review
When people say "peer review" in regards to a scholarly work, they are implying they refer to the "scholarly peer review process", not to some generic review by peers in the general sense of the meaning of the individual words "peer" and "review".
This process refers to review by your scholarly peers, not related to any age group, conducted though journals/publishers who assign reviewers to assess the paper and make editorial decisions about whether to publish the paper or not based on their recommendations.
Looking over your manuscript before submission is not "peer review" in the academic sense. You don't want to say that your paper went through "peer review" just because you had some peers (or even people who are you senior) look it over.

Acknowledging help on a paper
It may be appropriate to thank people who have helped improve the manuscript but haven't contributed enough to qualify for authorship; this section in papers is called the "acknowledgements" section. It can include statements like:

The authors thank J.A. Professor for helpful comments on a draft of the manuscript.

Sometimes authors will also thank people from the peer review process anonymously if suggestions raised in peer review are particularly important for the final paper, but it's not necessary or typical to thank reviewers in general.
It's polite to ask permission to acknowledge someone by name before actually mentioning someone in the paper (they may feel uncomfortable with it and ask to not be named if they either don't support the work or feel they didn't do enough to warrant it), and it's certainly not good to try to add acknowledgements because you think it will somehow help your paper get accepted (nor because you think it will make your non-published preprint appear to have been somehow validated and judged as correct by experts), only when people genuinely deserve the credit.

Perhaps to clarify for "beginners" in this business: even if your paper has been reviewed by some of your peers, who've given you advice, etc., it is not "peer-reviewed" in the charged sense of having been approved by referees at a journal.

@paulgarrett That's frankly debatable. Some people claim that “scholarly peer review” must always be synonymous with “journal guided refereeing prior to publication”. These people are wrong (and this is a fairly recent phenomenon).

@KonradRudolph, oh, I agree that the words have been corrupted, etc. But/and people need to be aware of these corruptions, to avoid being accused of deception, etc. Yes, for me, if it's on the internet, it's published. It literally is. :)  But we know that status-gatekeepers don't agree. :)

Actually, it is unlikely that you will learn the names of reviewers for a journal if those are the people you mean. So, in most cases this would be impossible.
Moreover, the version you submit is almost certainly not the version that will be published. There will be opportunities to update lots of things, including acknowledgements and such.
Finally, you can include a footnote or brief passage in Acknowledgements thanking "the reviewers" (not by name) for their suggestions (which there will almost certainly be.
Note that reviewers do much more than just make a yes/no decision about the paper. They might call for extensive revisions and suggest how that might be done.
But if, prior to submission, you ask people you know to review your paper and give you suggestions for improvement, then you can name them in an acknowledgements section and thank them for their help. Advisors usually get listed in this way, for example, unless they are co-authors.
And if you are going to name someone and thereby associate them in some way with the work, you need their permission to use their names.

We used to thank 'anonymous' reviewers, I also would thank professors and colleagues.  Yes there is an important difference between the peer-review process (of the journal) as compared to a more 'informal' reading by a colleague.

You usually add the acknowledgements after acceptance. Then you can add a section like

Acknowledgements
We like to thank the anonymous reviewers and our helpful colleagues for proof reading and John Smith for providing us with the example data.

Especially the name can only be added after a blind review.


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Should I apply to a job where the requested area of specialization is my area of competency?
There are some job ads in my job search where the school is seeking someone with an area of specialization (AOS) in "Bioethics/Biomedical Ethics or Environmental Ethics", and with an area of competency (AOC) in "Early Modern Philosophy, Non-Western Philosophy, Political Philosophy, Philosophy of Race, Feminist Philosophy, Environmental Philosophy, and/or 20th Century Continental".
This almost matches my AOC and AOS, except they are switched.
My AOS is Political Philosophy and Ethics (normative & applied)
and my AOC is 19th & 20th Century Continental Philosophy, Philosophy of Race, Environmental Ethics, Biomedical Ethics.
Is it worth my time to apply to jobs like this (I'm sure I will encounter more) where my Area of Specialization is one of their requested Areas of Competencies and/or where the requested Area of Specialization is my Area of Competency?

Others will, so why should you miss out...

I would say look at the other aspects of the job (location, pay and benefits, company spirit, tasks and teams you would be a part of) and if all of that fits you could make an excellent applicant. Don't be too narrow in your search as many jobs change over time or people end up doing things not strictly related to their training.
If the job looks good, don't be scared about not perfectly fitting their profile.

source: Stack Exchange

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

sort: votes


text:
Should I list my degrees chronologically, or in order of relevance in my CV?
Say that I have achieved a Masters degree in Physics, then a Masters degree in Mathematics. Then for a couple of years, I focused on different fields. I have had placements related to agriculture and botany, as well as taken online courses in Machine Learning. After careful consideration I decided want to pursue a PhD in Physics and so I am preparing for applications.
Normally CV's are written in (reverse) chronological order, most recent experiences first. However, my path is not straightforward, and so I am confronted with a choice.
On the one hand, since I have been told that a CV could be glanced at in less than 10s, I would want to put the most relevant (and prestigious) elements first. On the other hand, I am required to have those degrees to simply be eligible in those courses, and to provide the relevant certificates. This makes me want to keep the CV in reverse chronological order, for the sake of clarity and simplicity.
In the motivation letter / note of research interests I can also briefly explain my path, highlight my relevant experience and thus perhaps reduce the need of highlighting it in the CV.

Math is not so crazily afield from Physics that someone is going to see "Master's in Mathematics" and trash your resume. Might be worth reordering if you had another degree in, say, botany.

I would stick to the standard listing. As you say, the reader wants to spend only 10 seconds, so don't write it in a way that might confuse them. If you list a lower ranked degree before a higher ranked one, they may stop reading at what they imagine the end.
In general it probably isn't good to get too clever in lists of things. Be clever in your letter and interviews.

Thanks for the answer. Could you clarify the last sentence of the first paragraph?

@AndreaDiBiagio, if they see a BS, for example, they may stop reading there, thinking that is the end, even if it is followed by a higher degree. They will see what they expect to see.

I see. In this case though, both my degrees are relevant, so it doesn't really matter in what order I state those I was wondering more about the non-relevant activities in agriculture.

I did an undergraduate degree in a different field after my PhD, and was somewhat multidisciplinary even before that. My CV has the PhD listed first, then the rest in reverse chronological order rather than prestige. It looks a bit like this:

PhD
BA
GradDip
Masters
BSc

This way I have the PhD first, which is what everyone expects but I reduce the cognitive load of reading the rest of them. I have no evidence to back this as being 'good practice' but it works for me.
Note that I don't include online courses and other certificates in my CV at all, but I mention any relevant ones in the cover letter instead. If there's too much stuff in the education bit of your CV, it's hard to read any of it.

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text:
Is it unethical to submit a research paper to a second journal when the original journal appears to be ignoring it?
I submitted my work to journal X almost a year ago; the status of the paper remained "Assigned to Reviewers" for a long time, and despite repeated emails, no one from the editorial board responded. After my last email, they recently responded, and the status date has been changed to 22 February 2022, but the status remains the same, with the message "Assigned to Reviewers."
After such a long time, it appears that my work is losing its significance. So my question is, can I submit this work to another journal in parallel with the current journal to save time?
Is it unethical for me to do this?
PS. My question has a similar answer here.

Related: https://academia.stackexchange.com/q/17813/64

Consider a preprint publication like arxiv

To make it ethical, simply inform the first journal that you are withdrawing your paper. Wait a bit for a reply, though that isn't necessary. The paper is then free to be submitted elsewhere.
But to submit before withdrawing has ethical issues.
Reviewer time and effort needs to be considered also, here. Most journals would desk-reject such a second submission if they learn of it.

Typically, when you submit a paper to a journal, they require you to acknowledge in writing that you have not submitted the work to another journal.  By almost any ethical standard, then, it is unethical to make a written promise and then break it.
If you want to go with another journal, then I would withdraw the paper first.

I think it would be ethical to send (not "submit") your paper to a professional friend or acquaintance in your field that might have a good idea what the second journal might like or require.  So this friend sees your paper, says "Yes, submit that to Journal of XYZ and they might be very interested in it."
Then tell your original journal that you're withdrawing the submission and then submit to the other journal.
I know, as a matter of fact, many academics (and other scholars) have submitted nearly the same paper, with somewhat different titles, with possible variation in authors and principal author, to different journals and gotten the paper published both places.

The submission of two almost identical papers to different journals is self plagiarism and is unethical. That people have done it doesn't make it less so.

I agree.  I am just saying that I've seen quite similar papers published in both AES and IEEE by the same group of authors.


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Do I have to acknowledge the company where I started a project when I later publish related research in college?
I completed an internship at a company. During the internship I worked on a generic and publically well-known problem statement and delivered its solution to the company.
After the internship, I wrote a research paper under the guidance of my college professor on a similar problem statement (a kind of subset of the problem statement) with a very different solution as compared to the solution delivered during the internship. The paper was accepted at an A+ international conference. When the company got to know regarding the paper, they demanded an acknowledgment towards them in the paper.
But I feel that the only role of the company was to give me the problem statement. The paper was made possible only because of me and my professor's hard work. And the solution developed by me during the internship was also due to my skill and hard work.
So, how legitimate is the demand of an acknowledgment by the company, should anyone demand such acknowledgment in someone's work? Am I obliged to acknowledge the company in my paper? As an ethical practice I can show gratitude towards the company by mentioning in the paper that "the company gave me an opportunity to work on the statement etc". But it should be my decision that I want to or not?
What are the consequences if I don't acknowledge the company.

You don't explain why you don't want to acknowledge the company ?

Did the company also give you resources like a place to work, knowledgable employees, industry clout, etc? You got a problem statement and visibility into the business that you would not have had without an internship. If you really did this in a vacuum why did you have to wait for an internship to solve this problem?

“The only role of the company was to give me the problem statement.” That’s very important and it should be acknowledged. Without the problem statement, there would be no problem and no publication! It seems perfectly reasonable to acknowledge someone who literally gave you the problem.

@BasileStarynkevitch I was skeptical about giving the acknowledgement to the company because they demanded it in an unfriendly manner, and I saw it as a potential threat. And before acknowleging them i wanted to seek some actual advice regarding the matter. I have apologized the company for my innocent mistake and have acknowledged them everywhere i can. Thank you

At least in my field, Acknowledgements are generally regarded a fairly informal mechanism. There are few rules dictating what must and mustn't go in there. However, given that mentions in the acknowledgements don't dilute formal credit, I see no reason not to be as generous, gratuitous and grateful as possible in an acknowledgements section. Its not like adding an author, it costs you nothing and makes you look like a better person. Why wouldn't you?
Also there is probably an argument that you spent time thinking and learning about the general problem domain while being supported by the company.
I recommend adding something like "The author acknowledges BigCorp PLC for first bringing the problem to the authors attention and [financial?] support for work on related approaches", to the acknowledgements.

Thank you Ian, Is it okay if I add this line in the conclusion section as there is no space left in the paper? Or should I strictly manage to add the line in a separate section which would result in reducing some important information from the paper?

It could even be a footnote or the final sentence in an introductory paragraph.

I completely agree with this answer, even though it may not be "required" ethically, it is strongly advised to acknowledge such help. There is no downside and might be an upside at some future point.

Thank you for the help guys and the prompt replies, I will add the acknowledgement of the company in the paper. And should I also acknowledge the company at the official github codebase of the paper?

Up to you, I doubt anyone really cares, but then again, why not? Normally papers have a seperate acknowledgements section. But keeping it short if are lacking space is fine.

Good answer, though one could drop the 'first' and replace 'acknowledges' with 'wants to thank'. This sentence looks (at least to me) a bit passive-agressive; why not use this opportunity to mend bridges?

"Acknowledges" would just be the standard phrasing in my field. I can see that dropping the "first" would make it seem more sincere.

What are the consequences if I don't acknowledge the company.

You just burn bridges if you do that (you basically behave socially wrongly). For future conferences, it will hurt your professional reputation
FWIW, any European funded H2020 project contractually requires such an acknowledgement (at least in some footnote). AFAIK, NSF or NASA or ESA funding -of semi-academic work- has similar rules.

But I feel that the only role of the company was to give me the problem statement.

In Europe, that role alone is worth many thousands (or even millions) of €. Reports like ITEA3 roadmaps (or future HorizonEurope call for proposals) are exactly defining problems and inspiring funding of research proposals. The people writing them are paid, sometimes full-time. I guess that Indian people writing Indian DST call for proposals are paid too. Very probably, if you are happy enough to get funded for your research by them, you'll be contractually obliged to acknowledge such funding institutions.
In addition, research motivated by industrial needs is, in this decade, more professionally popular than unfunded research.
Suggestion: acknowledge both the company and your professor (unless he is a co-author).
FWIW, I tend to believe that lack of institutional acknowledgement in past submission related to RefPerSys (a not-yet-funded research project in AI) have been negatively evaluated.

Thank you for the answer, I never thought acknowledging someone in the research paper can be such a serious matter. Out of my curiosity I asked the question to which I can say I received very clear and true advices. I have acknowledged the company in my paper and will make sure to give acknowledgements to rightful people in my future works.

I'd like to add to the so far excellent answers:

Increases the reputation of the company, because they contributed to your research - even if you think in this case it wasn't much.
Increases the reputation of the field, because the paper shows there is interest for it in the private sector. This might not be important in this subject, but a lot of fields seem to have to practical applications. Showing at least one company was interested disproves that assumption.
Increases your and your professor's reputation, and shows you are both available for practical research.

And - as already pointed out - this has no negative side, no cost, nothing.

There is a tiny cost: conference papers are very constrained in size (e.g. number of pages or words). The OP would have to remove a few sentences to have his submission fit in the CFP


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Could number of years in Phd affect your chances to get employed in academia?
Say a Phd student spent 3 years doing systems, somewhat unsuccessfully (no publications since projects were not well picked..). Now this student switches to theory and ML (within its own department), so he pretty much begins his Phd from the beginning (e.g needs 5-6 or so years to graduate).
Assuming this student will do well in his new area, will his initial Phd "history" affect his employability? E.g if student will graduate in 8 years or even 9 years, having 3 or so years of work in irrelevant field (although without any publications...), will he have equal chances to get employed in academia e.g tenure-track as his first year peers that joined when he decided to switch areas?
I understand it might be highly subjective. If person gets to publish some field changing work in those years then I understand it will not matter, but let's assume nothing extra special happens during these years and his number and quality of pubs is average among his peers.
It would be great to hear this opinion from professors or postdocs or anyone who participated in hiring tenure tracks.
Thanks!

Brian May completed his...

@SolarMike And indeed he did not get a tenure-track position. Another one bites the dust...

I've generally heard people care much more about how many years it's been since your PhD ended. People can get their PhDs late for all kinds of reasons.

@FedericoPoloni If he got one, what would he play in his office " I'm going slightly mad"...

If you want to do the doctorate, then just do it. Never mind about the rest. While a few people might question the time, I think most realize that there are a lot of reasons that it can take longer than expected. Everything from funding to supervisor issues, to health reasons. Changing universities or programs.
It is what it is. There are so many more things that can effect "employability" that it shouldn't be a consideration. The general state of the economy in the years after you graduate has a much bigger effect, I think.

'you'? I thought we were talking hypothetically here ;-)


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While in Phd I developed a lot of code that I want to turn into start-up. Can I do this?
I was working 3 years on a project, that I came up with on my own, worked on my own, published 2 papers on it. I want to drop out of Phd (or take leave) and do start up at this point using my code.
Can I do it? Or because I developed this code while doing my Phd it cannot be used for commercial purposes?
EDIT: I am in US, top university for CS.

This is largely dependent on your location, as well as university guidelines. Some places strictly forbid it, some places encourage it. Where are you in the world?

Intellectual property rights for students working on unfunded or funded research projects are handled very differently at different institutions within the US and I'm sure there's even greater variation internationally.  You should check your university regulations and any intellectual property agreements that you entered into.

As useful as academia.SE is for certain types of questions, I definitely would not trust it as a source of legal advice for a potential start-up business. If you are serious about such a venture, you should get a copy of your university's IP policy, your PhD candidature agreement and rules, and contact a professional IP lawyer for paid legal advice.

Did you added the code to the publications/anything official in that time or did you just use it to help you figure things out? In the latter case, it should pretty much be yours in my opinion.

@SK19 I developed it in private repo and I published system's paper that talks about what we have achieved and partially how we did it. But since then I worked more on it and now I see it is a great for starting a new company. So I don't plan to publish more details

(not working at a US university myself) we were discussing open-sourcing our software with our colleagues at US universities. they seem to have strong restrictions from their university lawyers (whom you might want to contact in that matter), in that [my simplified view] code development US-publicly funded must be usable by US companies - i.e. exactly what you want to do. Therefore we cannot publish under GPL but are asked to publish all our code under Apache, which is (AFAIU) designed to be usable by companies, w/o harm to possible patents or restrictions to in-house improvements…

Only you can answer this. How do you not know the contents of your own contract?

I'm not aware of any blanket prohibition, anywhere, that say that you can't use code developed during a PhD for a commercial venture - but most Universities in the US will have some kind of intellectual property agreement in place to state what the process is for doing this.
You will need to check with officials at your University to see what agreements you are subject to - but you should go a step farther than this. Specifically, you should see what departments might exist that can actually help you.
In the US at least - and I'm sure many other institutions around the world - there are departments specializing in intellectual property, "knowledge transfer", corporate spin-offs, start-ups, entrepreneurship, etc. These can be a rich source of support and networking, if they are available to you, even if you have intellectual property agreements that assign various rights to the University.
Universities want to earn money for these projects, as I'm sure you do as well, and 100% of $0 is $0. Universities often heavily facilitate the process of converting this work into money, and it is not abnormal for even a place that has heavily restricted intellectual rights assignments agreements to assign use rights and royalty agreements that have zero cost for the first $200,000+ US dollars in income. There are often even startup grants available, accelerators (even if they are not called that - places that provide space and equipment to help starting businesses), introductions to investors, showcases, and more. You won't know until you ask and look for them, as where they are located tends to vary heavily by institution.
For the exact nature of the agreements that apply to you, we can't say; I've seen everything from "the student owns their own work" to "anyone funded assigns all rights and ownership to the University", and I'm sure there are agreements everywhere in between. You are right to check them out in advance of a major decision, but this is so specific that you'll need to talk with multiple people are your specific institution to see what applies to you. You may also need to speak with an outside legal professional (lawyer experienced in this area, etc) to verify, but your local administrators are your best first point of contact to see how things work.

This is not just a US thing; similar units operate in UK universities and probably elsewhere. The idea to get help from the university is an excellent one.

Locale matters a metric ton here. In Sweden, there is a principle called "teacher's exemption" that governs that universities cannot claim any IPR on their teacher's (and student's) inventions. However, even in that case a PhD student still needs to make sure that IPR between them and their advisor(s) is cleared. Just because you programmed everything yourself does not necessarily mean everything belongs to you and you only, especially if you wrote some papers where your advisor was a co-author.

US schools with top CS programs will have their lawyers all over this. Among other things, when I became a grad student at such a school and signed up for my school Internet accounts, it said the school would have a stake in any IP or business developed using its resources. (The way I read it, that would include using its hosted email and Internet connection, though criteria that extreme might be hard to enforce.)

You should ask officially, as others (notably BrianH) answered. At some places and countries, your university -or research organization funding your PhD work- will even help you (perhaps with a paid leave and/or some business incubator). At other places, it will forbid that and you could be sued. Perhaps your advisor might be helpful (so consider speaking with him about that startup idea, if you are on good terms).
In France, where I live, getting help on a startup with a PhD idea is probably easy (thru clusters like Systematic, BPI France, etc...). The official stance is that France is wanting more of that (and provide dedicated funds to help that), and it is likely to be the same in most European countries.
However, I recommend finishing your PhD (with 3 years of work on it you probably are not very far from that), get the official doctoral degree, and later on work on your startup (with approval, in some official setting which might ask you to give some parts of your company to the University or some other licensing terms, and perhaps help, from your University). An abandoned PhD work is a failure.
Even if your startup works, having the PhD (really) shows that you are able to end a difficult challenge. And if your startup fails (which is likely, since most of them do) the PhD is a useful blanket (or safety net) to have. 5 to 10 years later from now, having a PhD on your business card could make a lot of difference (and perhaps earlier: I guess that banks will more easily lend you money if your startup has the blessing of your University or research institution, whatever that means).
Conversely, dropping your PhD work right now, so close to finishing it, is probably a very stupid thing (and could send the wrong message to future VCs or potential clients : that you cannot be trusted because you are impulsive). Think a lot before committing that.
BTW having a working code on some research problem is really different from being able to sell it successfully (and requires different skills). And a research prototype software is quite different from a commercial product.

Agreed on the "finish the degree" recommendation. A company led by Dr. Franklin N. Furter, PhD, who has spent many years researching topic X, is a lot more impressive in business circles than one led by Frank Furter, the well-known college drop-out and wannabee entrepreneur.

@BobJarvis and yet, the irony is that most of the well known highly successful entrepreneurs were college drop-outs, such as Bruce Wayne or Tony Stark, Lex Luther, Mark Zuckerberg, etc.

@polfosol: But a lot more of the failed entrepreneurs have probably also been college drop-outs, and nobody remember them. Most startups fail!

@BasileStarynkevitch Aside from the humor, my point was, it is not so easy to prove that a significant correlation exist between finishing the degree and success in the business.

But after a failed startup, I believe that having completed your PhD makes a lot of difference to rebounce

@polfosol: I never said anything about the business being a success, which is IMO minimally related to degree completion. I said "...a lot more impressive in business circles...". Suits are impressed by degrees. The fact that the guy with the degree may be a full-time resident of the bo-zone is irrelevant. "PhD" may be enough to get you in the door. After that it's a matter of having a good spiel. (Also, I find your correlation of Zuckerberg with a bunch of comic book characters to be...humorous :-).

Further, the PhD work can be a time to try out the most speculative or theoretical parts of the potential company, where the timeline may be less forgiving at a startup. (You'd have to figure out how to protect the IP while also publishing, though.)

I've been through this a few times, but note that I'm not a lawyer. This is just advice to get you started on what you can look further into.
First of all code per se is covered by copyright not patents, and the copyright is probably owned by your employer (in a typical employment agreement). If the govt funds it you may be required to make it available to other researchers. If you never sell or publish the code you're using at your startup, no one generally knows or cares you're using it. Of course I've heard of people trying to sell their company get burned when the lawyers doing due diligence submits the code for copyright check.
The invention described by the code would presumably be patentable (because everything is these days), but whatever you have already published is no longer patentable in many countries. And in the US it will no longer be able to be patented one year after publication. This is all similarly owned by your employer if still patentable. After you publish it of course you and anyone else can do it.
One option is to see if you can get the University to patent it and have your company license it from them. This would actually be a great option as it adds prestige to your company. Plus the university's lawyers handle the legal stuff and protect/enforce the patent. This will also help you get funding. VC's will want to see you have protection for your IP (and conversely they will of course be turned off by potential IP issues).
Another option is to "engineer around" it by changing everything somewhat. Presumably you as the expert on the topic can imagine different ways of doing the same thing.
A final option is to not worry about the university and see if you can get anywhere on your own first. Then if you meet with success, you can now afford to deal with the IP issues. This is more the bootstrap option if you'll be scrounging one customer at a time and no one even knows what you're up to. Frankly the odds are you will find you need to change what you are doing anyway. Every customer tends to need a totally custom product oftentimes.

authors: Bob Jarvis - Слава Україні


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Rejecting a paper after final acceptance notice
I had a paper accepted by an Elsevier journal about two weeks ago.  I’ve already gone through the process of submitting the publishing agreement form and manuscript proofs online.
Then, a few days ago I received a rejection notice. No new reviewer comments were included.  I thought this might be in error, so I wrote to the journal and just received a response that it was not an error, but they gave no real explanation for what happened.
I didn't make any content changes during the proofing process and the initial reviewer comments were all favorable.
Do I have any avenues open to me to fight this?

You might also ask on Law.SE whether you could reasonably try to recover costs (including compensation for your time) associated with your actions which reasonably relied on the acceptance notice.

Related question: Why does editor reject when reviewers recommend acceptance?

I am curious to know the journal name, to avoid dealing with in future (just in case).

Sounds very strange. Have you received both e-mails from the same editor?

The question that jakebeal linked is somewhat similar, but here a final acceptance notice was sent out by the journal.  The acceptance email was from an official Elsevier account, with a rather boilerplate bit of text and the editor's name at the end. The rejection came from the personal email of the editor.

Perhaps the journal is ending publication?

@DmitrySavostyanov: No, please do not tell us the journal’s name; see this Meta discussion.

they gave no real explanation – So they gave some explanation? If yes, what was it?

Might the journal have any reason to imagine that there's foul play afoot related to the paper? e.g., discovery that it's been published elsewhere before, results that cannot be duplicated, plagiarism, etc. Depending on the exact nature of such an event, I could imagine a relatively detail-less recission for something.

For a respectable journal (which I would assume an Elsevier journal to be), this behavior seems so weird and unacceptable that I am tempted to assume that you are only telling us parts of the story here.
Specifically, the part about "but they gave no real explanation for what happened" is curious - what was the reason they gave? This will very much influence the advise you get here.
If, for instance, they said that the previous accept mailing was sent out in error and the new reject notification is correct based on review results, well ... then it would definitely suck for you, but I see no way to fight this decision. You are then basically in the crowded boat of people that feel like their journal paper was rejected even though the reviews were not that bad. That you received an accept notification first does not fundamentally change this. I also do not share the hope of Ben Voigt that you could potentially sue for compensation - as far as I know, journals typically reserve the right to cancel publishing a manuscript at any point in the process, so legally they should be fine to change their mind even at a very unusually late point.
If they said that they have in the meantime learned that parts of your paper are already under copyright elsewhere, then you can either clear up the misunderstanding (if it is one) or alternatively propose to revise the paper.
If they really give literally no useful explanation (don't answer your mail, or answer with no actual information), then I would fall back  to the answer of Wrzlprmft and contact Elsevier.

@jb35len please follow the suggestions mentioned above. We have the half-told case. Unless, you have a strong point to deal with, it is not advisable to arise bad impression about journal. From an editor's prospective, they are really working hard with manuscript handling process, sometimes it is very difficult and important to accept/reject any paper to maintain impact of the journal.

I got a response from the editor today and its basically what you said.  Despite the positive reviewer response, the original acceptance was a "clerical error".  This really sucks, but not much I can do about it.  Thanks for the advice.

@jb35len Thanks for the response. Btw., despite all, this is still a very embarassing "clerical error" for a reputable. They definitely own you an apology big time.

I cannot speak from experience here (fortunately), but my next steps would probably be (skip steps, you already performed):

Read carefully through all your correspondence for any hints regarding the reason of rejection.
Elsevier sometimes publishes preliminary versions online. If that happened, check the respective page and see whether any explanation is offered there.
Write to the journal or the journal’s chief editor and asking explicitly for the reason of rejection.
Write to the publisher (Elsevier) and complain about the situation. Append the entire correspondence with the journal beginning with the acceptance of your paper. The publisher should be generally interested in the integrety of its journals and also wasted resources on your paper, given that you already had proofs.
Threaten to make the whole affair public.
Make the whole affair public.

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/


text:
If you want to be a computer scientist, can competitive programming be helpful early on in your career?
Competitive programming is a craze among many computer science and engineering students. Is competitive programming important to be a good computer scientist? Thank you.

A good computer scientist is not necessarily a fast, or even a good programmer. It usually doesn't hurt, though.

Competitive programming is to programming as competitive eating is to eating.

Maybe if you are looking for an industry position that isn't research. Even then I would rather work with someone with a strong grasp of how to program rather than someone that can kick out working but not as sound code quickly.

Their are three things to my knowledge commonly referred to as competitive programming.
All are mildly beneficial, none are crucial, and winning never matters.
Code Golf and Programming Puzzles
This is the least useful perhaps.
If it is being done in the langauge you work in (rather than in a golfing langauge)
it can arguably keep you familar.
Really though it is a form of mental exercise.
Keeping your brain fit.
ACM International Collegiate Programming Contest etc
These tend to be restricted to undergrads or even highschoolers.
These involve becoming very familiar with a lot of algorithms.
Eg Dijkstra's algorithm, bellman-ford's algorithm.
And with important techniques like dynamic programming
Becoming so very practiced at these algorithms and techniques can certainly help one recognize when they are applicable to a research problem encountered down the line.
I know someone who became a very proficient at restructuring problems into things they could solve with dynamic programming during such competitions as an undergrad.
They have spent their PhD not only using it to solve their problem in some genome sequencing related area,
but then meeting other biological researchers (without the strong algorithm design background), and being able to solve the problems they have been fighting with for months in days -- which is a rad way to get a pile of collaborative works.
One word of warning is to not let them blind you.
They use a restricted set of tools -- often just a few programming languages with their core library -- and the problem needs to be solve entirely in them to the end.
But outside of those rules, there are more options that may be not notices.
E.g. if you can transform your problem into a mixed integer programming problem, you are probably done.
It probably can't be made into a simpler problem (that is not NP-Hard), because that tends to be fairly obvious (citation needed).
And once it is in that state you don't need to write a solver for it, you can just use one "off-the-shelf".
Hackathons
These have nothing to do with coding.
Hackathons are about building contacts.
Yes, you write code, but you are probably not writing code that is academically interesting.
(the coding may or may not be interesting to regular programmers, but regular programmers are not what this SE is for)
But they are a good place to meet people.
Sometimes the tools wanted to be made are for researchers in non-computing areas, and they need soemthing to gather-data, or something that lets them "productize" their research.
Sometimes that lets you put your face out their for industry people, who know know X is doing a PhD on topic Y. Then 6 months later: "Wow we really need this problem related to Y solved. We should get in touch with X".
And then maybe you get to do some research on their dime.
However some hackathons are exploitative, eg requiring you to pay to prototype something for a commercial company.
Rules for hackathons:

Never pay to attend. One does not pay to work.
If they do not have mentors/clients/competing teams who are going to make good contacts done attend.
Don't do 24 hour or 48 hours of continuous work. It is unhealthy.

Their are enough hackathons around that you can be picky.

I really appreciate even this answer. Though, I haven't marked it as the best I would like to really thank you for this answer! I was/am indeed thinking of the ACM style programming challenges! :)

I'd say it's a fallacy of converse logic. The winner of a hackthon is surely a good programmer, but the converse is not necessarily true that all the best programmers are good at hackthons and competitions.

It depends on what type of competitive programming you are talking about.
If you are talking about ACM-style competitions that have algorithmic questions it can be useful to participate in them. Practicing for ACM-style competitions forces you to become more familiar with algorithms and recognizing what types of problems can be solved with which type of algorithms. If you are interested in algorithms or algorithm design, I would definitely recommend participating in this type of competition.
If you are talking about hackathon-style competitions which are more about producing a prototype product, it would be more useful for learning software engineering than fundamental computer science. Hackathons can give you experience in quickly building an application, service, or device from the group up. If you are interested in software engineering I would definitely recommend participating in hackathons.
Overall, competitive programming is not needed to be a good computer scientist or software engineer, but it definitely can help. It all depends on what you want to learn and what other choices you have for learning and improving your skills.

Competitive programming is not particularly important for a computer scientist, but it can teach you useful skills. It's a form of competitive sports closely related to your work as a computer scientist. Like all competitive sports, competitive programming teaches you self-control: how to stop procrastinating and get things done. Being able to implement prototypes of new ideas quickly is a rather useful skill in most subfields of computer science.

all_licenses: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/


text:
If you have severe problems with speaking, is it okay to use more text and equations on slides?
I understand that it is best to give a good oral presentation supported by slides with minimal text. Questions like this have been asked before, but in the context of a "normal" presenter.
My ability to communicate in front of an audience is however so impaired by my nerves during a presentation that I think I can communicate more information by making nearly self-explanatory slides.
What is your advice on this in case of unusual limitations or problems of the presenter? Problems such as:

nervousness up to the extent that language gets incoherent,
people who do not speak the language required for the presentation well,
people with voice problems.

I understand this question can be a general debate of taste or style. But in general the objective in communication is the exchange of information by means of imperfect/corrupt media. If it’s difficult to repair or replace the media, it seems to make sense to change the mode of transmission. In an academic setting such as a conference presentation, or even a keynote, how acceptable is it to make the talk supporting the slides, in stead of the slides supporting the talk?

Anything that helps you to better get your message across is OK. But one could argue that you're really trying to cure a symptom here rather than the cause of the issue. A better solution that would benefit your career and your personal growth much more is to become a better speaker, and the only way to do this is by practicing it until it becomes a routine - even if it's a very strenuous path, it's a path certainly worth going.

@NajibIdrissi I agree that being bad at speaking is the natural state of most humans. But just to be clear, the symptom here (which the author hopes to cure by preparing the slides in a distinct way) is the inability of the audience to follow, whereas the cause are the bad speaking skills. My point is to focus on the cause rather than the symptom.

Perhaps you could avoid conferences and present your results elsewhere?

@NajibIdrissi Being nervous "to the extent that language gets incoherent" isn't "the natural state of most human beings". Yes, most people get a little nervous before giving a talk, especially early in their career; but very few get so nervous that the talk becomes incoherent. The incoherent talk is a symptom of the nervousness and, in the long term, it's the nervousness that needs to be addressed.

By asking about formatting slides, your question sounds like you're focusing on the short-term.  For a longer-term solution you should perhaps consider joining a group such as toastmasters, where you can get both practice and supportive feedback.

Have you tried to drink glass of wine before speech? It can give you placidity and assurance.

@Roland, I know these kind of presentations, and i agree that the presentation style is bad, and tiring. But the work itself could be good, and original. I think they are not happy and satisfied to give such a presentation, but they need to deal with their limitations. Intensive language or presentation training could help, but my impression is that there are people, who will always remain under average In terms of presentation skills, even-though they maybe invest much more time than others in the preparation, this effort is however not visible in net results.

@user2768, For me the conference is not only about the presentations, but also about the interaction with other people, asking them, and being asked in private during the breaks for further details. I was introduced to quite a lot of interesting work, from people who gave bad-style presentations at conferences, because i asked them some questions later. On the other hand there are fantastic presentations, in which there is few scientific content, its more entertainment. Of course the best is an fantastic scientific presentation with interesting content. It is a bit like with books and covers.

Slides with a lot of text or equations aiming to be self-explanatory tend to:

visually overwhelm the audience and don’t provide visual guidance – which is more relevant in talks than in written text as the audience needs to multitask to some extent, listening to the speaker and reading the slides at the same time;
contain more information than the audience can digest in the given time – regardless of what the speaker does;
have overly small text and graphics;
be read verbatim (which usually is a bad idea).

Mind the tend to: Neither are these issues inevitable, nor are they tied to the slides being self-explanatory. Rather, they are what often happens if an inexperienced speaker tries to make slides self-explanatory. In fact, I would consider most of my own slides self-explanatory and I am rather confident that my talks do not suffer from the above problems.
Hence I think your strategy to make your slides self-explanatory is fine – if you avoid the above problems. In detail, I recommend:

Avoid complete sentences, as they are bad for discontinuous reading such as usually done in talks.
Make sure that the main structure of each slide is easy to grasp.
Find a reasonable trade-off between not putting too much information on one slide and showing slides long enough.
If possible, use some test audience to ensure that your slides can be comprehended within the allotted time.
If a slide is complicated, build it up step by step in pieces that can be assessed by the audience within seconds.
Be careful not to overuse this feature, e.g., by uncovering a list item by item.
The audience likes to read ahead, in particular if you are rhetorically challenged.
Self-explanatory does not mean containing all the details.
In most cases, you barely have sufficient time to communicate your main message – only show what is essential to this message or at least make sure that sidenotes are visually distinct.
For example, if there is a standard way to choose the temperature at which you conduct your experiment, you usually don’t need to write this on your slide.
If you know that there are some people who cannot stop themselves from asking about this or it may be interesting for some members of the audience, give this information on the slides in a smaller font size or visually separate (and don’t talk about it).

This is a nice summary of practical advises. The test audience of people who understand the problem, but at the same time want to help to improve the presentation as much as feasible is probably the best point.

One additional idea to consider—you may want to treat what you're going to say as a "script" and memorize it. There's a lot of research that shows that reciting a speech (or similarly, acting or singing on stage!) uses different parts of the brain than normal everyday speech. You may find that it bypasses your nervousness and allows you to get through the talk.)

Yes. I write out the first 3 presentation slides, the last slide, and any other tricky parts of my presentation verbatim. I do my best to memorize. I practice several full run throughs with an audience of friends. If nothing else, it helps me to get the right order of points and key phrases.

The asker doesn't mention having any problems with normal conversation. So wouldn't it be better to make their presentation feel more like normal conversation, rather than less?

The question doesn't really state what happens. I presented the idea in case it's an issue. But your suggestion might work as well. (I did say it was "to consider," not "to adopt!")

I like the idea of activating other parts of the brain, like in singing, or making the speech in poetry mode. I will think about that.

If you have severe problems with speaking, is it okay to use more text and equations on slides?

Sort of: to be more precise, it's only "okay" to the extent that it may be the least bad option available to you or in general to a speaker who has the sort of difficulties you alluded to. But sadly I think that there is no such thing as "self-explanatory slides" -- the closest thing is called a "paper", and is something people can consume without going to a talk. The whole point of a talk is to use the medium of speech to communicate ideas in a completely different, and potentially much more efficient, way than through static, written material. To hear other people present their ideas through speech is the reason people go to talks.
Note that I am not trying to belittle your difficulties. I understand that just telling you you have to speak when maybe you can't is not helpful, so that's not what I'm doing. I'm just saying I think a talk with almost no speech is seriously unlikely to end up being a good talk no matter how hard you try, since you will be trying to use the wrong medium for the format to convey your ideas. It is like trying to play tennis with a ping pong paddle -- it can be done perhaps, but not well.

What is your advice on this in case of unusual limitations or problems of the presenter? Problems such as:

nervousness up to the extent that language gets incoherent,
people who do not speak the language required for the presentation well,
people with voice problems.

My advice is:

If the problem is completely, hopelessly unresolvable, e.g., due to being related to a medical condition, then just do your best with the text and equations and any other tricks you can think of. Also consider giving fewer public talks and trying to build your reputation more through interaction with small groups of collaborators and students, and written communication media such as papers, emails, blogging etc.
If there is any chance that your speech difficulties could be resolved someday, even if it might be extremely difficult and require years of therapy, voice practice, intensive language tutoring, or even surgery or other medical treatments, I think you might want to consider making the effort. Presenting your work in public is an integral part of academic life (and certainly one cannot hope to get a job that involves teaching, which are 99% of academic jobs, if one cannot demonstrate having that ability at least at a reasonable level), so your prognosis for a successful academic career with very limited public speaking skills would not be a great one, unless you are a genius of Stephen Hawking's caliber. Sorry I can't sound more optimistic, and good luck.

" job that involves teaching, which are 99% of academic jobs" Well, 99% of permanent academic jobs.

My sentiments exactly. You said it nicer than I would have done, though. Advice #2 cannot be stressed enough.

I understand that solving the cause, and improving presentation skills is very important. I really spend a lot of time on preparing, practising and reading about these things. (About 2 weeks full time for a 30 minute presentation, paper already accepted). The problem is a large difference in performance during practice and the real show time. During practice i am not nervous, so all goes well. I thought about recording it, but that is perceived as strange and i agree that it is odd. I heared of people-who take beta-blocker medicine, but i don't really dare to ask about this to my doctor.

I'm not sure if this is an academia specific question, but a general question about presenting. I'd strongly recommend against using more words on slides than necessary, which is what it sounds like you want to do.
As someone who has sat through lectures containing slides with big paragraphs in 12pt font, it's a surefire way to make sure you audience doesn't pay attention. You will lose their interest very quickly. They could, after all, read this on their own. What do they need you for? In addition, whether it's true or not, it could potentially appear lazy.
So ultimately, it's up to you whether you do this, just be aware that the majority of your audience will most likely tune you out.

how acceptable is it to make the talk supporting the slides, in stead of the slides supporting the talk?

In line with what Dan Romik said, I think you need to think about what the point of a talk is. Here's a non-example from a conference I was at:
The speaker began by apologising that they were not really comfortable in English (understandable, not itself a problem). They then brought up their paper on the screen, and proceeded to read it out in a mutter (bad. very bad.).
As a result, people either got on with some other work, or sat pondering what  they would have for dinner. I doubt anyone was interested in further interaction with the speaker.
Instead of trying to make the slides give the talk you don't feel able to, I suggest thinking about how best to use the talk time given the skills you have.
Eg.

Most people try to put too much into a talk anyway, so cut it down to
a small number of key points. If you want to pass on lots of details,
provide a handout that people can read at a more suitable time if
they want to. A talk is not for that purpose.
Design the slides to help reduce your nerves. I like having slides
because they remind me what I was planning to talk about, so I don't
have to worry so much about remembering (or otherwise).
Use diagrams that show what you are trying to communicate, and add
the explanation of it verbally.
Depending on the context and the topic, you might be able to make good use of audience participation. Set a question that helps the audience understand where the problem arises when you try the obvious solution; or shows up the bias many people bring to the question; or helps the audience see how your topic affects them. Achieving a good outcome this way won't be easy, but it could be worth the effort.

I think you should be mindful that some of your audience members may have disabilities.
Some may have trouble hearing and / or may be deaf and you many not be aware of this:  such an audience member relies on you writing enough material on the chalkboard / in your slides to follow along.  OTOH, some may have trouble seeing / or may be blind, and you need to verbalize enough of the material for them to follow your lecture.
So, basically, it's not all about you, it's about the audience's needs, too.  That may sound harsh, but perhaps that could help you forget about your own nervousness and instead focus on the audience being able to receive the information.

So, basically, you're saying to write everything possible in case somebody's deaf, say everything possible in case somebody's blind, and, ultimately, quit being bad at presenting and start being good. The last part, in particular, completely misses the point. The asker knows they need to stop giving bad presentations and start giving good ones; they're asking how. Unless you're Jesus, telling the paralyzed guy to just stop being paralyzed and walk doesn't actually achieve anything.


text:
How much weight does previous research experience carry for an admit to MS in computer science?
I don’t have publications from research projects or internships. However, my letters of recommendation may state about my research experience. I am applying to universities in the USA. I have all the coursework prerequisites.

What does LORs mean?

@user2768 Letter of Recommendation

Is it a taught MS or a research-based MS? What are the entry requirements?

What country is the MS in?

@O.R.Mapper USA

@O.R.Mapper USA

As @user2768 was asking, is there a research component to this Master's program (for example, do you have to write a thesis?), or is it purely course-work-based?

@user2768 I'll be opting for a thesis but I need not mention it now in my application packet

It sounds like @BlackSwan is applying for a taught MS, rather than a research-based MS. So, I don't think research experience is a prerequisite. Nonetheless, the OP should check the entry requirements, which should state whether research experience is required. (If it isn't, then it doesn't carry much weight.)


text:
How can I withdraw my paper from a fake conference?
I submitted one of my research paper in a fake conference by mistake. Now I want to withdraw my paper from it, But I am facing problem in withdrawal as no email id is given on that website. The problem is that now my paper has been accepted by another conference. But according to Turnitin, my abstract is already published somewhere else. Does anyone here know how and where to report such fake conferences?

I am not sure what you mean by 4% matches with the abstract which I submitted earlier in that conference. Matches with what? The other abstracts in the conference? Or something else?

Did the conference actually take place?

The abstract of my research paper is present on the website. Now each time I run a plagiarism check on  my paper it matches with the text on that conference website.

I didn't register there. According to the website it'll take place in August 2016. But as its fake so this also is a lie.

I still don't know what you mean. Why does this 4% have anything to do with the conference? If I understand it right, you ran a tool like turnitin and get 4%. This means the abstract of your paper has 4% plagiarism rate which may not be a big deal if you did not plagiarize. But this 4% is your problem, not theirs unless they modified your abstract.

Yes. It's a problem for me, not them. The problem is that now my paper has been accepted by another conference. But according to Turnitin, my abstract is already published somewhere else. Now, I do believe its is a problem worth worrying? Because my current publisher may raise this case that my paper is already present somewhere else.

@scaaahu : 4% on just abstract means a lot! Because it's indicating that this part is already present somewhere..

Please edit your question to include the information you stated in the previous comments. They are critical information for your question. I believe you have at least another problem - double submission.

The problem is that now my paper has been accepted by another conference. -- So you submitted the same paper to two conferences? Even if one of them was fake, that was a serious mistake on your part.

@shane: It sounds like you're talking about proposing an oral presentation to two conferences.  JeffE is talking about submitting the same paper twice.  The rules for paper multiple submission are different than for talks, and they also differ among fields.  (I believe JeffE's field is CS and that conference proceedings, not journals, are the preferred method of publication.  Take whatever you know about submission to multiple journals in your field, and in his it applies to conferences.)

@shane: In this question, it is clearly stated that the first, noxious, conference has already published OP's work.

@JeffE: I submitted the paper to the other conference after I came to know that the first one was fake and I was never going to publish my work in two conferences. This is why I never preceded with registration process in the first conference. And upon acceptance in the second conference, I requested the first one to remove my work which, according to them, they did but it still shows up in Google search results. But yesterday I made a legal request to Google to remove it and they are working on it.

My work is 'not' published in the fake conference. Only the submitted abstract shows up upon searching, along with my name and title of the paper.

@shane: i)The field of my work is Computer science. ii) Neither of the conferences asked me to do that. Because I requested the first one to withdraw my paper and I didn't tell the second one about it as I never preceded with any registration process with the first one.

Thank you all for your replies and answers but still, I haven't found any solution. This situation which I am facing right now might have been faced by many people but why is that no action is taken against it ever? In the second part of my question I've asked where to 'Report' such fake conferences because they are conning people on daily basis. Is there any authority/legal body to whom we can inform?

Thank you, sir. I respect your opinion. But I am doubtful about it... Should I take this chance when I have not done anything unethical on my part? I think by doing so I am only going to make this situation complex for me.

The fake conference is unlikely to co-operate – it's a fake conference operating for unscrupulous reasons. You can try, but I wouldn't expect them to play ball.
Your best chance of success is to clearly explain the situation to the organizers real conference, and hope that they understand your situation and accept your paper / talk request without problems.

This is a horrible situation for you. Until this moment, I never heard of "fake conferences". I just read about them, and the source I was just reading said, and I'm paraphrasing, there is very little difference between fake and legitimate conferences because they are both based on status-enhancement and profit-making rather than the spreading/seeking of knowledge. Unbelievable.
I would report it to your administration and discuss it with them to find out if there's any official action that can be taken. If there isn't any recourse, then I think you have found yourself a MAJOR career opportunity. Set up a business that clarifies which conferences are fake and which are legitimate. Sort of like an "Angie's List" of conferences.

@shane Thanks for that information about the list. I guess it needs to be increased to capture all or most of them. People are still getting the shaft.

I am well aware of the situation but instead of crying about the situation I need a solution to get out of it :) Up till this point even I wasn't aware of it but there are few 'signs' by which you can get to know that a particular conference is fake.


text:
What to do when you have accidentally submitted an article to a predatory journal
I'm an inexperienced researcher and I made the stupid mistake of submitting my article to a predatory journal. I realised the journal was fake when they failed to provide the reviewers comments.
I then requested that the article be withdrawn. I received an email back from the 'editor' saying that the article had been withdrawn and guaranteeing that they wouldn't publish the article without my permission. I didn't sign the transfer of copyright, pay any money and the article hasn't appeared on their website.
My question is whether my article is now a write off? Can I resubmit it elsewhere or just write off as a bad learning experience? I would really like to salvage if if possible.

Just to be safe, if you haven't done so already, send an email with wording that makes it explicitly clear that you do not authorize them to publish the paper in any shape or form.

Related: How can I withdraw a publication from a fake journal and resubmit to a legitimate journal?, What should I do if I submitted an article to a predatory journal?.

Out of interest, how do you know/how can you be sure that it was a predatory journal?

@Pharap As OP said, “they failed to provide the reviewers [sic] comments”. That should be enough of a sign. More generally, the (poor) quality of other articles published there is a good indication.

All you can do is just hope they spell your name right. (That's a joke)

You can now submit it elsewhere. It has not been published and it is not under consideration anywhere, so you are free to resubmit it.
The fact that the first journal was predatory is only relevant because that was the reason you withdrew the paper.

I suggest you do one or more of the following:

Put a version of it online - on your homepage, or better yet a place like ArXiv. If it gets published by somebody else later you would be able to demonstrate earlier publication. If you chose to put the article on your home page, it is strongly advised to go to https://web.archive.org/save/http://homepage.my/article.html to have it saved and stamped in the Internet Wayback Machine. Another option with a record of date of upload is a repository management website like github.com or bitbucket.com.
Talk to one or two central people you know personally in your field (and with whom you have a sort of friendly relationship). Tell them this happened to you, and ask them for the favor of looking at the paper. While this would preclude them from evaluating it as part of a program committee/editorial board, it would ensure they would back up your claim against a publication of the same work by someone else.

Also a git server like GitHub or GitLab. These keep all revisions and the timestamps thereof.


text:
How to organize content of slides for a conference presentation?
I am going to attend my first IEEE conference on Electronic Design/Verification and am feeling quite nervous about my first oral presentation.
I want to make sure to "sell" my point and ensure all questions are being tackled, and so I am looking for advice related to the organization of my slides. For example,

How can the slide material  complement my speaking?
How do I ensure that the end-product is not dry/heavy?
If my work is on for example, SRAM or Post-silicon technologies,is it recommended to begin my presentation with a foil on a collage of the latest news snippets about these topics? This could probably draw their attention rather than picking up some lines from my camera-ready's introduction section.
Also, how many slides should I ideally allocate for each section of my paper?

I am forced to ask such "trivial" questions as my Professor is on a sabbatical currently and has little/no access to mail for the next few weeks.
I have searched the Internet and found some generic advice, like "How to give a bad talk" by David Patterson.
There are some related questions on this site that do not seem to directly address how to organize the content of the slides. How to do a flawless and natural presentation? asks about becoming a more effective orator. Inspiration for great presentations asks about effective design elements (not content organization) for slides.

... I am a huge fan of Latex. Just do not use it for presentations. You can use the PDF export of TEX on a full screen, which is also universally supported everywhere.

Note: removed no-longer relevant meta comments related to previous versions of this post

Edited my question to differentiate from the linked one.

I removed some vestiges of the old post that no longer seem directly relevant to the focus of the new question, and reopened. Good luck with your presentation :)

I just stumbled upon this question. I wanted to know if it is wrong in requesting experts in that forum to post an example of their/others' presentation and the associated conference paper. More than advice, I am looking at a "template" for my presentation.

@ff524, Please let me know why this question is still not being attended to.

A new question asking for examples of presentations and their associated papers would be off topic (per the [help/dont-ask]), and would be closed. But you could ask in [chat] if anyone has any they would like to share there. As for why this question hasn't gotten more answers; nobody is obligated to answer any question. It seems that nobody has chosen to answer this one. You could post a link to this question in chat also - that might help draw attention to it.

Ok, I was under the impression that the question was closed. That is why I needed some clarification.

It is better to finish early than late (if they would let you). Do not
try to say too much. Then try to be informal, to give a feeling and
intuitive understanding for what you are doing. If you include an
equation, you probably want to explain it informally. It is often unlikely
that most people will follow details that are too technical.
Part, or all, of the presentation is really advertising for the
paper. Make then understand the concepts, and why it is interesting
and new. But you should probably skip the technical details of proofs
or programs.  However, relating your work to existing work is
important: the audience will want to understand why they should spend
time reading you paper, what advances they will get beyond what they
already know.  If they are interested in a specific detail they
consider crucial, they will as a question. But you are unlikely to
know in advance what it will be.
Remember, you will not tell your whole paper in one talk. Else the
talk would be longer, or the paper shorter.
If you think that some details are important and that you may have
question about them, though they would overload your talk, you can
prepare slides to answer questions about them. And you use them if
needed.  But do not mix them with the other slides, put them at the
end.
Your PDF (PDF is generally accepted) should be organized so that you do not have to think about it
during the talk. You will be busy enough.

Thank you. Do you have some examples regarding the advertising part? If you can provide links to papers and publications by undergraduate researchers, it would be of great help.

@AgrimRaghav I wrote on the basis of personal experience. No precise example available. What I mean is that you have to put forward the key ideas that make your work interesting, with enough details to be credible, but not more than people can swallow in the alloted time, after attending many other technical presentations. What matters may be dependent on topic. Relating to previous work is needed, but then your work may be interesting for the result, for the techniques used to get it, for the potential applications, or possibly for its new perspectives on the problems (rare, but important).


text:
Can you study and contribute to physics if you are a mathematician?
I'm an undergraduate student majoring in mathematics; I totally love it and I want to get Ph.D in pure mathematics.
I'm also interested in physics, especially the theoretical field; my favorite areas are relativity and quantum theory. Of course, I'm more into mathematics than physics, that is why I majored in math; plus I don't get as high grades in physics as I do in math.
Now here is my question, if I became a mathematician, can I switch to physics easily if I wanted to? I heard a lot about mathematicians contributing to string theory and other areas. I guess what I'm looking for is not a total switch to another field; rather it's more like the ability to learn more about physics easily and being able to contribute to the theories.
What I meant was that I want my Ph.D to be in pure math; in essence my focus would be on math. But also I want to study the stuff that interests me in physics, e.g. GR, String theory, etc. I'm asking if it's possible for a professional mathematician to

study these subjects in depth without much difficulties; and I'm referring to difficulties in getting enrolled in classes and being able to handle them, and
be able to contribute to these fields

I'm sorry English isn't my first language, I hope I made my question clear.

I wonder if this would be better at physics.se as it is not about switching fields in general, but about the details of math and physics.

Yup I thought about mathematical physics, I think I'm more into the pure mathematics field.

I don't understand. You say you're into physics but you don't want to do mathematical physics because you prefer pure maths. So in what sense are you into physics. Your question just sounds contradictory.

What I meant was that I want my Ph.D to be in pure math; in essence my focus would be on math. But also I want to study the stuff that interest me in physics, e.g. GR, String theory, etc. I'm asking if it's possible for a professional mathematician to (1) study these subjects in depth without much difficulties; and I'm referring to difficulties in getting enrolled in classes and being able to handle them, and (2) be able to contribute to these fields

I don't think it would be that hard to contribute to physics if you're already at an advanced level of mathematics, since physics is just using that mathematics (which you want to get a PhD in), and putting it into equations (my favorite part of physics), describing the universe in which we live in.

Yes, if you choose your sub-specialty in mathematics wisely, you will be able to interact with physicists as much as you want and decide the amount you want to be linked between the two fields. Mathematics and physics are not in a binary from one another, but instead there is a spectrum amongst the fields.
As you note above, you see that there are links between the two, namely in GR and string theory. Let me address your two priorities separately.

"study these subjects in depth without much difficulties; and I'm referring to difficulties in getting enrolled in classes and being able to handle them"

Typically, getting enrolled in classes during a PhD is a formality that one may even skip and just attend the course without signing up. As for studying these subjects in depth without much difficulty, that may be harder, in particular, because the subjects themselves are, in fact, difficult and will take time and energy. And you will be more focussed on mathematical knowledge in order to work on your thesis.

"be able to contribute to these fields"

This is quite easy if you choose your mathematical discipline and research problems with this thought in mind. Personally, I'm solely trained in pure mathematics; however, I keep my ear to the ground to string theoretic research and go to many talks in order to glean what mathematical problems string theorists have. Much of my pure mathematical research has string theoretic implications and I am in communication constantly with string theorists as I make a concerted effort to keep that connection.
This leads to communication with physicists where I can try to help with mathematical problems that physicist contemporaries have in the context of physics research. It really depends on how much physics you learn with your pure mathematics if you learn the physics with it or if you need it to black-boxed. Many programs in pure mathematics now have Geometry and Physics seminars. Usually these programs have opportunities to focus on geometric problems that have origins in physics and might satisfy your aspirations for working in the intersection of the fields.

Yes, technically speaking, you can cross the fence -- either direction -- between those two disciplines, but be aware of their different agendas.
Physics uses the language of mathematics to construct mathematical models of reality, but the physics is really contained in the following three non-mathematical tasks:

Establishing the association between mathematical symbols and reality (interpretation of the mathematical models).
Verifying the validity of the conceived mathematical models (physical theory verification).
Establishing their limits of validity.

You can be a great mathematician, but if you fail in understanding the above not-so-easy tasks, you will be a bad physicist.


text:
Why do some universities charge an application fee?
In the high competition of admission in top universities, it is common that every applicant must send lots of applications to different universities/programs to get approval for a PhD program.
Some universities charge an application fee. Why? This hinders many potential applicants.
For a research position (research associate, postdoc, etc.), the job advertisement system encourage as many as possible applicants to send applications. This gives more flexibility to select the best candidate.
Why do universities stop potential applicants for PhD applications with an application fee?
If the application fee is US$100, charging US$10,000 for 100 applicants is nothing for a university, but sending 10 applications ($1,000) is something for a student (particularly if coming from developing countries).
WHY do Western universities charge a small application fee, which is probably one month salary of a candidate from developing countries?

sending 10 applications ($1,000) is something for a student (particularly if coming from developing countries), I understand the pain. I was in this same situation 4 decades ago. My monthly salary was USD$200. I had to spend much more than that just for applications. The lesson I learned is: send applications to only the schools I know I would go to and I had a reasonable chance to be accepted.

@scaaahu Which is exactly the response they're looking for with the fee.

Indeed. I was in this position two decades ago, when considering applying to universities in the US, all of which charged application fees (all of the ones that I checked out, that is). This is one of the main reasons I set my sights on the UK, and ultimately got my PhD there.

Some department/universities will waive application fees for applicants in developing countries.  Unfortunately, mine is not one of them.

@JeffE In the old (pre-web) days, even when a university refused to waive the application fee, a department could look at the applications for which no fee had yet been paid, could decide which of those students to admit, and inform the students of the decision.  If the decision was positive, the student still had to pay the fee, but if the decision was negative,the student wouldn't waste a fee on a rejection.  I fear (but don't actually know) that nowadays applications reach the department only via the central administration, so this idea no longer works.

It truly does disgust me how admissions force applicants to gamble (while consistently and disingenuously avoiding calling the process such, of course ...) at fees too high for even the obscene present prices of labor to explain, and also how you're damned if you do whatever:  if you apply to one school at a time to minimise the total you throw at the system, you likely have to wait through many semesters (a gap which some will have the nerve to demand that you explain); applying to many at once so as to have an appreciable chance of success will guarantee you waste all but (at most!) one app.

Also repugnant in addition to the concept that one pays, with certainty, for a shot at an opportunity that to them is a crapshoot (definitely not nearly as deterministic or meritocratic as many make the decision out to be, or have convinced themselves, or like to believe) and to the admissions officers sheer discretion is the fact that said prize is the privilege to, in part but a significant part at that, hand them more of your money on a silver platter.

I understand the imposition of a modest barrier prevents a deluge of excess applications by asking applicants to put their cash where their mouth is, but I've seen much and the current level is ridiculous.

The reason why applying to one school at a time results in such a grievously slow stream of verdicts is that those schools (for the most part) collude and synchronise their decision periods, so that if you see the result of one application, that means it's too late to post another within the same window and you're forced to wait another half-year or so.

As an example of what happens when everyone can apply for free, consider: http://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/41687/what-is-behind-the-indian-undergrad-research-experience-spam

"Why? This hinders many potential applicants." That's exactly why.

A system where everyone applies everywhere is not in the interest of any of the participants. Handling the applications requires significant effort on both sides and the applications are less meaningful. In particular, plenty of people will receive multiple offers inevitably turning all but one down. That requires waiting lists etc. In the end, some positions will even go unfilled.
In countries with a centrally-run system (for undergrad places: eg UK or Germany), this can be avoided on the central level. If there is no such system, then application fees are a means for the universities to encourage the applicants to send out only a small number of good applications.
That this disproportionally affects students from poorer backgrounds is an unfortunate side effect while the extra income is fortunate for the university.

I like this answer because it's in a neutral position, Neutral in the sense that the OP is speaking for both applicants side and university side.

There has not been a central system in Germany for some time, for most curses of studies. (*affects, too.)

There is no central application system for PhDs in the UK, either.

Why couldn't some other solution be implemented?  For example, requiring on your application that you list all the schools you've applied to for that same semester.  Most places would reject anyone with more than 2 or 3 outstanding applications, which gives students a huge incentive to only apply to a few.

@BlueRaja-DannyPflughoeft perhaps it's because they know they can't check. A rule without enforcement is useless and counterproductive, penalizing the honest.

@Alexander: What a beautiful phrasing; I want to like that a bunch of times and also engrave it in stone.

The imposition of an application fee serves two purposes:

It helps offset some of the costs of graduate admissions, which otherwise has no revenue at universities that (effectively) charge no graduate tuition.
 My university must receive at least 10,000 applications a year for its 400 doctoral slots across the disciplines. That's about $1 million in revenue, which is not trivial.
More importantly, the cost imposes a burden (opportunity cost) on applicants that helps weed out the less serious and ensures that people are not applying to every program under the sun without regard to fit or suitability.

Comments:

Most universities have an admission fee waiver program which you should explore. At least at my university, the admissions committee/faculty don't see which students applied for and received waivers, so there's no downside to applying if you qualify.
When we do job searches, we often wish there was a higher opportunity cost so that applicants wouldn't apply so far outside of their fields for positions they have no chance of getting into. However, the general trend has been to actual reduce the opportunity cost by getting rid of the requirement to send letters at the same time of the application and to move to electronic applications.

Re your last point, requiring letters of recommendation to be sent at the same time as the application puts the opportunity cost on the writers of those letters. It's much easier to ask for a letter than write one.

@david Presumably, the thinking would be that advisors would put pressure on advisees to not apply to 200 schools if they had to write 200 letters. However, in this day of electronic portfolio systems, there is effectively zilch direct or indirect opportunity cost, this we've had to abandon this system.

The PhD admissions process is a hugely time consuming process. Depending on the department, the vast majority of applications are reviewed by multiple members of the faculty. In the case of 4 people reviewing each application at 15 minutes each, that is a person hour of time application. As the list gets shortened, often the number of people involved increases. So while in the final stages you might only be considering 10% of the applications, they are being reviewed by 40 faculty members, hence even 15 minutes spent discussing each applicant and funding for them, would still contribute another be a person hour per application. While I have never tracked it, each application probably requires a couple of faculty per hours to process.
You claim that $10,000 is small change to a department is wrong. Assuming a 10% acceptance rate, if that money went directly to graduate students, either as an increase stipend or travel and research funds, that is $1000 per graduate student. That is a huge increase.

The first paragraph is important: handling applications costs time of highly qualified people -- hence money. $100 is but a fraction of that cost, but it may help keeping the workload in check.

if that money went directly to graduate students — Yeah, but it doesn't.

even 15 minutes spent discussing each applicant and funding for them, would still contribute another be a person hour per application — Yeah, but that's already part of our job, for which we are already paid.

@JeffE: How do you know? It goes into a big pot of money out of which it may come back in the form of graduate fellowships. It's true that the application fees are not specifically earmarked, but they go into an account for which there are likely very few restrictions on use -- exactly what you want to have if you're considering adding an additional fellowship or TA line.

@WolfgangBangerth How do you know? — I'm an associate department head. — they go into an account for which there are likely very few restrictions on use — But that's exactly the opposite of "go directly to graduate students"!

@JeffE my point was for a department that accts 10 PhD students a year (i.e., a small one) an extra $10,000 is a lot of money regardless of where it goes. As for reviewing applications being part of my job, sure, but in an ideal world grants pay for research time, tuition pays for teaching, and application fees pay for admissions work.

@StrongBad: Your Fermi calculation that gives $1000 per grad student is a bit strange.  First, you seem to assume that graduate students only stay in the program for one year.  Second: as has already been pointed out, it's absolutely counterfactual to say that the money goes directly to the grad students.  The more interesting question is whether the money goes to the department in any sense or just to "the graduate school", which means the university at large.  In my case, I've always assumed it was the latter, though it's worth checking on this.

@PeteL.Clark, you are right, I missed the multiple years. My point is that I disagree with the OPs assertion that the $1000 per incoming student is nothing to a department/university. Tracking any single pot of money is obviously hard, but in my experience, if the university removed those fees, there would be a cut to departmental budgets. That lost money would have to be made up someplace. I will try editing in a bit to see if I can make this clearer.

@JeffE: "Yeah, but that's already part of our job, for which we are already paid." -- But that paid-for time is a limited resource to faculty and departments which should be used wisely. For example, at my college I estimate that over 1,000 faculty hours each year are spent on paper attendance records -- not all "paid for" time is a good expenditure.