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How do I convince older academics to switch to MS Teams rather than using email?
I'm a postdoc and the most junior member in a multidisciplinary academic project. Currently the team's main form of communication is via email, which has become more and more chaotic recently. It's becoming increasingly difficult for everybody to keep track of all the threads of information.
I would like to create a MS Teams channel and ask all team members to use it as our primary source of communication, to consolidate our different information streams. I believe all members have access to MS Teams. However, I'm concerned about the blowback from such a request, as many of the older academics may not see the point of using it, being more familiar with email.
Does anybody have any experience with trying something similar, and any advice for how to be persuasive in making such a request?

Are you sure you’re not solving a problem that doesn’t exist in the group? Or overcommunicating? It would help your case to show gaps the group has and how this, or any new tool, is worth the investment learning.

This is probably a hopeless task. Many of my older colleagues have explicitly pushed back against use of Teams chat for communication (even from higher-level management), citing non-permanence of chat logs and difficulty in searching through it cf email. If they are happy with the way they are doing things, they won't see the benefit of changing.

MS Teams and eMail are suited for different kinds of information. Do you want to switch because the kind of information you exchange matches MS Teams, or "just" because people have access and it’s not eMail? At least judging from your description of communication being chaotic with many different threads, it doesn’t look like MS Teams has a fundamental advantage.

Note that MS Teams is not particularly pleasant to use if you're on Linux or, presumably, anything else other than Windows and MacOS. It works, but it isn't pleasant. I would really hate what you are suggesting, for instance.

Not me. My computer is a MS-free zone. See: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/legal/terms-of-use. Most commercial offerings have similar issues. Their priorities are not your priorities.

Comment from older software dev. We once attempted to use Teams too - but it is not usable in our environment - it is chaotic, it makes increasingly difficult for everybody to keep track of all the threads of information, it is distracting, it does not allow efficient search for older information and so on and so on.

Note that the senior in "senior colleague" is not quite the same as the one in "senior citizen".

@Scriddie, the headline suggests "older". Perhaps as in older and wiser. ;-)

I am one of those older devs and I've never forgotten Joel Spolksy's advice about minimizing interruptions to stay in "the zone." (https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2000/08/09/the-joel-test-12-steps-to-better-code/) It's important to use the right tool for the job: Email for asynchronous communication that isn't urgent. (Just because someone lacks patience and wants an answer right now doesn't necessarily make it urgent.) Chat for urgent things that are short and uncomplicated.  And a phone call or online meeting for urgent things that require back-and-forth discussion that is too much to type.

The  copying of large blocks of text is really terrible on teams. Why dont you try and copy a long (several pages) conversation? I find teams lousy for that.

Why use MS Teams?  So Microsoft can collect valuable data about us!

As someone with lots of experience with all kinds of tools, it's better to convince people to use email threads and labels properly and effectively than an entirely new system. The proliferation of different chat tools is a major turnoff - some of us have to track 6-7 different channels. Not a good argument.
Using chats effectively is another steep learning curve. E.g. Discord workflow is quite subtle and has lots of features that you have to train people to use properly. MS Teams may be disliked by people who dislike MS in general.
Short of high-end professional org tools (the usual suspects in software engineering come to mind) who make a compelling case, I  think less flexible academics won't see much gain with such a transition.
More chat-experienced people may gain a bit, but, to be honest, despite myself being an experienced user of chat systems for many  years, I am tempted to go to back to an almost entirely email-based communication for anything but the most quick and short-lived communication. At least, you can search for where some statement - that you distinctly remember - has been made without having to scour different chats, channel-associated file repositories, channels etc. which is something I had to do just recently.
This is complemented by Nelson and PLL's excellent additional argument: chat information ages and decays, sometimes catastrophically, for a number of reasons:

licenses limit the searchable time window
host and support change model or disappear
data export is limited, sometimes due to honest tech constraints, sometimes due to intentional "garden-walling"
owners of files/chat dropping out of reach

While it is possible to implement effective chat use and data organization by very rigorously applying workflow etiquette of a highly professional and disciplined well-oiled industry developer team, these latter people are paid for that level of discipline. Academics are not. Academics tend to focus discipline onto thinking, not onto organisation.
My recommendation would be to introduce discipline in the tool they know, that is, email, such as choosing good subject lines and keeping threading hygiene and leave it at it.

Agreed - I'm a pretty young academic and am also very reluctant to use teams over email in most cases.

Some of these downsides just don't really exist. Like the searching one. I've never had problems searching for stuff in even when I have no clue what channel, DM, or group chat it is in.
It feels like grasping for any any every reason possible to say no.
The main reason I'd say not to change is because there'll likely be some resistance to it for very little gain. Like this answer says there's plenty of tools and labels and setups that can be done to organize emails. That eliminates the need for any other tools imo.

The linking of attachments to onedrive is a giant disaster. Dealing with onedrive permission settings and then having stuff disappear is a nightmare to deal with. Even as an engineer, it gets missed, and if the colleague happened to have left the company, well, good lucky trying to deal with orphaned data in one drive.
Email attachments are MUCH simpler to deal with.

@TheEvilMetal: Searching in chat isn’t a big problem for current projects, but it ages terribly over time.  In chat-based projects, I’ve had all of the following problems, aside from remembering what platform they used: (1) the platform shut down and the history is lost; (2) history is only saved up to a relatively small limit; (3) history is saved, but past a small limit only searchable with premium subscription; (4) the app is outdated and barely-functional.  In my email, on the other hand, I have 20+ years of full history, all easily searchable.  There’s just no contest.

@TheEvilMetal Apart from the excellent aging arguments mentioned above, you say "I've never had problems searching for stuff..." - but that's exactly what happened to me once or twice in the past weeks. Wasting 20-30 minutes to find something that I was sure I had seen when I am going to a meeting where I need to know this - is no fun. A single repository is searchable, but multiple ones are not.

You see a problem and you're proposing a solution. Does the rest of the research group agree that this is a problem? For example, can you point to recent instances where someone missed an important update that was communicated by email (and, as a result, they wasted time/effort)?
If you can't, consider whether you should implement your own individual processes for tracking this information and working within email.
If you can, that's the place to start - not just in persuading others, but also your own problem-solving. Read the other answers carefully. I would encourage you to consider all of the specifics and ask yourself: Given the nature of the issue, and your collaborators' tools and tool access, what change in process produces the best results with the smallest change?

Exactly this. The first step should not be "convince my colleagues to use [my favorite software]", it should be "check whether my colleagues agree that there are significant problems with continuing to use [the current software]".

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XY_problem ; if possible, bring the problem to the group (or other people in the group who agree with you that there is a problem) and try to come up with a solution (perhaps e-mail threading, perhaps Teams, perhaps something else) that works best for most people.

Any tools are as good as all people are able to learn them and want to use them properly.
The problem with cluttered e-mail is not the e-mail system. It's people cluttering the system.
I'm quite confident people messing up the communication via e-mails are about to mess the communication in Teams, Discord, post, etc. as well.
Another issue here is that e-mail or IRC are protocols, Teams and Discord are services.
With e-mail, one can use Outlook, another Thunderbird, another some hosting and still you can collaborate quite efficiently no matter what happens to Outlook or Thunderbird. When Teams fade, how can you access all the data sent through it? Do you remember AOL/ICQ? Skype?
If you want to clean the communication the best option, in my opinion, is to teach the members how to communicate efficiently. What they want to say, who are the recipients, what information to include and what not to include, etc.
Also think of assigning administrator duties and authority to someone, who will focus on the communication within the team.
You can look for request tracking system, where few people will administrate is and the rest will interact via e-mail only.

For me, the problem with email is not about communcation methods -- email versus chat. Asynchronous communication is fine for collaboration. The problem is maintaining accessible information over time. Email is generally designed around a paradigm of write, send, receive, archive, done.

In a collaboration, we often need to let a message "sit" for days or weeks while I think about the answer.
We also need to go back and read things like meeting notes or previous decisions we'd come to, often weeks or months later.
A long-running collaboration could have dozens of threads and hundreds of messages, and the subject lines of the email are often not that informative.
People tend to either try to maintain "Inbox Zero", so they want to archive read emails immediately, or they have very messy inboxes. Either way, it's often hard for most people to quickly access an older ongoing email thread.
The big provider email interfaces (Exchange, Gmail) are clunky, slow web interfaces often with poor support for organization and search, and people often don't use the organization tools.

We got our entire research group to switch to Zulip, which is a similar tool to Slack. It currently has a free plan for academic research. However, there were only a couple faculty and they were "young". The pitch was that this would be a place we can store and organize things like meeting notes, discussions about e.g. where to submit the paper or how to format a certain part, etc. Once we tried it, we liked it and we use it for almost all of our projects.
However, if this project is a small part of somebody's day and they don't feel there is a problem for them, they probably won't want to switch. So you'd need to try to politely raise the issues you perceive ("it's becoming increasingly difficult for everybody to keep track of all the threads of information"), raise the possibility that a different organization method is needed, and propose your solution. Maybe my points above about the drawbacks of email can help. Discussing it with your closest collaborator or two one-on-one first would be a good idea.

Your first two bullet points sound like email should be the tool of choice rather than chat (where "sitting" messages or messages from a week ago quickly scroll into oblivion). Your third point seems to argue for email with good subjects (rather than a huge chat with NO subjects), and so does your fourth (it may be hard to quickly access an older email thread, but so is to find an older topic/thread/separate chat in a chat tool). Point 5 is good, but Outlook/Thunderbird allow for a ton of productivity tweaking. So: are you arguing for email?

I'm saying there are good asynchronous alternatives to email, and I'm talking about email as it is used (not as we wish it were).


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How soon should I begin my introduction for a PhD by publication?
I'm in year 2 of my PhD, and have a fairly good idea of what papers I'm planning to get out of it by year 3. Is it too early to start writing the full introduction to the PhD? Or is it a good idea to get started early if I have a fairly good idea of what to work on?

What field is this? How do you know any of your planned research will be successful unless you have results?

In general, I find it helpful to write the introduction to these sorts of things last. For my dissertation, I did it a week or so before I submitted. But your style may vary.

@Dawn The introduction for a PhD by publication is typically not something you write in a week.

I read PhD by publication as being equivalent to sandwich thesis. Is that not what is meant?

I don't think that there are any hard and fast rules for this, irrespective of the discipline. I do think that the discipline might make a difference, but so too does the writer.
Like many writers, I find that writing helps me to discover what think. In fact, I'd go so far as to say that I only really know what I think once I've written it down, decided that what I have written isn't quite right, and altered it to mean something closer to what I (think?) do think. A consequence is that I find it helps me to begin writing very early. I'm typically a very very slow writer. I rework sentences until I'm happy with them, rework paragraphs until I'm happy with those too ... but once I've finished as much as a paragraph, I find that it is likely to remain that way even if I don't use the paragraph in quite the place that I thought I would.
By starting to write early, I gain two things. First, I get ahead of the delay that my slow writing speed would otherwise cause. Second, I get paragraphs that I'm pretty happy with and can use en-bloc when I construct the final version of an introduction.
Other writers are very different. There are people in some (particularly empirical/experimental) disciplines who wouldn't dream of writing the introduction before writing the whole of the methods and results sections. They'd just see the writing of an introduction as a waste of time until the other sections are settled. I, on the other hand, find that even with empirical papers, doing something on the introduction helps me to formulate the kind of argument that I want to use to drive the whole thesis/paper, etc.
My suggestion would be that you take less notice of specific "start early" vs "wait" advice about writing an introduction and instead look particularly to your own history of writing.
In your undergraduate writing, in what order did you typically write things, be they essays, lab reports, or whatever? Which parts did you typically find hard? Are you a fluent, fast and easy writer, or do you congratulate yourself (like me) when you manage to write more than 150 words in a day?
Perhaps the best advice is to write whatever you can, whenever you can. Finishing a PhD can be hard. If you have bits of writing stored away, you will either be able to use what you have written in your final PhD ... or else the process of writing them will have provided you with good practice that will make writing easier later on.
Good luck!

It may matter what field your dissertation is in. I have just finished my dissertation, which comprised of 4 peer-reviewed articles, with an additional general introduction and general discussion, which are not peer-reviewed. I finished the four articles first, and then wrote the general introduction and general discussion in a couple of weeks. I used these sections to make a clear connection between the four articles. If I had written the introduction in an earlier stage, I would have probably had to rewrite virtually everything. For me, leaving it until the end was a good route to take. I had enough other stuff to focus on in the writing process.
Still, it could be a good idea to start the introduction now, if you think it would be beneficial for writing your papers later on, and if you are not yet able to start writing those. Even if you later on decide to scrap big chunks of what you've written now, they can be useful in deciding your direction, finding out what doesn't work etc. However, I personally would not prioritize your introduction before your papers.

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What happens to my ethics application when transferring PhD to a new uni?
I may need to transfer my PhD to a new university soon due to moving overseas. My PhD can be done entirely online, so in theory this shouldn't hinder the research itself.
For my current project, I have already had my ethics application accepted by my current university, along with a substantial number of other documents (e.g. data management plan, data sharing agreement, etc). Will I need to repeat this documentation at a new university? I.e. will I need to redo my ethics application and data sharing agreement?
Thanks a lot

will I need to redo my ethics application and data sharing agreement?

Yes. It's possible (but not particularly likely) that you will be able to expedite approval a bit if you've shown you went through the process before, but every institution is in charge of their own research program, and you're now going to be part of a different institution's program. If both you and a colleague at a different institution were involved in collecting data for the same project, you'd likely both need to get separate approval in that case, as well.
Hopefully most of the writing you've done can be used again, saving you some work, though different review boards may have different standardized forms they want you to use.
One way to think about this is that basically your old institution no longer has any sway over you, so they can't really hold you to anything. They can't fire you or prevent you from getting a degree or anything - your new institution can, so they're the ones that have jurisdiction over the work you do. In the US (other countries may be similar), the laws governing ethical research typically apply primarily to the institution: as a result of receiving government funds, the institution promises to comply with certain regulatory requirements, including ensuring that work done at their institution is performed according to certain ethical standards. Even if you were moving within the same country, the new institution would need to sign off on your work. It's even more unlikely that anything approved in another country could be considered ahead of time to comply with the local regulations.

Unfortunately, the approach that Institutional Review Boards (IRBs) and Human Research Ethics Committees HRECs) take to approving research at universities tends to conflate ethical behavior with institutional risk.
As a consequence, a decision by a university to approve a research project should therefore usually be interpreted as a positive statement about two separate issues, one of which is general but the other, university specific. In particular, the approval probably implies that your research both conforms to generally accepted ethical standards of behavior and also does not expose your approving institution to unnecessary (or, for them, unacceptable) risk.
The problem is that if you then transfer to a new university, the new institution might well agree with the first university regarding the conformity of your research with accepted standards of behavior. However, they will almost certainly want to make their own assessment about the extent to which the research exposes them (i.e., the new institution) to risk. You are, as a result, almost certainly going to have to submit a new ethics application.
... As an academic, I'm just about to do the same thing myself!

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Should I share my idea for a grant with a potential competitor?
I'm a fairly new postdoc, about to meet with another new postdoc in my field for a coffee. I'm really excited to share one particular idea for a grant proposal with them, as I think they could be an ideal collaborator on this proposal. However I've never met this person before, and despite all appearances being favourable, I am worried that they could take the idea and run with it.
What are some ways to ensure that this doesn't happen? I want to be able to share the idea without risk of being scooped, but also without being too precious with my idea (I know it's just an idea at this stage, but I still think it could have legs).

Why are you so anxious about this person, and why would you consider inviting them to collaborate if you think they might steal your idea?

Trust but verify. Given the potential for a collaboration - yes, you should share your idea with them. Take the risk. At the same time, think of ways to mitigate the risk: perhaps follow with an email mentioning in writing what you shared with them or perhaps have a third person join the meeting. Either way, and before sharing your idea, ensure that they're interested in a potential collaboration. If they're not or if they're hesitant - keep your idea to yourself and only share it when the other side understands the need to play fair. Good luck.

Ideas are cheap, and until you put them into action, they are fair game. How do you know your potential collaborator hasn't had similar/related ideas? Or other people for that matter?
If you are hesitant and want to protect your ideas, then I suggest you begin working on a proposal on your own, and then carve out a space for the potential collaborator to contribute to. That way it is clear that you are adding them to an existing concept paper/project (not that it will guarantee they don't strike out on their own at some point, but it gives you more credence as the originator).
Besides, how do you know that this person wants to collaborate with you, is compatible with you? How do you know that you will actually want to collaborate with them? Fruitful collaborations take a lot of moving parts, and even if everything looks good on paper, there is no guarantee it will work out to everyone's benefit in the end.


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How many related concepts should I try to fit into a research article?
When writing a journal article, I've noticed I have a habit of name-dropping concepts that are related to my argument. This has the benefit of increasing the links between my paper and other research, and also provides a framework for my arguments that is grounded in the literature. But it also tends to clog up the article with too many ideas, making it confusing, boorish and overly academic.
What is a good balance to strike between these two - linking my argument to other ideas vs keeping it simple and understandable? Any tips on how to know when you've gone too far in one direction or the other?

Well, if your text is boorish it may be more about tone than the number of concepts mentioned.

You put in the ideas that need to be there to convey your point to the reader. Anything else is confusing at best.

This is a judgement call and you seem to be making it, but not adhering to your judgement. "I can't define it but I know it when I see it" is a common trope.
If you think you are overdoing it, then do less of it. Or just edit (once again) any paper that you think has overdone your own best judgement of the practice.
If reviewers comment then try to follow their advice, as always. If they don't comment, then you are probably more or less OK.


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interpretation software
Does anyone know a software that is able to interpret a report. I need help for regularly marking 90 paper, each about 2000 words. This is ver time consuming. I was wondering if anyone is aware an `AI type software package were it can spot key words.
Many thanks
Siavosh

I’m voting to close this question because I think you should not be looking for this. The answers here already tell you that.

Marking is one of the responsibilities that academics never enjoy, because it is time consuming and not very exciting. However, it is your job to do it, and you need to do in properly. Consult your University / college policy on marking and check if it allows the use of such software. It is very likely that as a marker you are expected to read all the reports carefully and mark them based on their content, not just a few keywords.

You're barking up the wrong tree.  There is no software substitute for grading papers by hand. What you need to do is create a rubric, assigning points or penalties to each aspect of the assignment you consider important, so that grading becomes simply a matter of checking off the items that apply, then adding up the result.


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Graduate of Graphic Design, want to pursue Applied Mathematics for physical modeling. Can I get Recognition, either Certificate or Degree?
I have a bachelor's degree in graphic design (US resident). I recently got interested in real-time physical modeling of instruments; after realizing that I needed math to do what I want, I started self learning. I completed Stitz and Zeager's college Precalculus book, and now I'm going through UBC's CLP Calc 1 book. I ultimately intend to be able to apply: solving partial differential equations with transformations and space/time discretization, vector calculus, complex analysis, state-space models, Volterra series, etc. So far, I'm having fun and I intend to keep going, as I'm extremely motivated about this subject (physical modeling). Looking at the subjects/topics I want to learn, they essentially make up an applied math program (especially when looking at MIT's course list for Physical Applied Math).
I was thinking, since I want to learn what is essentially applied math, why not get a certificate, degree, or some kind of recognition that could help in my professional development in the future? Problem is, most graduate programs require students to already have done several math courses I've yet to learn. Is there a way for a US non-math grad like me to "officially" complete the prerequisites to get into an applied math program?

Have you looked into the possibility of taking courses at a nearby college or university? Even in the case of a community college, you should be able to take differential and integral calculus (single variable calculus), and for some community colleges even multivariable calculus and differential equations. I think once you get to this point (what you can do at a local community college), you'll be in a much better position to decide whether (and how) to continue. You'll also meet teachers and other students who you can talk to about your goals.

Yes, that's a good idea. However, I have a few months that I'm spending full time to learn math, and so being confined to spend an entire subject on one semester like Calc 1 before a second semester of Calc 2 isn't really ideal. I'm thinking I can self study at my faster pace and take CLEP tests to earn college credit, for at least the classes that must be taken in sequence. Then I can attend a college for classes I can take concurrently?

If you're pretty sure you will have the opportunity to CLEP the courses, and you're confident of your ability to self-study, then that would probably be better (no travel; no dealing with on-line classes) and probably much quicker and definitely less expensive (although community college costs tend to be quite low). Make sure you use an appropriate text (what's used where you're at), and don't rely on over-the-top recommendations I sometimes see for someone (in the U.S. at least) beginning to learn calculus (i.e. avoid the books discussed here).


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Working on original calculations versus reading papers
I am a beginning phD student in theoretical physics trying to understand how the research process works. I have been wondering how top physicists/scientists actually do research. I would like to work on specific problems and original calculations. However, I find that I would also want to understand how other physicists think about problems/ what the core ideas in my field are by trying to read the original papers in the subject. I am struggling with this process. How to find the balance between reading important papers in my field (older papers with a large number of citations), recent papers, and working on my own calculations. How can I find a problem to work on? I wonder if experienced researchers can give advice on this.

This is an extremely broad question.  Are you doing experiment?

This is the sort of question that is far better directed towards your thesis advisor; the balance will depend a lot on you and your project and where you're at.

If you're a beginning graduate student in theoretical physics, you probably still have a lot to learn from reading before you can produce original calculations.

Too many questions.  I tell my students only to go into the in the literature when they have a specific question in mind.  Otherwise, it is not practical to read everything under the sun.   Also your supervisor is also a good source of questions; e.g., has anybody done X?

You will not earn a PhD in sciences for work done in a vacuum. Alternatively said, no one will care about your original calculations unless they contribute to the existing body of knowledge in a way that advances our scientific understanding or solves a problem. Alternatively said, how will you know that your calculations are original unless you know the body of calculations that have already been done and can acceptably demonstrate that you are truly filling the holes that exist in the already-existing calculations?
As paraphrased from somewhere ... "This PhD defense presents much new and interesting work. Unfortunately, what is new is not interesting, and what is interesting is not new".
In summary, directed to your title, you must not only read literature in your chosen field but also comprehend and put its results in fullest context before you can discover something "original" to do, let alone before you should define how to work on that original idea successfully to earn a PhD.
As to your broader question about how the research process "works", I would close with a synopsis paragraph.
The research process to earn a PhD is not linear or amenable to a consistent, directed road map going from point A (stepping in to it) to point B (ending it successfully). If it was as such, anyone might simply propose to buy a recipe book and get a PhD by completing the steps in its pages. The research process to earn a PhD can include starts, stops, dead ends, and breakthroughs. The process can include short or long bursts of studied literature review, construction or formulation of ideas, and experiments or analysis. The process can encompass ideas gleaned both from the most recent publications in the field as well as from those considered classics in the field. The various stages in PhD research (literature review, idea/hypothesis formulation, experiments or analysis, reporting) can be done sequentially, in purposeful isolation, or in parallel depending on the resources available, time commitments possible, or skills/training at hand. The sequence (review, formulate, experiment/analyze, report) and the path (sequential/parallel) can change at any moment in time, again depending on what currently might be limiting progress for the final work that is needed. Finally, the process can be intimately personal and unique. However it must not be done in a vacuum, especially not in one that purposefully excludes mentors, colleagues, and peers.

This is only a partial answer to your question perhaps, but I’m two years into my PhD and this is a question I’ve asked myself for a long time. I guess part of the answer is to go get to work on specific problems, read what you need to solve those, and over time you’ll get a sense of what is relevant more generally in the context of your PhD. You’ll find that the amount of literature — both published in the past and published every day right now — is astronomical, so one of the caveats will be to really narrow down what you want to read. This is only possible once you really get a sense of what is relevant for your PhD ; over time you’ll realize some "general" stuff (e.g. reading generalist manuals for field X and/or theory A) will be essential to your success — while other "general" stuff still related to your field won’t be. For instance, I’m in astrophysics, and I can’t even imagine how much time reading everything about astrophysics (both published in the past and published right now) would take. You have to focus on your subspecialty, then go broader as you feel the broader stuff is still essential for your research.
Hope that helps a bit!


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How to overcome lack of ideas periods?
As a background, I am a PhD student in Physics. I have published 3 papers with my supervisor and 3 without my supervisor,as an independent work. After all these, I reached a point where I don't have any good ideas anymore. I don't know what direction I should approach. I have some ideas, some of them are not so good being too simple, and others too complex and might be done in long periods of 2-3 years. the question would be on how to increase productivity and find new good paper ideas?

Quoting Picasso, "may inspiration finds me working".

In Russia, "Ideas have You". But seriously: It may be the time for vacation or doing a few completely different things for a limited period. Also, in physics, the world gives you structure. Make use of that. Is there a way of cutting the big problems you are looking at down to size? Smaller, digestible chunks? But sometimes, it's just time. Give your brain something entirely different to chew on (apologies to Talleyrand).

You may face a minor burn out period. Changing directions, taking a short holiday, visiting a conference outside of your field, spending some time solely reading and doing routine research may all be a good way to shake you a little up

In my experience a major point is to engage with other's research. The most common occasion is to attend regularly seminars, and go to conferences. By listening to research talks, you will learn about tools which might apply to some of your questions, and about questions for which you might have the right tools.
Another possibility is simply to read other's research, but it is quite difficult to decide in what direction to read, while when you have a weekly seminar to attend you get in touch with ideas regularly without having to be proactive.
Maybe there is a subfield, with connexion with what you already know, where you heard things are happening and someone wrote a nice survey? Then read that and see if it leads you somewhere.

The existing answer is a good one, and essentially recommends that you look inside academia for research projects. Another way to approach the problem is to look outside academia. I find this approach to be more fruitful, and questions originating outside the discipline tend to have higher general impact, although it can sometimes be more challenging to find an outlet or a relevant research program to tie into.
Stack Exchange is a great way to find ideas. Find the stack or stacks related to your field, and just start answering questions. When you find questions that don't have answers in the literature, think of a way you can answer that. If it could lead to a paper, then do that and your drought is over.
Another option, closely related to the recommendation to interact with other people's research, is to talk to smart, educated people outside your discipline. This works best if your research area is not something highly specialized. It doesn't take long, in most cases, for a smart person to ask a question for which there is no accepted answers. Follow that question until you find the answer and then publish it.

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Why some papers are retracted and others not?
Recently, in Reviews of Modern Physics, I have read an erratum which represents an apology for a copied verbatim text. The text is:
"Large parts of Sec. VI.A, “Inverse magneto-optical excitation of magnetization dynamics: Theory,” consist of text
and equations that are verbatim quotes, or very nearly so, of material in the paper by Gridnev (2008). Although this theory
was developed in close collaboration with Dr. Gridnev and jointly published in Kalashnikova et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 99,
167205 (2007) and Kalashnikova et al., Phys. Rev. B 78, 104301 (2008), we adopted the more compact and rigorous description
given in Gridnev (2008) for this review. We regret that we did not identify these parts of our review as direct quotes, and we
apologize to V. N. Gridnev and the readers of Reviews of Modern Physics for this oversight."  from here.
Although there is a copied text, from what I see, there is not a retraction. The question is: why this paper was not retracted?

Evidently the authors didn't request retraction and the editors didn't feel it was necessary.  We can only speculate as to how they reached that decision.  I don't know what we can say beyond that, without being mind readers.

Because probably the piece of text copied with respect to the whole text didn't warrant a retraction, and let's be happy about this: the fight against plagiarism should not become a blind witch-hunt where at the minimum case one requires retraction.

I'd speculate that this was a genuine 'oversight' as they say (of which they convinced their editors) and the rest of the content was fine.

In general, an editor will choose to issue a retraction when misbehavior or errors undermine the "core" of a paper (authors may request a retraction, but ultimately it is generally the editor who decides).  An erratum or correction, on the other hand, is for when there is a problem that doesn't change the "core" of the paper.
Different editors will draw the boundary differently, and some things are in a grey area.  In this case, it looks like reuse of background material (a grey area on self-plagiarism) shaded over into plagiarism from another closely related piece.
In most cases plagiarism, even of a background section, would be enough for a paper to be retracted due to the issue of dishonesty, which cases doubt on everything else in the paper.  In this case, however, it appears that given the close relationships between the authors and the papers, the editor judged it less a matter of theft than of sloppiness, and opted for the lesser correction.

Speaking of retraction: initially, I voted to close the question, but this answer shows that it's possible to give quite good and general answers to apparently opinion-based question, and I've retracted my close-vote.

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


text:
Should I accept authorship in a completely unrelated field?
I helped a friend with an analysis and this will now be published. The analysis only took me two evenings of work and I saw this as a favour to my friend and told them I didn't need authorship in return. In the past, I have helped several colleagues from my own field with analyses and regularly invested similar amounts of time in this and never got authorship in return, which was fine to me. However, this friend now offered me authorship because the analysis is the core of the paper and other co-authors contributed less than I did. The paper is in a completely different field as I am, so it may not add too much to my CV except that my skillset is transferable to other fields. Do you have any advice on whether I should accept this co-authorship?
Potential cons:

Hard to take full responsibility of the paper because I don't know anything about the field
Perhaps it diffuses the focus of my CV/publication list(?)

Potential pro's:

Extra publication/citations etc.
Shows that my skillset is transferable and acknowledged and valuable by/to others

For context, I just finished the first year of my postdoc. Do you have any thoughts or advice?

I think you have correctly listed the most important pro's and cons. The decision you make is up to you. Personally I would say yes: publish what you can: you never know where you end up in future, and it is more likely to help than to hurt you. Of course you could consider informing yourself about the "unrelated field" to remove one of the cons. I hope that my comment helps, but I will also vote to close this question because the choice you end up making is opinion-based.

Agreeing with @Louic (at least on the decision part, less so on the closing part), and I also think the pros you list would outweigh the cons. Interested in seeing other perspectives on this though.

Are you afraid the rest of the work wasn't done properly?

Not entirely hypothetical question: Imagine you are at a job interview, and someone you talk to asks you exactly about that one paper. If it is one in many, you can probably talk your way out of it, but if it is a significant fraction, it can leave a bad impression.

@user151413 I don’t understand why it would be necessary to “talk your way out of it” – why would honesty not be the best policy in this case? Why would the facts as presented in the question hurt the OP’s chances at a job interview?

@user151413 In that case, you respond "Oh, glad you asked about that paper! T. his was an interdisciplinary collaboration with my friend and colleague Dr. X Y and my contribution consisted of (...). The research question was set out by Dr. Y, and my understanding is that my analysis lead to the conclusion that (summarise main conclusion; probably can grab that from the abstract)."

It really depends on how many papers this happens. If this happens one one paper, fine. If this happens on 50% of our papers that you supplied the method to someone else and don't understand the other part of the paper, this will affect hiring decision. Of course, if they look for someone who just applies their method to many contexts and thus produces papers rather than developing their own research profile, this might be a plus as well.

You have listed the wrong reasons for considering accepting an authorship. The only consideration should be whether you've put in enough work to qualify as a co-author. That threshold is field-dependent, and presumably, your friend knows a lot more about the standards in their field than you.
What may be a trivial analysis in one area might not be somewhere else. Actually, I'm worried you were overly conservative in turning down prior authorships.
With regard to taking responsibility for the paper, a comment from Bryan Krause:

I have encountered some journals/submission systems that do ask that all coauthors take "full responsibility" for the paper ... That said, I don't take those declarations too seriously, and I'm comfortable declaring I take "full responsibility" as long as I feel comfortable with the aspects of the paper that I've had the ability to influence.

To which I would add that there is always trust between authors. If you're otherwise confident your co-authors did everything correctly, that shouldn't be a barrier to becoming an author. After all, if there's no author that takes responsibility for the "core" analysis that's a serious problem!
Even if it does end up "diluting" your publication list, then you can always not list it, and name the section "selected papers."

Thanks for your responses. I'm quite confident that I formally did enhough to qualify as a co-author. I made a script to run all analyses and made all figures. Thanks for the discussion on the 'full responsibility' and 'diluting'-issue.

I disagree that it is only about "whether you put enough work into it". This is what is relevant to decide whether you deserve coauthorship. But you can still reject it, e.g. because you don't understand certain parts of the paper, and you don't want to be blank when people ask you about the paper. Different people care to a different extent about this aspect, and it is a fair point to say that one only wants to be on papers where one fully understands all aspects.

@user151413 Well, I completely disagree with all your points, so feel free to leave an alternate answer. We don't know the OP's field(s) so yours might be more accurate in another field. Much better move to understand the paper than reject authorship ...

@Azor I certainly have colleagues who do exactly this - only accept coauthorship on papers they can comprehensively explain. It is not standard in the field, but they care about their reputation in a different way than others. That's a fair point, and really also a matter of personal taste. But you don't want to earn the reputation that you just the bare minimum to be on the papers you're on.

In terms of authorship, contributing to the analysis done for a paper does rise to the level of being an author of the paper. You can see some examples of what contributions give rise to authorship in the CRediT statements used by some journals: https://www.elsevier.com/authors/policies-and-guidelines/credit-author-statement. Listed in there are things like the formal analysis (applying statistical analysis, etc.) and writing software for the research (which can also be the analysis software). So, from what you say, the offer of authorship is proper. At a minimum though, there should definitely be a mention of your contribution in the acknowledgements section.
As for accepting the authorship, while you say it is hard to take responsibility for the full paper, do you at least know enough in the field to understand its ideas and do you feel the collaborators you worked with have a good understanding of it? In my experience, the expectation for knowing everything and taking full responsibility rests mostly with the corresponding author rather than each individual author (since the corresponding author is usually the one who has been involved the most). The individual authors should be knowledgable and responsible for their areas of contributions.
In my opinion, yes, it would be fine to accept the authorship. You also mention that you had already done work like this in your own field with other colleagues without the authorship credit, and I would encourage you to bring up the topic of authorship with future collaborators you work with during the project (typically it is better to discuss these things when you are starting the project to ensure there are no surprises). I know it can seem tough, especially when some of them may be more senior, but you can make strong cases for being included (and it can definitely help your career by showing you can collaborate and work with other teams).

It would be good for the authors to acknowledge your contribution in an acknowledgements section. All authors should accept full responsibility for the entire paper and you have stated that you can't do that. It is, of course, your decision. But what if other results turned out to be fabricated? What would you want to do then?

While lovely in theory, there are many situations (high energy physics for example) where any given single author can't personally vouch for the whole thing. Here it sounds like the OP provided a specific analysis that was needed, and so is core to the results. If some other collaborator fabricated results, that really isn't on the OP - they can't know everything.

@JonCuster, you may be comparing apples to oranges here. If you are working in a well developed area with leaders of the field then their reputation matters in accepting the arguments without personally verifying them. In other fields, with untested authors it may not be so clear. And not being "on the OP" may be an unrealistic judgement. I think this is an edge-case that isn't clear either way. Hence the OPs dilemma.


text:
Resubmitted paper not processed for 3 weeks. Should I notify the editor?
My paper was given a minor revision by a Springer journal. I finished the revision and submitted 3 weeks ago. But the paper still has not been sent to review nor accepted. Should I notify the editor or should I just wait longer?

Leave it alone.  Editors and reviewers are volunteer.  They process/review a paper when they are 'free', which could be the next hour, or the next year.

why are you so impatient?  The editor deals with 10s if not 100s of papers in a year, and they have a life outside of the journal.

The editors are not volunteers. They are employees of the journal. @Prof. Santa Claus

The reviewers haven't yet acknowledged the receival of your rebuttal letter and corrected manuscript. Springers computer system will start nagging them soon, no need for you to nag the editor.

@andy90 most editors receive no salary or benefits from the journals, unless they are chief editors.  (There are exceptions, such as Nature Publishing groups).  There are managing editors or handling editors that work for the journal but they are not usually academics and usually don’t deal with sending manuscripts to referees.

@andy90 in my discipline, all editors and reviewers are volunteers!!!!


text:
Left academia for a job with a publishing company. Is it normal to feel guilty or "settled" about a decision? How to overcome the feeling?
After PhD and a year of postdoc in mechanical engineering, I accepted a position of a scientific editor with a publishing company. The pay is decent but not great. I have been working in the new role for the past 9 months.
So far I have been finding the job quite interesting though not as enjoyable/stimulating as a industrial research (which I did during postdoc) or my research during PhD.
A part of me wants to explore this career option to the fullest. Being a publisher or project manager/data analyst/strategy director for the publishing company. Acquire skills for making progress in my career (PMP, scrum master certificate, study data science, etc).
On the other hand, I miss being relevant in research and academic fraternity. An industrial research scientist position will be a good middle ground between academia and my current job. However, there are not many permanent R&D industry jobs in the country where I live. And I don't see myself as an academic at the moment. I am just not smart and hardworking enough to be one.
This is making me feel that I have chosen the easiest option. I should have struggled a bit more before settling with the current prospect. I am probably harming my potential by not seeking postdoc positions or applying to tenure track positions.
I am not sure what career decision I should take. Staying in my current role longer would make transitioning back to academia or research impossible. Also, though I enjoy research, and might get a position in future if I try for it long enough.  I don't know if I have it in me to keep struggling.
I feel judgmental tones from my PhD colleagues or other friends when they hear I am not doing research at any capacity and working as a scientific editor. This makes me feel "lowly", "unaccomplished" and "settled" with my decision.
Is it normal to have such thoughts after leaving research and academia?

"I feel judgmental tones from my PhD colleagues or other friends when they hear I am not doing research at any capacity and working as a scientific editor." They are not friends, they are a***holes.

"I am just not smart and hardworking enough to be one." Hardworking is just the other side of exploiting.
You do not realize it now, but 10 years down the road, when only a minimal percentage of your "friends" and colleagues will have a research or even academic position, they will see things differently.

"I miss being relevant in research" do you mean objectively (i.e. could you see your publications having an impact, people inviting you to spend periods abroad) or for your inner being (i.e. working for "progress", instead of for a for-profit company)?

@EarlGrey By being relevant in research, I meant by carrying out and publishing research. Satiating my own intellectual curiosity and making an impact in the scientific community while doing so. Recognition as a decent researcher is something I will miss too.

A case of "crying all the way to the bank"

I was the opposite. As I came up to finishing my PhD all the expectations were that the right thing to do was to stay in academia. But I knew that I wanted to apply what I had learned in the real world, and I knew that if I didn't get out of the academic bubble then, I never would. I've never regretted it for a minute.

@EarlGrey Well, people really can be both.  I have many friends who are a**holes (and some have said the same about me).  People are complex things.

Beware that, judgements of the sort you describe are often simply personal rationalisations. As in, "I have this opinion because I need to justify my reasons for staying" rather than "your reasons for leaving". It's a bit like the Ben Franklin Effect, which says you're more likely to grant a favour to someone after you've done it once already. People who find themselves positioned within an established context, often tend to retroactively adjust their beliefs, as a way of regaining their sense of agency in the established situation (Stockholm syndrome being an extreme example of this)

Related: ls it wrong to not have any research ambitions after PhD and postdoc experience?

Yes, it is normal to feel conflicted after any major life decision. You gain some things and you give up some things. There is a phenomenon called Buyer's Remorse that is related to this. (I bought the Ferrari, but I shoulda got the Lambo.)
Your friends have made different decisions and are evaluating you based on that, rather than on your needs. Hopefully you can remain friends, but it is unfair of them to judge.
Your life is what you make of it. Try to base such big decisions on whether they are right for you, not on externalities.

Guess what? Those feelings of a missing limb don't go away.
I left academia in 1990. I joined industry. My income has gone up substantially. Since 1990 I have had exactly 2 days unemployed. And that was because I chose to have two days between jobs when the company I worked for was bought out. Most of the time the work has been interesting, if somewhat mundane compared to what I did my PhD in.
But the world does not need many people doing topologically massive gravity. So my thesis did not get me a job in academia. Explaining to the guy who interviewed me for a job in industry that "long hours do not scare me" got me a job.
A few years ago, one of the profs at a local university suggested I apply for an academic position. They have been having difficulty attracting qualified individuals in the specific field of my work in industry. If that suggestion had come in 1992 or 1993, I would have been massively happy. But it came in 2015. When my income had reached a point that would be equivalent of quite a senior prof. And I had an established career. With about 100 calculation reports in the document database of the company.
But my teeth hurt when I gritted my teeth and said no. If I didn't have a mortgage then, I would been severely tempted go back to fresh-caught prof wages.
The path not taken is always a pang. Anybody with more imagination than last year's sneakers has felt this. If not for academic career passed by, then for something. A passed up lover, a passed up trip somewhere, that lottery ticket you didn't buy. Any opportunity passed up is going to make you wonder.
Don't think that way. Your life is what it is. It is what you have made it. You have choices HERE. You have decisions HERE. Make those the best way you can. You can become somebody in your current job. The amount of work, the difficulty of the work, the grind, is similar in industry to academe. You have to apply to some upper-manager for funding instead of a granting agency. You can still be creative and productive.
And yet, I'm still on Stack Exchange trying to answer questions in my former discipline.

Just want to say that I really like this, '...If not for academic career passed by, then for something. A passed up lover, a passed up trip somewhere, that lottery ticket you didn't buy. Any opportunity passed up is going to make you wonder.'

First: the chances to transition from a PhD to a permanent research position are increasingly small. You are just anticipating the choices that 99% of your colleagues and friends will have to take.
If you had a time machine and you would propel yourself 5 years in the future from now, you would see how very few of these colleagues and "friends" are helding a research or even an academic position.
Second:

academic fraternity.

vs

And I don't see myself as an academic at the moment. I am just not
smart and hardworking enough to be one.

Hardworking is just the other side of the coin of exploiting.
People under exploitation and hardships tend to form a closed circle, negating the deep pain they are being inflicted. Have a look at the behavior of people being part of religious sects (you can find many academic references).
The reaction of your colleagues and "friends" is the classical reaction of sect-members to the voluntary exit of one member.
I do not want to state that all academics or all the academia world is like this, there are many decent people ... but surely not the majority.

support informations about academic being more oftenly people withpotential underlying mental issues:
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-03761-3
But there is a definition for what OP is going through:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religious_trauma_syndrome

You could argue the same for the people in the military. Is it really religious trauma or just normal human nature?

@Magicsowon
Military in the modern times are just the end-product of nationalism, idealism and messed up histories... as well as the mix-up of the definitions of homeland with country with nation... it is a mess that I would not touch with a 100foot pole. So back to your question, yes it is religion, also in the military.

Then it is not just religion. A better word would be ideology. Also, I think what you just say works for people like miners, or any other kind of workers that get collectively abused by just the nature of their work environment.

@Magicsowon stalinism was one of the purest form of religious sect, although we tend to identify it as ideology. Since you speak about miners, same religious beliefs applies fully in the realm of sects apply to the economic laissez-faire that underwent Chile under the great economy master Augusto Pinochet. I do not argue with you that ideology may be better fitting, but I was linking the "religious trauma syndrome" page because it is sufficient to explain the feelings and most of the world around us revolves around religious/spiritual/irrational reasons, rather than rational ones.

While I agree in spirit, are you really suggesting that 99% of PhDs won't be able to get a permanent academic job offer?  That seems insanely high.

@Kimball it results from the convolution of these statistics https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/17431/what-ratio-of-phd-graduates-in-stem-fields-ultimately-end-up-as-tenured-profes with the attitude showed by OP's peers ... I am generalizing, but the people blaming others'choices are usually the one doing exactly the same choices, given equal boundary conditions (that explains why they react so strongly and they quickly become judgemental. They are very good in seeing themselves in OP's shoes and they start playing defensive mind tricks .... poor them.

@kimball and to further the 99% reasoning ... I am pretty sure that only 1% of people have the guarantee of a permanent position after PhD+1 year PostDoc, so the 99% will face the choice. If you ever faced the choice, you would not behave like the peers/"friends" of OP behave, whatever path you take, to proceed in uncertain academia world or dive in uncertain industry world or whatever.

Re: "Hardworking is just the other side of the coin of exploiting."  Wish I could upvote this a 1000 times.  I a constantly stunned by how many posters on this site implicitly or even explicitly try to justify so many postdocs and other PhDs in research or academia being exploited worse than what any IT tech or software dev with barely a BA/BS would put up with.

@RBarryYoung unfortunately, instead of having 1000 academics thinking alike and upvoting (1 upvote each would be enough), I am left with the pleasure of few individuals understanding such a deep philosophical concept :)

This is a lot of food for thought, thanks.

As someone who left academia and was begrudged by peers for having done so, I deeply sympathize with you. For context, I have left research in physics after my Ph.D. for a job as a programmer in a completely unrelated field, which had just a requirement for a Bachelor degree in any IT-related field.

This is making me feel that I have chosen the easiest option. I should have struggled a bit more before settling with the current prospect. I am probably harming my potential by not seeking postdoc positions or applying to tenure track positions.

I have struggled with the fact that I had "thrown away" five or more years of my life just to leave and start anew, and that I was considered "lesser" because of that. I originally thought about it as a complete failure to hold up to my original goal of becoming a full-time researcher.
I needed some years to overcome that feeling, realizing that my current occupation, while not as prestigious, has given me other things I was desperately in need for (i.e. a more decent sleep schedule and some stability in my life) and that those research years weren't wasted, as my Ph.D. experience helped me overcome a lot of stuff my job threw against me.
I don't know if answers from personal experience are okay on this Stack, but I would suggest you to try to focus on the positive aspects of your current situation and on how your path led you to this point w.r.t. the tools that you have gathered and you are still using. It's not "the easy way out", it's a life choice that happened to work well for you.
If you are happy with your current job, you don't need to care about what your peers said about you (even if you will probably keep mulling about it). If they can't accept it or just look down on you, probably they weren't good friends in the first place.

I went through much the same thing (see my answer also).  Glad you have found a good career path.

Thanks, @JosephDoggie! I've come to accept the fact that going out of research wasn't a failure and this helped me a lot to recontextualize my situation. Not sure what my career path will be from now on (heck, I might find a new idea again and branch into something completely different), though I'm confident it won't bring me back to academia. Happy that it worked out for you too!

I felt triggered to answer because I am in an exact situation like yours with slightly different details.
In the past few days, I was watching many videos on youtube and reading a lot of articles/posts on how to leave academia without this bad feeling that I cannot give a label. You will find a lot of people sharing their experiences:

How/Why I left academia?

Many of them give advice and talk about how working in the industry is amazing and academia after PhD is waste of time. In contrast, you will find a few successful academics judging those who are asking how to leave academia and that one needs to fight for his dream.
Honestly, I was disappointed with both opinions because they are trying to generalize their experiences to everyone, while everyone has a specific path in life with its particularities.
Despite your ambitions and main goal, you definitely have other small and side goals that are important. Also, there are factors in your life that are specific to you:

Am I happy in my current position?
Can I survive this pressure of limited contracts and waiting for grant and paper notifications?
Is this pressure affecting my social life and mental health?
How money is important in my life? (given that an industrial position pays better)
What about other responsibilities (e.g. family)?
If I want to stay in academia and it does not work, how difficult will be to transit to the industry?
If I quit, can I accept the fact that I am not a researcher?
What are my chances to get a faculty position given my progress and the progress of my peers? Here, note that a lot of factors must be considered.
Can I transit back to academia if I want?
I think there are more.

I know your question was about how to overcome the guilt feeling after leaving but I want to start my answer one step earlier.
If you analyzed everything and you found that industry is the right career path, then go for it and do not care about any judgment because no one knows your life and needs better than you. I will quote a passage from EarlGrey's answer to another question:

But then, who cares? you are you, they are they.

Feeling guilty and sad is normal because academic research is like a drug and something you (and I) have been doing for a long time with passion and stress hoping that it will pay off someday. However, only a few people are meant to get faculty positions after their PhDs, not because they are smarter than you or better than you but most probably their circumstances are better (Of course assuming that you worked as hard as they did).
I have the same feeling as you after 2.5 years being a postdoc and 2 years as assistant professor, where it becomes very hard to get a position in the industry and at the same time, I don't know whether I should risk my family's future hoping that I will get a faculty position in the future (despite that I publish a lot and have funded grants). I decided to balance between both (my life and my family from one side and my career goal). I got an offer in the industry after hundreds of rejections and I decided to go for it and temporarily leave my career goal because I have responsibilities that are more valuable than my personal goal. temporarily because I still hope and work to come back if possible. Otherwise, I will be satisfied with the fact that I have tried and failed.
I hope sharing my experience helps you overcome this feeling.

I personally left academia, worked in industry, came back to academia (a mistake) and wound up working outside academia.  One's first duty for employment is to provide for oneself, any family, and any pets, etc., plus whatever charitable obligations one feels.
For career fulfillment, I am currently doing meaningful work that helps people.
If you like your current situation, then go with it, and try to improve your standing in that community.
If you don't like your current situation, then try to return to academia, but I did it and it isn't easy!
NOTE:  As various responses imply, don't let judgement of others shape you.  If there is something to learn from what they have to say, follow it as best you can, however.

Don’t let others judge you? Others judging you is their right! You are not a Supreme Leader and This is not North Korea.

@user354948 -- I think that you are interpreting what I said a bit over literally.  Obviously one can't and shouldn't control others.  However, I edited it to say: NOTE:  As various responses imply, don't let judgement of others shape you.  If there is something to learn from what they have to say, follow it as best you can, however.    I think this is true, and a good idea, in general.

I’m a literalist.

I miss being relevant in research and academic fraternity

Being in your case some 25 years ago, I had a hard, cold look at how I am "relevant" to research and I found out that I was not really.
Academia was great, I knew that I would have a pretty straight track through the food chain but I would never get a Nobel Prize or make a discovery that would shake the world.
I would have, of course, done all kinds of small discoveries that would have pushed human knowledge by 10^-13% but I decided that industry would open brand new horizons.
I will not be a CEO either (because I do not want to) but the change was great on many aspects that overshadow the bad ones.

Academic positions themselves are great; the process of getting them is a godawful nightmare, and it requires a substantial amount of luck. It's fine to be unwilling to burn that much time and energy and opportunity cost for a slim chance at that kind of position, just as it's fine to avoid paying for a lottery ticket even if you'd enjoy the million-dollar prize. (The judgmental tones you're describing are certainly real, but they're not anything you need to bother paying attention to.)


text:
Should I ask for a letter of recommendation when my performance wasn't great at the beginning?
I recently finished a vector calculus course in which I received an A and I'm considering asking my professor if he would write a letter of recommendation for me when I begin applying for grad school. My biggest problem is that I did not perform well on the first exam. It was a "wake up call", so to speak, and due to grading policies and a substantial improvement in my subsequent performance I was able to get the A grade. I had articulated my concerns in his office hours and met with him again after my second exam went significantly better, but I'm concerned he will view me as lazy for only performing after I had initially done poorly. Is this request ill advised? I should mention that I still have two years of undergraduate studies left, but I've been regrettably lax when it comes to making faculty connections (something I fully intend to remedy in the upcoming semesters), so I'm trying to capitalize on relationships I've already begun to establish.

As a general rule (in the US, at least), when you ask for letters for graduate admissions, you should ask the letter writer whether they can write a strong letter on your behalf. See How do I effectively solicit a strong letter of recommendation from a professor?

I think that the poor performance on the first exam might actually help you to get a good recommendation.  In general, faculty like for someone to learn from their mistakes and make up for it.
Or, the faculty member may not remember your performance on the first exam and just go by the final grade.  Especially if you ask after the semester/quarter is ended.
Other things that can help you get a good recommendation include asking for help in a polite and formal way (e.g. without complaining) by visiting during office hours, and asking for specific assistance with something.
If you have more classes and have the same instructor/professor, then do well there too.  Ask them, in person, "Would you provide me with a positive recommendation for graduate school" and if they seem to grimace or have another negative expression, immediately ask "How can I earn a positive recommendation from you?"  People, especially faculty, want you to earn.

It is completely appropriate to say to the professor "I am applying to graduate schools such as NAMES in the program for FIELD OF STUDY. Can you write me a strong letter for my applications?" I can't imagine why your professor would lie (who wants to take on the extra work of writing for a student they won't recommend) and you don't want a letter from anyone who would say "no".

You did well in the course. Your less than stellar performance on your first exam should not stop you from asking for a recommendation
It is good that you are making faculty connections now, keep doing that
My only concern is that it might be premature to ask for a grad school recommendation now when you still have two years of undergraduate studies left. If you really like this professor and have a good relationship, then keep in contact. You can go back to him and ask for a recommendation closer to graduation.
Hopefully you will find more professors over the next two years that you can build relationships with.


text:
Terminology: Pagraph subject identification prefix text
Reference books, technical manuals, MIL standards, etc., prefix every paragraph with a short subject identification statement. For example, paragraph 1.3 in the 16th ed. of the Chicago Manual of Style (CMoS) begins,

1.3     Rectos and versos.  Publishers refer to the ...

Is there a common terminology for the bolded and italicized (in this case) subject identification prefix text? What is this writing practice called? In particular, does the CMoS define this practice (I've looked extensively in the CMoS but I couldn't find anything).
(FWIW, the MIL standards I checked typically identify this text as "paragraph identification", "subject identification," or "paragraph and subparagraph identifications". But I can't find in other style guides a description for this paragraph summary text.)

I'm not sure this is about academia per se; your question seems to be more about style terminology and hence off topic.

Engineers and technical writers commonly use this style. This is a writing style that's sometimes taught to undergraduate engineering students because they will likely see and use it in industry.

In my experience, this is just called the (sub)section name --- as driven by the LaTeX styling used in many STEM disciplines.  No fancier title is needed.

In my experience in the software development industry, people usually just call it the heading or header. But (sub)section name is also used, as jakebeal suggests.
However, in my field, the heading is more commonly separated from the rest of the text, as shown below. So this may not be the terminology you're looking for.

1.3     Rectos and versos.
    Publishers refer to the ...

We do sometimes combine the heading with the rest of the text, as you have it. This might be done at the lowest level, for example, when there's a list of terms with their definition. In such a situation, If I wanted to make it clear that I'm referring to the text in bold, I'd probably say the heading itself.


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Attribution of authorship within undergraduate group project reports
I teach a senior design course for undergraduate engineering students at a public university. Our senior design projects are all team based, usually with three to five engineering students per team. The teams are all multidisciplinary--e.g., electrical engineers, computer engineers, mechanical engineers, etc. all working collaboratively on a given project.
At present each student team coauthors a GROUP report that documents their project-level information--e.g., project history, problem statement, project concept, engineering merit and innovation, project goals and objectives, project requirements, risk management, constraints, budget, timeline, project evaluation, etc. Each student also individually authors an INDIVIDUAL CONTRIBUTIONS report which details that student's contributions to their group's senior design project.
Because these reports are scholarly works performed within academia, I need to devise a method of identifying which student(s) authored which sections(s) within the GROUP report for feedback and course grading purposes. Right now I'm considering requiring the use of bylines throughout the report so that I can unambiguously determine which student(s) authored which section(s) within the report. This copious use of bylines might appear unappealing in the finished product, and it's a practice that's not commonly used in industry, but it does solve my necessity of ascribing authorship to specific students.
If multiple students coauthor a given section of the GROUP report, I will require that there be a principal author and one or more contributing coauthors. The principle author's name shall be listed first on the byline, followed by the coauthors' names. For course grading purposes, the principal author shall be fully responsible for all written content provided under their byline.
I would, of course, provide rules that define the criteria for qualification as a coauthor (for example, see section "2. Who Is an Author?" on the web page titled "Defining the Role of Authors and Contributors" on the Internal Committee of Medical Journal Editors website).
I might also allow an additional and separate contributors byline to identify students who do not qualify as an author, but who contributed in some way to the writing in a given section of the report. I'm thinking of placing the contributors' byline on a new line immediately under the authors' byline:
By: Jane Smith, Frank Cedars
Contributions by: Huan Sung

I'm wondering if anyone has comments regarding this proposed use of bylines, or perhaps has other suggestions for identifying authorship within undergraduate group reports produced as scholarly works within academia.
(n.b. Assigning a single group grade is ill-advised for a number of reasons. Different students have different levels of writing competence--e.g., foreign nationals for whom English is a second language. In an undergraduate course, skilled authors should not be held responsible for, nor unfairly burdened with the task of, editing / correcting other students' writing in order to ensure the entire group receives a decent grade. Indeed, if the skilled authors do all the work there is neither accountability nor incentive for lesser-skilled writers to work at improving their writing skills. For what it's worth, these students receive feedback on their writing via peer review, rubrics, project advisors, and course graders. The project advisors and course graders are the ones who need to know which student wrote which sections of the GROUP report for feedback and assessment purposes.)
(n.b. I've already considered and rejected the idea of a two document solution where one document is the GROUP report itself, and the second document is a "key" that identifies which sections within the GROUP report were authored by which students. This "key" document adds extra work, its upkeep is clumsy and unreliable, it's another piece of paper that must be tracked, it slows down the grading and feedback process, etc.)

Maybe you could use footnotes to the section headings?  Although I didn't quite understand why the bylines in the main document are needed, since you said "Each student also individually authors an INDIVIDUAL CONTRIBUTIONS report" -- could this individual document be a record of the individual's writing?

@aparente001, your footnote idea is a definite possibility.

@aparente001, I didn't mention previously that the drafts for the INDIVIDUAL and GROUP reports are written and evaluated at different times. And, evaluation of the GROUP report would be inefficient, to say the least, if the evaluators were required to reference five or six different documents to figure out which student wrote which section(s) in the GROUP report. Also, a student might forget to update their INDIVIDUAL report after revising the GROUP report. So the attribution information (byline or footnote) must be provided in the GROUP report itself, and not via a separate document.

If you don't want to do footnotes, and you don't want to clutter up the document with a lot of bylines, you could have them submit an appendix that's sort of a table of contents, with the primary and secondary contributors listed next to each section title. If there is a time crunch for them to submit the final report, you could have them hand in the appendix 24 hours after the report is due, but with instructions that if they neglect to hand in the appendix, all their grades will be halved-- i.e. make sure they understand that the due date is later only because you're trying to be a nice guy.

There's a lot more to evaluating the performance of students working in teams than just figuring out who wrote what parts of the final report.  I'd suggest that you take a look at the CATME system that allows team members to provide feedback on how their team functioned.

The GROUP and INDIVIDUAL reports contribute a substantial portion of a student's overall score for their senior design project, but other performance metrics are of course defined and evaluated. Author attribution must be performed immediately and not at the end of the course. When draft reports are submitted throughout the semester for evaluation, the advisors and graders need to discern which student(s) wrote which sections in those draft reports. So my goal at the moment is to define an acceptable method/style for author attribution within the GROUP reports.

@JimFischer Would you care to write your solution up as a self-answer for the question, for the benefit of others?

FWIW, I mocked up some sample reports--some having the byline style and some having the footnote style--and I've decided upon the byline style. I disliked more the presence of footnote numbers at the end of the chapter subtitles compared to the bylines.
Noting that the same student(s) could author contiguous subsections within the report, I think I'll use bylines only to indicate a change of author/contributor rather than requiring a byline within each and every (sub)section within the GROUP report.
The definitions for AUTHOR and CONTRIBUTOR I've settled on are those provided in the IEEE Publishing Policy and Ethics manual. The IEEE manual was chosen simply because the students I instruct/manage are electrical engineering majors, or computer engineering majors, or both, and the IEEE's style guides are relevant to both majors.


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How to address reading courses in cv for Phd application for pure math?
How to address reading courses in cv for Phd application for pure math? I can only think of listing topics we covered in the course. But that seems to me very pointless since professors know the major topics of most math courses without reading that. However, I think independent readings are important experiences for math students, they definitely deserve a place in my CV.

Unless the course involved reading several papers on different topics, it shouldn't take more than something like "studied the first 4 chapters of Lambek's Lectures on Rings and Modules, working approximately half of the exercises". If you think more should be said, then give the details in your cover letter.

It would be helpful to list the topics you looked at, and their sources. Even "standard" courses, with standard names, vary wildly depending on the choice of textbook or other sources, and depending on the instructor (who may be the author of notes or textbook for the course!)
Similarly, "reading course in X" tells far too little, just as saying "standard course in X" would. Prior to the enforced uniformization of applications to our grad program, as occasional Dir of Grad Studies in Math, I required applicants to not only tell the course name, but also, even more importantly, the (title and) author(s) of the text(s)/source(s) for the course. Reading courses treated the same way.
To repeat: the standard catch-phrases/labels of course names absolutely do not describe the content... so, yes, please do give more details. These details are not at all implied by the general, vague, cliched titles.

If it's a reading course, then it should have had some sort of course title for administrative purposes. If it didn't, it should be possible to make up a sensible title which would be as informative as a standard course title, and designate it as "reading course in..." along with the rest of your courses.

I am sorry, but I mean do I need to expand on it a little bit besides just listing it there?

@Keith Do whatever you do for other courses. Why should a reading course be treated differently?

I'd object that what people "do for other courses" is wildly inadequate to describe their content, because it is (incorrectly) presumed that there is standard content...

@paul Fair enough, but whatever you do for one you should do for the other.

Yes, indeed! I did elaborate on this in my own answer: telling author(s) of source(s) is essential, contrary to any idea that there is some sort of standard content.


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How do you think academic publishing companies can improve the publishing experience of researchers?
Academic publishing are here to stay and keeping the discussions about already well voiced topics (ethics, open access charges, paying reviewers) aside, as an academic, what changes would you like to see in the manuscript submission and peer review process for major companies like Elsevier, Springer, Wiley, MDPI?
As a previous postdoc researcher, I think, submission of manuscript should be as straightforward as possible and review should be double blinded for all journals.
What are your thoughts? I am currently a scientific editor with a publishing house, so I am just interested to know if there's any pain points that I have not witnessed during my PhD and Postdoc experience.

Please note: scientific publishing will be seen as a business branch that has a profit return of ~30% or more https://www.theguardian.com/science/2017/jun/27/profitable-business-scientific-publishing-bad-for-science good luck in changing the system from the inside: there are too many interests in keeping the status-quo (money for free for the management of the top publishers) and scientists are too gullyble to change the system (they would deserve an anthropological study ... of course to be published on Nature ;D )

I'd love to answer this question, but I'm wondering if I should, since it's arguably opinion-based or a shopping question.

I flagged this question, then edited one of the answers, I am stupid!

Thanks for trying to do things right.
My primary complaint is the astronomical prices and extortionate business practices of some publishers. For example, The Cost of Knowledge is a boycott of Elsevier with over 20,000 participants (I am one), by researchers who object to their practices. I recommend that you read their statement of purpose, signed by world-famous mathematicians including multiple Fields medalists, and avoid the practices which they object to.
You mentioned MDPI. I reviewed a paper for them once, and I will never have anything to do with them again. They made ridiculous demands, such as a referee report within three days -- totally out of line with what is expected in mathematics. They also have spammed my inbox repeatedly. Please do not do this.
Another complaint is that copyediting can be terrible. There is nothing worse than to pour your heart and soul into a paper, submit it to an expensive journal, and watch it get mangled by careless journal staff.
You should keep in mind that academia varies more than you think it does; common publishing practice in one field will be totally unheard of in another. Researchers will not adapt to you; you will need to adapt your workflows to the customs and conventions of each field in which you intend to publish.
Finally, accept that as a publisher you will have little influence. For example double blind review is a very interesting idea, with very compelling arguments in its favor. Math doesn't currently use double blind review (with some exceptions), and there are significant drawbacks as well. If this changes, then it will be because prominent people from within the profession pushed for it. So by all means push for changes you would like to see, but push gently, and don't expect all of your initiatives to pan out.
Good luck to you!

+1, you preempted my answer with the last points. Double blind reviews are are not very useful if it is likely that the reviewer knows all 3 people interested in that specific problem personally and has already seen the arxiv-preprint. And don't get me started on all the times I see an ethics/data-collection statement in a pure math paper, because policy apparently trumps common sense...

They should accept .tex source file and provide a decent publishing experience or support, at minimum grammar&spelling checks as well as replotting figures if needed. Wtf do I pay thousands of €/£/$ to some company just to have them exploiting peer review for free and then providing (gated) access to a pdf file?
See one of the few smart pictures from PhDcomics, (Jorge Cham (c) 2009, Nature Vs. Science Pt. 2, 07/17/2009
PhD Comics, Piled Higher and Deeper Publishing, LLC, . republished by 2) (which otherwise is perpetuating PhDs exploitation by trivializing it).
In short:
Do something tangible for the money you receive, instead of being a simple matchmaker between scientists and reviewers plus watermarking the document provided to you by the scientists or get ready for the moment community-efforts like volcanica or tectonika will bypass you.

Please note: scientific publishing will be seen as a company branch that has a profit return of ~30% or more https://www.theguardian.com/science/2017/jun/27/profitable-business-scientific-publishing-bad-for-science good luck in changing the system from the inside: there are too many interests in keeping the status-quo (money for free for the management of the top publishers) and scientists are too gullyble to change the system (they would deserve an anthropological study ... of course to be published on Nature ;D )

By vanishing.
For profit publishing has little left to offer researchers. We host files we review each others work. A publishing company only has a name, reputation, a scope, expectation of some quality and copyrights to the work it already holds. Most of those are parasitic and only serve the profit interests of the publishing company, not science.
Name, reputation and expectation of quality are simply branding choices that the company made. These days they only serve to rank papers by the money spent on them and by boards who don't want to think too much when deciding who to promote.
I don't want to talk about the ethics of holding copyrights to most likely publicly funded research works here but a company holding them forms an adversarial relationship with scientists. They can at best be decent about making the works available at low cost but nothing on that front won't improve by making the work public domain in the first place.
That leaves the scope and to a lesser extend expectation of quality. Which is useful for categorising work and making choices on what to read. With the advent of internet and ease of communication, post publication peer review, I think it is best for this to be handled by researchers and not publishers' advertising choices

I think this answer represents the view of many academics. Apologies if this is blunt, but the question reads to me like this: "Climate change is here to stay and keeping discussions about well-voiced topics (fossil fuels, methane, flourocarbons) aside, what changes would you like to see for major oil companies like Exxon, BP, Shell?" I would encourage someone who cares about the mission of academia to find a different way to support it than at a big publisher.


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Courses expected to take before graduation
I am applying to PhD programs in pure mathematics and many programs ask for a list of courses that I have taken. Some of them also say that we should include courses expected to be done in winter 2018, so I include a topic course which I plan to do in winter 2018. However, I find it to be an extremely hard course and I might end up not taking it. Will this cause a problem?

Depends upon the specific program. Anyone there you could ask?

I cannot do that now, since I will not know the admission result before my add/drop deadlines.

The question is asking you to list courses you plan to take. Personally, I would avoid listing a course I didn’t know for sure I was going to take. If you listed a course in your major and then dropped it, it might cause problems later on. I doubt a grad school will complain that you took a course that wasn’t listed.


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Is it advisable to email director of graduate studies inquiring about the application status?
I am applying for a PhD in mathematics, and xxx is my top choice. They have sent out their first round of offers. I want to know whether they have more offers to make or not. Is it advisable to email their director of graduate studies with this question?

Director of graduate studies typically refers to the professor who is in charge of the graduate program. Those are not contradictory.

Ah I'm sorry, I just read my initial comment and realize the confusion; I meant to write "program," I wrote "department." I'll delete and restate since comments can't be edited past a time: Note that a "director" typically refers to a professor that heads a graduate program. Sometimes questions like these would be better directed to someone who is a program coordinator or similar role in the office of the graduate program.

From my experience, you may if you think it is long overdue, as in if the expected deadline for your school "xxx" to send out all offers of admissions has elapsed. If that is the case, then it is okay to send in an inquiry email regarding the status of your application.
Most schools usually send out the first round of admissions to very outstanding applicants first, then in that order. Also, domestic students often receive their admission offers first before international students do. These are the most obvious graduate school admission process but other applicant-unique factors may account for the delay in hearing back from your school. So you may have to factor all these in to see if you should have heard from your school or not regarding your application status. Contacting them before the given deadline for admission offers to end may paint a rather not so good image of you to them.
In my case, apparently the school had received more applications that year for that program than anticipated and so the selection process was rather complicated. I waited for the given time (month) all admissions (both international and domestic) to elapse before I contacted the graduate secretary. They immediately replied explaining the difficulties they faced that given year and the status of my application. Apparently I was placed on their waiting list. I hope this helps :)


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Should I decide research field base on my performance on qualifying exam?
I'm about one year into a math Ph.D. program. With some scientific computing background in undergraduate and master study, my research interests are in numerical analysis/PDE or probability. All of them are analysis orientated.
Recently I took (written) qualifying exam in several subjects, and passed all of them. However, I noticed my real analysis score was bare minimum passing score (i.e. I would have failed had I lost one more point.) and my algebra score was more than 30 points (out of 100) above the require passing score.
That result makes me a little bit confuse. Should I stick to my original interest, where the exam result indicates my knowledge is mediocre at best, or should I switch to a more algebra orientated field, where I did well on the test but had almost no related research experience or elective courses in the past?
People who are not in mathematics are also welcome to answer the question in the title in the context of your department and research field.

Which one do you like better? I'd stick with that one. Don't subject yourself to working on something you don't like/enjoy, just because you had high marks on one exam.

The most important direction to choose is the one you feel a real passion for. Anything else is a waste of your life.
If real analysis (or numerical analysis) is really your passion, then stick with the subject you love, and be prepared to work hard to bring that love to fruition. Do not switch to algebra so that one day you can tell your grandchildren "I wasted my whole life doing something I have no interest in, because I seemed to be good at it".
You have to remember how little meaning exam results have. They indicate your performance, on a particular day, in certain artificial circumstances. They are no predictor of your ability to deal with the research tasks you may set yourself in the future. And there may not even be much overlap between the "real analysis" of examinations and the kind of analysis you need to use when you are following your interests.
Do not hurry to make a decision. The exam is almost irrelevant, but it may have told you a little about what you are good at, and you could listen to that. You could also reasonably ask yourself, "Can I fall in love with something more algebraic?" But answer that question on the basis of love, not utility.

I believe an aptitude test such as this one would help you to decide early on (such as high school) which fields would be best to focus your energy on, at this stage in the game it would be folly to focus your topic solely on the results of this test.