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Advisor likes MS Word, I like LaTeX
I have an issue with my supervisor: he likes to write papers in MS Word and I like to write in LaTeX. We have had issues with editing and formatting, since it is difficult to do it, while working on different platforms.
Does anyone have any advice on how to resolve this situation?

While not an exact duplicate this might be a better fit over at TeX.SE.

@StrongBad, who is doing the writing? Unless the other part will be doing much hands-on editing, that the PDF for marking comes from LaTeX, Microsoft Word, LibreOffice Writer, or (gasp!) troff is irrelevant.

@vonbrand that is not a fight I would recommend picking with a supervisor.

@vonbrand the change tracking in Word is actually pretty good. Not so much with a PDF file. To get good version control you need to roll back to editing the LaTeX source, which the OP's supervisor probably won't want to do. This is a battle where it's probably much easier just to surrender.

the full version of Adobe can convert a LaTeX pdf to a very easily editable word document. Don't ask me why/how I know... ;)

What field are you in?  Is one of LaTeX or Word standard in your field?  My opinion is a bit different depending on which of you is the weird one.

Possible duplicate of Collaborative paper-writing with non-LaTeX-using colleagues

As I started to write an answer it felt familiar.  So here's my old answer: http://academia.stackexchange.com/a/45007/8494 at the question I think this duplicates.

@ChrisH disagree, the other question is about a technical solution to collaborate, This one seems more like an organizational/interpersonal issue

@CapeCode you may well be right.  Both aspects are in the question, and in some of the answers.  Anyway it's closely related and worth a read for anyone interested in this question.

Check out pandoc markdown. You may try the WYSIWYT app Typora. You may write in markdown language which is like a hybrid word-latex style. Then you can use pandoc to export the markdown file to docx, latex, pdf, html and many other type.

In the end, once the paper is published, nobody will worry about what software was used to generate it. The software is just a means to an end.
So, if your advisor has a strong preference for Microsoft Word then - regardless how you feel about that preference - if you can't easily convince your advisor to use LaTeX you should switch to Word. There are much more important things to worry about, and there is no reason to make life difficult for your advisor for something so unimportant.
Converting your paper from LaTeX to Word is not likely to produce ideal results, as you have noticed. By the time you go through and fix things, you might as well simply work in Word from the beginning. In other words, the "efficient" way to do this is to convert the content in your head as you are writing it in Word, rather than trying to convert the content to Word after it is written.

Thank you for your answer. The problem is that I find MS Word very difficult and frustrating to work with. I spend a very long time formatting and fixing errors that LaTeX solves automatically. Besides that I have more expertise with LaTeX than with Word.

Rule Number 1: Do what your supervisor says.
Rule Number 2: If you don't want to do what your supervisor says, see Rule Number 1.

@user3025898 That's probably how your supervisor feels, and it's much harder to learn LaTeX than it is to learn Word. If you can't win the battle after gently prodding, then you'll just have to learn Word. After all, it's not like knowing Word and LaTeX will make you less marketable or useful. It won't hurt to know both.

@BobBrown That's just wrong, the advisor can be ignored on points like this that don't have anything to do with the progress of the research, that is likely going to be a massive waste of time when not ignored.

Agree entirely with @tpg2114's comment - using LaTeX from a cold start can be very challenging. What saves you some time and frustration may cost someone else a lot more.

Depending on the type of document you write, Word can be more trouble than it is worth - especially if you are good at LaTeX. And if your references are in BibTeX Word becomes effectively impossible to use. Add to that, the only (!!) advantage that Word offers over LaTeX is a good spellchecker.... - And finally, there is no requirement for academics to have access to Word - and no, the uni PC does not count, as this may run Linux. (This was actually the case when I had to deal with a conference paper - I had to use my own laptop as the uni PC had Linux on it)

@BobBrown That is a very stupid rule. Maybe you haven't encountered it yet, but unfortunately not every supervisor is competent in the field he is supervising nor neccessarily up to date. There are cases where it is best to work against (!!) the supervisor - unless you want the supervisor to end up sabotaging your work... (I had one supervisor for some reason harping on about completely irrelevant heat transfer in a chemical problem completely independent of heat transfer with zero relationship to heat transfer.)

@CountIblis the tricky bit is that as far as your supervisor and the university are concerned his time is worth more than yours, possiblly a LOT more.

@DetlevCM But again, learning Word is not a bad thing in this case and it really isn't worth the fight. I have worked on projects that require monthly report submitted to the government, contractually obligated to be in Word format, or they won't release funds for the month. You cannot always control the file formats and submission avenues and versatility is a good idea. And for what it's worth, my university requires all students to have access to a computer with Windows and Microsoft Office.

@DetlevCM There can be a requirement for one to use Office, no matter the OS one is personally using, particularly if that school has an agreement with Microsoft which allows for free copies of Office 365 and standard. I know I have had this requirement (and yes, 365 works on Linux but with less features). Though, personally, I convert to LibreOffice (or just use it) then to word for submission on most of my assignments.

@user3025898 what is it that you have to frantically format all the time during the collaborative writing? In my field it's the publishers that do all the typesetting and formatting but even if it wasn't the case, I would not do any formatting before everyone agreed on the content. Then it's irrelevant which is your pet software.

@JGreenwell The original poster speaks of a supervisor which would indicate a thesis being written - I'm not aware of any university making requests to the software used in a thesis. (The format is closely specified though.)
Ironically I once asked a conference about LaTeX - they agreed it was a superior format however their workflow was based on Word. Well, in the final PDF version they produced, and image overlaps the text...
Word has many issues - and is seldom objectively required.
As to free copies: That won't help if you use Linux and the online version is painfully slow.

Use latex and then, make RTF document. That's compatible with word. Another possibility is convert LaTeX to HTML and then import the HTML file from Word.

MS Word 2016 imports PDF satisfactorily (but not so for some figures and tables).

@AlejandroSalamancaMazuelo If you're doing one way conversions anyway, you might as well use Pandoc which does a good conversion of TeX directly to Word.

I think you have two options:

Learn to use Word. It may not be ideal, but this is probably not going to be the last time you are faced with a need to use it, or some similar editor.
Offer to do all the editing. Give your professor .pdf files or printouts to comment, and then incorporate the changes yourself.

====================================================================
I faced this situation the other way round when I was a PhD student. I had been using MS Office as long as it had existed. I had no trouble at all editing equations, incorporating charts from spreadsheets, formatting text etc.
My advisor preferred LaTeX, so I learned LaTeX for smoother collaboration.

Option 3: Make clear to the advisor that this irrelevant issue is a massive waste of time and that you have far more important things to do.

@CountIblis I agree that this should not be a big deal. However, if they are going to produce a joint paper, a decision has to be made about its format that supports a reasonable process for writing and editing it.

Right, but the OP should then mention the problems with Word; it's the advisor's task to make sure the OP sticks to spending most of his/her time on the right issues.

@CountIblis That goes both ways -- the supervisor should also make sure he/she sticks to spending his/her time on the right issues, and perhaps learning LaTeX isn't as important as dealing with sponsors, advising students, etc.. At the end of the day, neither party is morally just in demanding the other convert but it's a bad idea to really upset a boss over something like this.

Point 2 is really the sensible approach here - unless there is a need for the supervisor to actively edit the actual document, a pdf is perfectly adequate for commenting on.

@CountIblis Realistically, the supervisor has less time to waste on spend learning the workflow of each of his student (said as a LaTeX user).

Option 2 is only feasible if the first draft is already good enough. If every paragraph needs a rewrite you cannot do this with comments in PDF (without getting mad at the person choosing to use PDF)

For my PhD studies (in medical physics, YMMV) I used lyx as a happy medium. Lyx has a LaTeX engine but exports as Word, albeit imperfectly. In my experience one can open a LaTeX document in Lyx, spend less than ten minutes reformatting the tables, and export to a Prof as MS Word. The Prof can then mark it up with sticky notes or track changes, which can then be applied by the researcher to the original LaTeX.

I have my students use both: Word and LaTeX.   In the early stage of paper writing, I prefer MS Word because of its commenting tool, and allows me to teach my students academic writing.   I have my students paste the latex source code, and any rendered figures and tables into MS Word.  The resulting Word doc then looks pretty standard, except for the occasional LaTeX commands.  I assume your supervisor could simply be taught to ignore all LaTeX commands and be asked to focus on the contents.  In the later stages of paper writing, I then ask my students to supply the .pdf (rendered version) as well.  Once the paper is relatively stable, I edit the .tex only.  In your case, I assume once your supervisor is happy with the contents, he/she can then work off the .pdf.
I use the above process with my collaborator, who is a MS Word person.  I basically asked him to 'stay away' from the backslash text.  Thus far, it has worked out fine.

Generally, the advisor rules. Yet, the advisor may learn from the student, especially if the student is wise often to show the benefits. And the issue depends on the purpose: to write paper, to prepare slides and posters, for a thesis? The amount of collaborative work varies with the topic.
Some benefits of LaTeX are nice-looking formulas, great non-standard or forein characters, macros, easiness of collaboration with versioning systems (svn, cvs). So, depending on  your field, you might first check whether LaTeX is of help in your domain.
Now with recent pdf editors, it is becoming much easier to comment on a document, and the text editing is quite simple. So now, when I collaborate with non-LaTeX users, I take charge of the editing, offer "input-like" spaces for their parts written in Word. I generally convince them with the quality of the reference section.
Recently, I have been using interesting LaTeX packages, like \usepackage[draft]{changes} or todonotes. The first one is great at showing edits, replacements, additions. And just by changing it to \usepackage[final]{changes}, you get your final text. The second one is fantastic to show, in the document, what is left to do, what is done, and is great for an advisor who see the work in progress. Such packages can convince others that you definitely know what your are doing, with method, and leave you in charge.
So, if you have some free space, my advice would be to stickk to LaTeX, and if you can share the directory with your advisor, he can comment on the .tex and on the .pdf

I recommend latexdiff to show changes (especially if paired with a revision control program.) The package changes seems very unwieldy.

Overleaf allows simultaneous editing in RTF and latex. It's ideal for collaborations
https://www.overleaf.com/

I do not see how this answers the question ...

Overleaf allows two people to edit the same document, one using latex, one using plain text. I thought this would solve the problem of either person in this situation learning to do what the other finds easiest

@user49355 Without saying how to communicate the usage of overleaf to the supervisor, this is not an answer to the question.

Maybe it is possible to make your advisor use a wysiwyg latex editor.  I think http://www.bakoma-tex.com/ could be an intermediate solution.

Even if you win, anything that involves "make your advisor" is a losing battle. Demonstrate the advantages of LaTeX might be a winnable battle (but probably not).

@StrongBad It's not about winning or losing, the OP can stick to LaTex regardless of what the advisor says. This is not an issue for the OP worth wasting much time on.

@CountIblis to an extent you can ignore your supervisor, but, for example, if the advisor likes working with Word documents and the OP gives him a PDF, the feedback could be slower and less complete.

@StrongBad The OP needs to decide what works best for him/her. The advisor may not have clear grasp of how much the OP is spending on formatting issues if the OP keeps silent about that. Whatever time is spend should be minimized so that the OP has the most time available to spend on the content and on his/her research. If some time is spent on learning formatting and it's within a system the OP will use in the future then that can still be ok. Wasting time on dealing with Word/LaTex incompatibility problems should i.m.o. be avoided.

I've used Microsoft Word since 1989 and Word for Windows 1.1c!  (1.1a shipped, but was not functional.)  I've observed several things over the years, including that the even number version of Word for Windows are the good ones:  2, 4, 6, 8 & 10!
I always sent people the output in a PDF file, so the editing issue never comes up.  Otherwise, how would you know if you were editing at the same time somebody else was editing?
I've tried a number of conversion programs from various editors with very limited success.  Might as well say it doesn't work.  Even if you got it to work for one version of Word, Microsoft changes the format slightly, so  the conversion won't work with the next version of Word.
Therefore, the less said, the better:  We've got the master copy.  We publish in PDF format for portability.  All changes go through us!

Oh, BTW, my favorite current editor is Open Office Word, right now!  PDF is an output office and it's a lot like Word for Windows!

Have you tried Libre Office Writer (no, not "Word")? It has evolved much faster than OO, and I hear it's interface has been streamlined recently (LaTeX user myself, no clue on their GUI intricacies).

There are a few ways to make a shared word document editable by more than one person while making it clear if it is being edited by more than one person at a time. Dropbox handles this quite well, for instance.

@Significance In my experience, Dropbox is horrible at handling simultaneous editing. Is there any special kind of interaction with Word that makes it more bearable?

I don't see how this answers the question. Question: How to solve me wanting A and my boss wanting B? Answer: B is great. I am sure that the asker knows the points for wanting A or B, so what purpose does this answer serve?

@Frederico-Poloni If you have the current version of Dropbox installed on your computer, then it adds an icon when you have a Dropbox open in Word that tells you when someone else has it open and has unsaved edits, and also when they save it. If you make other edits at the same time, it still saves a separate copy which you will have to merge later, but it's better than nothing. Google Drive docs are much better for collaborative work, but not so good with equations, references and complex style sheets.

You should simply stick with using LaTeX and not bother about any problems this gives with formatting. The last thing you want to do is learn using MS Word just to get this paper finished, as working with MS Word can be extremely awkward if you are dealing with technical mathematical text. Formatting issues are very minor issues and should be given low priority. Stick to the subject and stick to any requirements of the IEEE journal by using the correct LaTeX templates for the journal and forget about  your advisor's preference.
This then means that you have your LaTeX version and your advisor has a Word version that may look slightly differently, but content-wise are equivalent. That's not a problem worth worrying about, it's a massive waste of time to do so.

Have you read the question? The answer doesn't seem to convince me of that.

How do you suggest to make changes to the paper? Edit both "versions" simultaneously?

@yo' Yes, the question is very clear to me; the OP is wasting his/her time on irrelevant issues, that's the main problem I see with what the issue the OP is engaging in.

@DmitrySavostyanov Yes, and if it's clear that e.g. the LaTeX version is going to be submitted then the other version can just be edited for content without bothering about formatting. This is going to save a lot of time.

+1, but I would suggest simply to do the paper in LaTeX, and give a PDF to the advisor for proofing. The advisor more than likely is not going to do any editing themselves, so I don't really see the need to have both a LaTeX and a Word version.

@MadJack, it really comes down to what the PI wants to do. If someone sent me a PDF when I asked for a Word file, I would not be impressed. I also wouldn't invest any time in learning a specific tool just to appease a student.


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Qualitative approach to evaluation of academic production
In Brazil, a government agency, named CAPES, takes care of evaluation of the postgraduate courses. Among other things, they receive criticism, because such evaluation is based on bibliometric approach. Explaining briefly, the main problem of following this approach is that it becomes counterproductive, because the academy spends time on increasing the number of publications, instead of focusing on quality research (it is considered more valuable to increment the postgraduate course classification).
A logical advice would be that the organization needs switch to a qualitative approach (here is a report, where four international guests shared this observation). My questions are the following.
Are there today any countries that can be models in regard to their system of the academic production evaluation? How such transition can be initiated, focusing on a qualitative approach?

I think you mean "productivity".

In the UK, you are only evaluated based on a small number of publications every 5 years.  Additional publications in that time span are not considered.

Every time you set up a "measure" (really, some measurable quantity that you hope correlates with some nebulous, often multi-dimensional "quality" that is tenuously related) you set yourself up to be gamed.

That is a very sensible point. I heard about UK. That also brings some questions: How to guarantee an equal and fair evaluation for everyone? Who will evaluate the evaluators? However, I think that is a much more interesting  way to evaluate a researcher. I would like to see more studies addressing this evaluation perspective. Thanks for the answers!

I'm from Brazil and I understand you very well about our research/funding system.
Let's branch the problem in topics:

CAPES classify the papers by "research impact", it's basically how hard is the congress/conference... to accept your paper: (A1,A2,B1,B2,B3,B4,B5,C).
CAPES is responsible for funding research presentations and they have a very limited money.
Only A1, A2 and sometimes B1 are really relevant for the society. Nevertheless both are commonly international congress. (let's consider international travels are expensive in Brazil, plus the conference taxes)
Let's also consider, poor relevance conferences (B2,B3,B4,B5,C) are commonly in Brazil, sometimes on places where there are a lot of universities, e.g São Paulo, Rio, Rio Grande do Sul, etc. Furthermore, all of them are in Portuguese.

Well, at this time I guess you already see the problem... Summarizing, the Brazilian research is very correlated with local congress and that makes everything easy even for CAPES (due to funding), even for researchers (due to easy paper acceptance), then you create a perfect productivity system... With a lot of useless research.
In my opinion, poor impact research are irrelevant. Then, I guess the solution would be change the impact rank  and  funding to only classify (A1, A2 and B1). This probably would make everyone work hard and then you probably would change the status quo in a long-term.

Note that is theoretical scenario. As I said before, this kind of system is perfect for lazy researchers and their financiers.

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Are there opportunities to support cancer research through volunteer IT or software development?
Several friends and acquaintances have recently died from cancer. The chemo treatments are crude and destroy quality of life. Furthermore, chemo treatments depend on the efficacy of antibiotics for protection while one's immune system is compromised.
We have to do better.
Who is developing the "personalized medicine" processes? It seems like there should be a way to look at the DNA of a cancer and reprogram it to settle down or go away.
My expertise is in systems engineering and software development - not in the biological sciences. I am just retired, so I don't need reimbursement. How can I contribute to improving this situation?
I suspect the answers depend on more fundamental research, that is why my question is:  How can I contribute on a volunteer basis to cancer research?
Update: I plan to upgrade from a 2006 MacBook Pro to something that can run BOINC problems a bit quicker. Rosetta@home seems like a reasonable target.
I have found Rosalind - a site for exploring bioinformatics.
The next step for me is to ask friends who might have contacts in academia.
Thanks for looking!

Search idealist.org for volunteer opportunities posted by cancer research groups (they'll probably be fundraising organizations) in your area.

I recommend asking this on biostars.org, the bioinformatics SE.

I greatly admire your interest in contributing to an area of medicine, and I'm sorry to hear that so many of your friends and relatives have succumbed to this disease. You're absolutely right that the treatments are barbaric. The subject of personalized medicine with application to cancer treatment is a hot scientific topic right now, and we're probably on the verge of a revolution in this area.
Two specific groups come to mind as leaders in this though I'm sure there are more. Levi Garraway's lab at Harvard is developing "PHIAL", which stands for "Precision Heuristics for Interpreting the Alteration Landscape" [in cancer genomes]. The name alludes to Galadriel's phial, although it remains to be seen whether this sort of computational analysis will live up to being 'a light to in dark places, when all other lights go out.' It is exactly what you imagined in your post, that is, given DNA sequence, predicting candidate causal mutations. There's also Tim Ley's group at Washington University in St. Louis which was one of the first to sequence a patient (one of their own oncologists!), identify the specific mutation and treat his cancer. The story is pretty compelling, but it's worth noting that this was a fortuitous situation where the underlying mechanism just happened to be one treatable by a drug already on the market.
Laboratories are always underfunded -- your services would be a gift. It's just a matter of finding the right one. If you live in a major city, consider contacting some people in cancer to identify someone in computational biology or bioinformatics. If you post what city you're in, I (or others, I'm sure) could help you find a lab doing this sort of work already. Good luck!

You may want to consider keeping an eye on Solvers.io - it's a new site that's trying to link up coders with scientists in need of help for bite-sized software development tasks. I haven't looked to see if there are any cancer-specific calls for help, but it may be a place to find people who would value your time and expertise.

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Do you not belong in a PhD program if you don't live and breathe your field of study?
In my PhD program everyone talks about how passionate they are about their field of study, and how they go to seminars because they're fun.  Is it expected that PhD students truly love their subject, or is it enough just to do good work and publish papers?
This thread was prompted by discussion here.

Very very closely related: Is a PhD right for you if you hate doing research in your free time but love doing it as a job?

@osa +1 for "Just because people talk how passionate they are doesn't mean they actually are."  People like to also invent a nice story ABOUT themselves.

If there is multiple applicants for a given position the best candidate needs to be chosen.  There is a tendency that the persons who live and breathe their field of study, has worked harder and longer than those who don't and therefore are better qualified.

In my experience, good primary investigators are always rather unbalanced human beings in one way or another.  If you aren't intensively passionate about something closely connected to the research process, then you can't last, because so much of leading research involves shaping your own agenda.  That said, you can still be doing work in research, even at a Ph.D. level or beyond, without having such independence and drive, but instead being a "super-technician" following somebody else's agenda and leadership.
The scientific ideal holds that every scientist should be of the primary investigator type, and Ph.D. programs are typically designed to select for and cultivate this.  That said, in practice it depends a lot on the group that you are in.  Some professors expect their students to develop their own research agendas very strongly, others are (whether they admit it or even realize it) more looking for good technicians to execute on their grants, and a Ph.D. is more of a byproduct.
We don't really like to admit this as a community, but with the current market structure of academia, we actually need to have the second type of education and people as well.  Look at it from the perspective of simple flux balance analysis: the rate of Ph.D. students entering programs is far higher than the rate at which primary investigators retire or die.  If every Ph.D. student either ultimately ends up as a primary investigator or a "failure," then it means most Ph.D. students are failures.  But I don't think that is actually the case: people who aren't hyper-passionate to the point where it distorts their lives can still succeed just fine in a Ph.D. program and at research, they just are likely to take one of the other tracks besides being a professor or other form of PI.
That said, even if you don't end up going the harrowing road of PI-ship, research work is very hard, and there are a lot of easier and/or more financially rewarding ways to make a living.  To get a Ph.D., you need at least enough passion for the subject to find more value in this difficult and low-paid path than in any of your alternatives.

As I see it, there's a big difference between being obsessed with something (to the exclusion of other interests) and loving it.  Obsession is neither necessary nor helpful, but love is certainly helpful and perhaps even necessary if you want to achieve your full potential.  Love dramatically increases your powers of concentration, beyond what can be achieved through self discipline alone.  Love makes all the little details memorable and engaging, while also drawing everything together into a meaningful story that illuminates the big picture.  Of course it's still possible to do good work without love, but that just makes everything harder.
It's important to keep in mind that different people express love differently.  Some people are dramatic and expressive, while others are quieter and more reserved.  You can have a perfectly good love for your subject without feeling the need to tell everyone, and comparing yourself to more vocal classmates may be unhelpful.
If going to seminars isn't fun, then that's a little worrisome.  Some people simply don't enjoy attending talks, regardless of the subject, and that's OK.  However, if you like talks in general but not so much in your research area, then that could be a sign that you haven't yet found the right area for you.  (Or maybe it's just not a very good seminar.)
Love not only makes things easier, but also more rewarding.  Having a job you love is a wonderful thing, and if you could better achieve this by following another career path, then that's worth serious consideration.  However, you shouldn't feel any external pressure: if you can do good enough work, then nobody else will care what's in your heart.  Ultimately, the only person this really concerns is you.

I tend to find that seminars about thinks I don't know are more interesting...

I only enjoy seminars when the speakers are good presenters, more or less independently of the topic itself.

I think all of the answers here have merit, but this probably covers the most important point.  While you don't have to love it, if you don't love it, why are you doing something that doesn't pay very well and has crappy hours?  If you're smart enough for a Ph.D., you probably can get a 6 figure job within five to ten years in something else, either via Ph.D. then industry, or in a profession without a Ph.D. , that has more like 40 hour workweek.  If you're an Academia lifer, it's usually because that's what you like doing or believe in.

Allow me to offer a dissenting point of view. In the words of 5 Brainy Birds:

If you don’t eat, sleep, and breathe science, get out of the lab! ... is an antiquated view

I know many successful academics (at all stages of the academic lifecycle) who do not "live and breathe" their field of study, and manage to do excellent, creative, interesting work regardless.
Does it help to enjoy your work and feel passionate about it at least some of the time? Yes, sure. But the stereotype of academics as people who are single-mindedly obsessed with their field of study is unrealistic and unnecessarily discouraging to the huge numbers of PhD students who feel otherwise, and who worry about not feeling "passionate enough" (people like this OP). PhD students are a diverse group with a tremendous range of passions, motivations, and ambitions.
Also, all of the PhD students I know personally (including myself) passionately hate their field at least some of the time.
How much love for/devotion to your subject do you really need? In the words of aeismail:

It should be interesting enough to you that you're willing to put up with the failure that is a necessary component of successful research. But it's not necessary, or even practical or desirable, to spend every waking hour thinking about or doing research.

I agree with your answer. The majority of the tenured faculty in my math department are married and have interests outside of research.

I agree with this, but there is an important counterpoint. Perhaps the most important attribute for finishing a PhD is persistence. Earning a PhD is an enormous amount of work, and everyone knows students who "had the ability" but who didn't put in enough effort to finish their degree. So, in aeismail's comment, we should not be too quick to pass over the first sentence to get to the second.

The question and its answers have parallels outside academia, and that is something to consider if you perceive one of your options to be "getting out of academia."
I have seen the problem from a few different sides: I was a student. I worked in the private sector from 1985 to 2001, taught university for a couple of years, and I now work in a staff position at another university where I do not teach.
Being in a field that you "live and breathe" benefits you. Find it, and get in it, and stay there. In the private sector I always preferentially hired people who demonstrated true interest in their field; it seems to be no different in academia, nor do the reasons seem different.

Doing a Ph.D. and working in academia both involve being self-motivated on projects with a long time horizon.  For example, it's important to go to seminars in the long run even though any given one is not likely to pay off in the near future.  One common place that motivation comes from is deeply loving your subject in a way that means you don't need as much self-discipline to work when no one is looking.  But that's not strictly necessary in order for people to be comfortable working in a self-motivated way on projects with a long time horizon.  If you work best to external motivation or with clear deadlines, then a Ph.D. program is probably not the best place for you, but living and breathing the subject as such is not crucial.

In my experience, passion can manifest itself in multiple ways. Some people are passionate about their fields, whereas others are passionate about the methodology. For me, the challenge of understanding and modeling of a complex system is my main motivation. I enjoy the process and the model development. I do enjoy my work a lot, but I could be a happy scientist in a different field.

When I was a child I read a lot of books about scientists and decided to become one. Fast forward a few years, I graduated in Physics and decided to do a PhD. I loved the research part, I loved (and still love) Physics but the exact field I was in was not at the same "love" level. It was nice, challenging but I discovered what I really liked were computers and simulations.
I started to administer my department servers and gradually got involved with business companies. When getting my PhD I was immensely proud of it, happy to have done research but ready to try something else.
I now work in IT, love it, do not use anything from what I studied but, looking back, I would not have chosen another path.
This is just to say that what you actually love may not be the exact subject of your PhD studies (and further research) but the academic environment is such an interesting environment (challenges, teaching, how achievements are measured) that it may be the optimum place to blossom. You may also find after some time that your exact interest is somewhere else but your PhD studies helped to reveal it.


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How can I keep my ideas of a new theorem safe?
This post is similar to this one except this is a little bit of a special scenario, I have yet to graduate high school.
I know what you're thinking, oh THIS conversation again, check if it exists, make sure your theorem works, etc. etc.
I have gone through all of this, for over a year I have looked for my theorem online and nothing has come up. I have tried disproving my theorem for over a year, and I have contacted professors and have conversed about this and they all say that it is definitely publishable, but that I should prove it myself. My big worry is that due to my position my ideas can easily be stolen, and I am starting to get a little on edge.
How can I ensure that my ideas are not stolen, Can I provide direct proof that the idea is mine somehow? Should I just publish it without a proof, Can I even publish without a proof? I am kind of stuck at this point.
I have a document that has the theorem on it written in permanent ink, dated, and it is signed by a witness. But what more can I do?
EDIT:
For those curious about my conjecture click here, there are two pages so click next to see the other page.
Feel free to comment

For what it's worth, publishing is how you provide direct proof that the idea is yours.

I'm already looking forward to learn more about the famous "Lawson Conjecture" and see if it turns into the famous "Clark Theorem" or is rendered false by a counterexample obtained by the famous "Nick S Construction" ... :)

What's the conjecture?

@DavidZ it should be noted that publishing in peer reviewed venues is not necessary, there are other ways of publishing nowadays. I'm uncertain about the timestamping and trustworthiness of blogging platforms, but hopefully that will be fixed soon.

For the sake of answering the question (I'm not claiming this is something you should do per se), if you're looking for a way to prove a document exists, you can use Bitcoin's proof of existence ability.

@Trylks yes, that's what I meant. Not only peer reviewed journals but also arXiv or any other means of making the results widely known within the scientific community.

@DavidZ I'd say that doing something widely known is not easy nor needed (for "safety", not dissemination). Basically it needs to be accessible and have some trustworthy timestamp that cannot be modified. Blogging platforms would be good enough (IMHO) if they kept a log of modifications to posts (like wikis do). GitHub and such would be good enough (excellent in fact) if the timestamp was set in the server, not the client.

@01000100 I have edited the question so you can see

Making mathematical discoveries that seem true, but hard to prove, is easy, and usually, if this conjecture does not have profound implications, it will be hard to publish. If I find a math problem interesting, I share it, or ask if anyone has an idea how to solve it, on mathoverflow, or a coworker. No-one steals conjectures, but someone might prove it, and publish the proof (stating that it was your conjecture, of course, if they heard it from you)

The word "theorem" implies that there is a proof.  If you do not have a proof, you do not have a theorem.  Let's call it a conjecture instead.

I have tried disproving my theorem for over a year.

That's a slightly strange thing to say: how long have you spent trying to prove your conjecture?

Should I just publish it without a proof, Can I even publish without a proof?

It is possible to publish conjectures, but it is significantly harder to do so than to publish theorems.  I would not recommend that a young researcher -- especially, a high school student! -- try to do this.

I have contacted professors and have conversed about this and they all say that it is definitely publishable, but that I should prove it myself.

It's no help if I'm not honest, so: this sounds fishy to me.  It is often not so easy for (even) a professional mathematician to know what is "definitely publishable": after more than a decade of submitting math papers I find that I still have some things to learn about this.  But anyone who is telling you that your mathematical work is "definitely publishable" if it does not contain a proven theorem is either giving you bad advice, or you are misinterpreting the advice.

How can I ensure that my ideas are not stolen, Can I provide direct proof that the idea is mine somehow?

With probability extremely close to 1, professional mathematicians simply do not steal ideas in the manner you are worried about.  The "I did something great, but oh no I can't show it to anyone" train of thought is a sad one that amateurs often fall into.  Rather, if you do something great, show it to more than one person, and you're fine.  One way to do this is just to upload it to the internet in some public or semi-public location.  For instance, if you have an account on facebook, just post a scanned copy of the paper as photos.  Facebook posts are archived with date and time, so that's that.
I will extend to you the following offer: after you archive your paper publicly on the internet, send me a copy.  I will spend up to one hour looking at the paper and tell you one of the following:

The mathematical content of your work is such that you should try to publish it.  I will then tell you some places you might send it.
In my opinion your work is not publishable in a reputable, professional mathematical journal.
I am not qualified to judge whether your work is publishable, but I recommend that you send it to third party X.

You should understand that unless the work is very directly connected to my own I will not have the time to help you with it, nor to send more than one email.  (I simply can't: I have a lot of other people who are counting on me to spend my time on them.  In many cases I am being paid to do so.)  But I will give you a professional evaluation of your work so you can (probably) know where you stand.

"I have contacted professors and have conversed about this and they all say that it is definitely publishable, but that I should prove it myself." < -- I actually interpreted this as "IF you find a proof, it can probably be published."

Well, I have obviously tried proving it, but I feel it is just as important to try to disprove the conjecture Because if it happens to be false, then I would rather find that out after 2 months of work than trying to prove it for years.

@Nick S: The quote says "definitely"; that sets off my alarm bells at little.  I agree that the conditionality of the statement was probably more prominent than the OP is making it out to be.  However for a high school student to come up with a new conjecture which, if correct, would be publishable is already unusual and impressive.  Until I see the work I would not want the OP to think that as soon as he can prove the result he definitely has a publication.

"Well, I have obviously tried proving it" This was not obvious to me.  I apologize for my obtuseness.

Also I appreciate your honesty, This has been very helpful. Thank you. Just as a side comment, I didn't mean for the words "definitely" to come into the publishable part, just that if it is proven, it is work that has the ability to be published.

@PeteL.Clark It really depends on the field. In number theory, which I would think is the most common field a student would come up with a new theorem, it is easy for students to discover simple statements which are extremely hard to prove... And not finding it might mean either that it is not famous, or simply that the student didn't know how to look for it. Math theorems are hard to google :)

@Nick S: (I guess you know I'm a number theorist.)  Yes, there are a lot of statements in number theory that are easy to conjecture and thus far impossible to prove.  However, if someone sent me work making a standard (or less than standard, but not really novel) difficult conjecture like, say, the infinitude of twin primes (not as good an example as it used to be!), then "Yes, that is definitely publishable but you should prove it yourself" is really not a good response.

@PeteL.Clark Yes, and I agree with a theorem like that. But I think there are few problems in number theory on which I would expect the experts not to spend too much time, and you can confirm/infirm this. Probably not the best example (but as this is not my area, I don't know too many good open problems) but the perfect cuboid problem probably would qualify... Now, if a bright high school student comes and asks me about this, I would not discourage him about looking at this problem, I would think he can learn some things simply by investigating it......

I wouldn't expect him to solve it, but he would probably learn and discover a lot more by looking at something it looks interesting...... Personally I would make it clear to the student that this is a very hard problem, but someone else might think that this is discouraging the student......

Sorry for so many comments, but one more comment here, it just hit me. We might also both misunderstand the word "publishable". For us it means in a peer reviewed research journal, but them might have referred to something like Crux Mathematicorum  or some similar journal.

Isn't this answer mixing up quite some things? You are making it sound as if the "proof" in "Should I just publish it without a proof, Can I even publish without a proof?" refers to proving the validity of the conjecture, but it would rather seem that in those two sentences, "proof" refers to the proof of ownership of the idea.

@O.R. Mapper: My reading was indeed that this "proof" referred to proof in the mathematical sense.  (This seems more sensible: of course one does not need "proof of idea ownership" in order to publish a mathematical paper; if anything, it is the other way around.) If the OP meant otherwise, I hope he'll let us know.

@PeteL.Clark: Indeed, maybe I misinterpreted that. My impression was based on the directly preceding sentence "Can I provide direct proof that the idea is mine somehow?" (highlight by myself)

@O.R. Mapper: Certainly the word "proof" is used in both senses throughout the question, so I think there is reasonable ambiguity either way.

@PeteL.Clark How can I contact you?

My profile is linked to my homepage.

@EricLawson: I'm also interested in your idea. After correspondence with Pete, if the result of the discussion allows it, can you update me with the idea also?

@PeteL.Clark The link is in the question

@justhalf It is linked in the question

@PeteL.Clark what ended up happening with this?

For mathematics finding a "Theorem" without a proof has very little to no value. With very few exceptions, a Theorem becomes (somewhat) important when it is proven.
The hard part of mathematics is not finding Theorems or statements which seem plausible, the hard part is proving them. And the most important skill as a researcher is finding results which can be proven.
For many Theorems in mathematics, over the years there were many people which discovered and re-discovered that a certain result seems plausible, but no proof. Most of the times noone remembers them, and they don't often care. People usually remember who proved the Theorem, not who discovered first that this could be true.
I wouldn't worry about your Conjecture being stolen, unless you find a proof. And this is probably what those profs suggested: if you want to publish it you need to find a proof.
Also keep in mind that this applies to mathematics, might be different in other fields.

Well this is not one of those things that are unprovable, but it is definitely a challenge, But I fully agree with the statements you made. Perhaps I should keep trying to prove it.


text:
Can I put into Acknowledgments someone who is no longer living?
I am finishing a paper which was created thanks to my inspiration of Erik Erikson's work on psychological developement. The paper is, however, in the field of thermodynamics and complexity-science. I, therefore, feel grateful that such a great theory was created many years ago, and now is capable to push exact sciences step forward. I named two terms following Erikson's theory. I would like to note this somewhere, or state in general that I was inspired by the theory.
Do you think that it is OK to do this? Maybe I should hold back for some time, I can always state the "thank you" in the subsequent papers?

Perhaps the question can be rewritten to "someone who is no longer living."  Right now ("someone that is not living") it seems that this includes inanimate objects or imaginary characters.

This sounds like what citations are for.

The answer to the question in the title is simply "Yes."  The details of your situation involve other considerations that are answered below.

You can put whoever you want into acknowledgements - living, dead, undead or fictional. Still, I agree with @AnonymousMathematician's answer.

Generally, yeah. I've put in my dissertation's acknowledgments a nod to one of my professors who died recently. He helped a lot in shaping me to the mathematician I became, and he did not live to see the full extent of my thesis. He was also acknowledged in one of the thesis papers that took a few years to prepare, for the same reason.

I would reserve the acknowledgments section for people or organizations that directly contributed to the paper.  For example, if you talked with Erikson while he was still alive and he offered advice or suggestions, then it would be appropriate to thank him in the acknowledgments.  If you were just inspired by his papers, then it is better to discuss that elsewhere in the paper.  For example, you could note in the introduction that your approach is inspired by Erikson's work on psychological development, or you could mention this background when you define the terms based on his theory.  But if you thank him in the acknowledgments section, then people will assume there was a more personal connection unless you clearly specify otherwise ("Although I was never lucky enough to discuss this work with him in person, I owe Erik Erikson a great debt for...").
The main thing you should not do when thanking a deceased person is to attribute opinions to them, because they are not around to contradict you.  For example, you should not thank them in a way that suggests they supported your work, even if it's true, unless you have some documented proof.  For example, it's awkward to write "I am deeply grateful to Erik Erikson for his steadfast belief in my theory."

You could, however, day, "Shortly before his death, Erik Erikson expressed belief in my theory and encouraged me to get it ready for publication. I am grateful for his contributions to my work."

Instead of acknowledging him, you can dedicate the paper to him. I fully agree with @anonymous mathematician that acknowledgment has another purpose. Dedicating to a paper to a famous professor for her/his birthday, however, is not that uncommon and in spirit, I feel it closer to your intentions.

I would still think of this as something you would only do if you personally met the person. The original question does not specify whether this is the case or not.

Not really, in history few theorems in mathematics (my field) were dedicated to and sometimes even named after great mathematicians that lived as much as centuries ago.

@a3nm Erik Erikson died 23 years ago. My guess is that the OP is not yet 40 years of age.


text:
How do hiring/promotion/grant committees assess individual applicants who've authored papers with huge teams
While reading this slightly-too-snarky question, I was reminded of a slightly more serious question I’ve wondered about from time to time: how does being one of the 1000+ authors on a paper like the LIGO discovery or one of the CERN collaborations influence your career?  I’m used being in a field (mathematics) where most papers have between one and three authors (I’ve written with three separate four-person teams, and people have often considered this a bit exotic), so when reading a CV, one can reasonably ascribe most of the “credit” for a paper to any of the authors.
If you’re in a situation where you have to judge the research output of a scientist (like a hiring or tenure committee), how does seeing a paper from an enormous collaboration change your thinking?  What do you if you have make a decision between candidates whose publication lists are identical (due them being in the same collaboration)?

For hiring/promotion, I'm going to guess just like for all other situations: letters of recommendation.

A related issue is that at some institutions, like mine, reference letters for promotion and tenure are supposed to come from people "at arm's length" from the candidate.  My dean, being an experimental particle physicist, often points out that in certain fields, one is forced to be flexible, since virtually everyone familiar with your work is a collaborator.

Often the committees include other members of the team.

@AnonymousPhysicist So I should ask the follow up question: how do you remember the name of 1000 coauthors, let alone remember what they contributed to the project?

@BenWebster I would assume there is a hierarchy which keeps track of these things, just like any other large organization.

There's generally a way of assessing your contribution to the project even if it's enormous. So even if you're 29th author, if you were the senior manager of say particle detection and analysis, that's knowable. And they'll have a letter of recommendation from the project supervisor detailing your role.
And people on the committee (especially the person's department head) if they think you're great will advocate for you, the importance of your role, and the importance of your contribution to it.

It depends a lot on what you are using papers for. A published paper can inform a committee on the relative author potential for:

Capacity for innovation
Scientific leadership
Skills in data analysis and interpretation
Skills in scientific writing and navigating scholarly communications
Team membership
Peer connections
Capacity for securing and maintaining funding

Any paper with more than 15-20 authors supports with difficulty any of the above items, as there is an evident dilution effect. For instance, when looking at a paper such as Chatrchyan et al, with 2189 authors, what can be inferred regarding the contribution of author 123rd (randomly picked...)? Only, at best, items 5, 6 and 7. Accordingly, only if such gargantuan papers are accompanied by others more reasonably authored ones, can the multi-authored ones be considered credible.

It is my understanding that in some fields (e.g. high energy physics), virtually all papers have huge numbers of authors.

I understand this habit, put I think this in part is a friendly hijaking of the typical scholarly endeavor of the past, especially when these multiauthored papers drive citations and h indexes.


text:
What is a “sandwich thesis”?
On the Internet, I have found that some people have graduated with a PhD by means of a “sandwich thesis”. Could anyone explain what it is?

This might be termed "PhD by Published Work" in some UK universities.  That is were a body of previously published work is assessed instead of a single new thesis.

The Finnish way of saying this is "artikkeliväitöskirja", or "article thesis".

My understanding (as a brit) is that "Phd by Published work" and "sandwich thesis" are seperate things. "PhD by Published work" is a mechanism for people who published PhD standard work but did not participate in a regular PhD program to register with a university and convert their pre-existing published work into a PhD. "Sandwich thesis" is a thesis format. AIUI lots of people use the "Sandwich thesis" format, while being regular PhD students.

I believe that a sandwich thesis (sometimes called an integrated thesis / stapler thesis) consists of a collection of published or in-press articles (some schools also allow submitted articles). These articles are included in the thesis verbatim.  The publications are usually preceded by an elaborate introduction that sets the context for the thesis.
EDIT:
As Willie Wong pointed out,  there is also usually a final discussion / conclusion after the integrated papers.

This is essentially correct. It's sometimes called a "stapler" thesis as well, for obvious reasons.

the collection of published / in-press articles usually makes up the bologne and lettuce, while one is often asked to tack on two slices of bread (introduction/conclusion) on the outside.

@GWW: that's just what I've heard used (so don't take it as authoritative in anyway). And "open-faced sandwiches" are not unheard of. And perhaps there is an academic equivalent of the KFC Double Down :-).

In some fields these are also called "Portfolio dissertations" or "3-article dissertations".

This is the standard in Scandinavia, at least in the natural sciences.

Are they also called "thesis by publication"?

@AndrewGrimm: I'm not sure I've heard that name before but it seems fitting.

My own thesis consisted of exactly one paper that I had already submitted elsewhere.  All I did to it to turn it into a thesis was adjust the margins and add a page of acknowledgements.  This is fairly common in mathematics.

@AndyPutman: That's awesome I'm really jealous, we still have to write an expanded introduction for each paper.

@GWW : Is that a requirement of your advisor or of your university?  The standard for a thesis at all the universities I've been affiliated with (only three and all private universities in the US, so far from a representative sample) is that it is a document that the advisor is willing to to sign off on.  Old-fashioned kinds of advisors might require more, but my advisor's philosophy (which I share and use as my policy with my own PhD students) is that it's a waste of time to spend time writing something you can't publish.  Better to move on to the next project.

@AndyPutman: Our department has bizarre and archaic thesis requirements.  We are required to have an introduction, two data and a concluding chapter.  The data chapters cannot be unaltered manuscripts, they have to be modified and any supplementary information has to be merged with the results.

Supplementing GWW's excellent answer somewhat, the "sandwich thesis" or similar concepts, seem to be rising in popularity. For example, in my University, they're afforded equal standing to the more traditional "book"-style thesis, and in my Department, they're the required form of a dissertation.
The reasoning for this is fairly straightforward. In many fields that don't rely on book publishing as the primary means of publication (most of the sciences), the production of a large manuscript-style work is likely a one time event. One can have an extremely successful career without publishing another book, and the mechanisms to publish books on research findings (rather than say methods) may not actually exist.
As such, requiring doctoral students to produce something like that is counter-productive - they gain no experience in the future requirement to publish journal articles, and leave graduate school with a body of work that isn't represented in the journal literature. The idea of the sandwich thesis is to get around this by layering several journal-style publications (either submitted or unsubmitted) as the meat of the sandwich, with an introduction, perhaps a joint high-level methods section and a conclusion section weaving them into a coherent narrative as the bread. This allows the student's work to flow nicely into the literature in a way that's useful to all involved.

Also: almost nobody reads a thesis buried in a library archive in an archaic format. Putting the "meat" into the peer-reviewed literature makes it much easier to find.

What is described here as a sandwich thesis (a collection of published (or intending to be published) articles + Introduction + Discussion) is also called a compilation thesis. In the Netherlands this is a very common format for nearly all science PhD theses.
I'm not sure what Peter Green meant by "AIUI lots of people use the "Sandwich thesis" format, while being regular PhD students".
Nowadays, most Dutch universities also publish their PhD theses in online public archives.

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text:
Why would the organizers of an online conference ask poster presenters not to include any URLs or hyperlinks in their poster?
The following instructions were sent to poster presenters at some online conference (AAAI 2022):

Submission guidelines: All posters must be uploaded as PDF files. Posters may not exceed 1 page/side. Recommended file size: under 2MB. Posters should be horizontally oriented in 16:9 or 4:3 aspect ratio. Do not include any URLs or hyperlinks.

Why would the organizers of an online conference ask poster presenters not to include any URLs or hyperlinks in their poster?

You could just ask them why? And, if the reason is not technical, and you have a pressing reason to include these (which in 2022 for communication and multimedia purposes I imagine is not out of the realm of possibilities), ask them to be exempt from this rule?

As an organizer of several virtual poster sessions: I don't know.

@J... Because a URL is easy to memorise or write down, whereas a QR-code is completely useless for anyone who doesn't have a smartphone with a QR-code scanning app and an internet connection on that phone.

@J... Many of my friends don't have a smartphone. I've only had one for three years. The OP specified that it's an online conference, not an in-person conference. URLs might even be clickable. Even for an in-person conference, how can you be certain it'd have free wifi accessible by the attendants? The only conferences I've been which had free wifi for the attendants were conferences held inside universities, where the Eduroam network was available. Other conferences didn't have wifi for the attendants, only for the organizers.

@Stef Weird, I'd consider it wildly unprofessional if a conference didn't have free WiFi.

I don't think the URL-or-QR code is an important distinction here, they probably would have included QR codes if they had thought of it, precisely for the reasons Dan gives below. There shouldn't be material external to the poster that someone has to access on a personal device (for reasons you give). Franck doesn't say what they're trying to do, but maybe putting your Twitter on and making sure your poster or whatever is pinned would be the best thing to do.

Meta discussion on converting an answer on this question to a comment. In particular @Franck might want to input on the motivations for the question.

@Wrzlprmft thanks, motivations are 1) curiosity 2) I sometimes organize workshops so I'd like to know why my peers are banning links, to see whether I should do the same.

I'm also bemused by this request: it doesn't just affect references, but also things like authors' ORCiD. It would be good if you did manage to find out from the organisers why they have this requirement.

The organizers of a conference generally need to put restrictions on the amount of content presenters can communicate to their audience. For example, talks cannot go over time, a poster has specified dimensions, conference papers have page limits and sometimes limits on font sizes and page margins, etc. This is to ensure that attendees have a pleasant experience and are not overwhelmed by an unreasonable amount of information by presenters eager to capture more than their fair share of the audience’s attention.
(This eagerness is amplified in competitive situations in which getting more of the audience’s time and attention can increase a presenter’s chances of, say, winning the Best Poster Award, or of generally improving their standing in the community. So these restrictions are also about fairness and ensuring that presenters don’t game the system to gain an unfair advantage over other presenters.)
As for the rule about hyperlinks, I don’t have a strong opinion about  whether it’s a good rule, but it seems likely that it’s at least motivated by these sorts of considerations.

these restrictions are also about fairness and ensuring that presenters don’t game the system to gain an unfair advantage over other presenters – I don’t think I ever witnessed a case where gaming these restrictions worked as intended instead of leading to a horrible talk, poster, or similar.

@Wrzlprmft: It does not matter whether "gaming the system" works or not. If it works, then it's unfair, and if it doesn't, then it causes attendees to have an unpleasant experience. Either way, the conference is better off if you prevent people from trying to game the system (which they will do, regardless of whether it is advisable or likely to work).

I agree with @Kevin. It’s also the case that gaming the system (in the context being discussed sometimes does work (that is, produces actual benefits for the presenter). What’s even worse is that sometimes it produces benefits for the presenter and leaves some attendees with an unpleasant experience. But basically as Kevin said it doesn’t really matter whether it works or not, only that some presenters think it works.

@Kevin: Sure, I wasn’t arguing against the rule. I just wanted to emphasise that (at least in my experience), the problem is less people successfully gaming the system but people hoisting everybody with their own petard when trying to game the system (or being clueless about good presentations in general).

This can steem from possible technical causes, such as organizing and publishing software will be used by the conference organizers, to limiting the possibility of publishing harmful material, where harmful can cover the whole spectra from cultural (indecent content, political messages, religion, hate speech) to technological (hacking smartphones, browsers, etcetc).
It is rather easy to present an abstract good enough to pass the screening, then you have access to the poster room (either in person or even riskier in the virtual room).

If the organisers want to avoid the sort of attack you are envisioning, trusting on the participants to not use any URLs seems wouldn’t work. They would need a somewhat efficient way to detect all hyperlinks in the posters, in which case they may as well check for any shenanigans directly. – Of course that doesn’t mean that your answer is wrong. The organisers may just be clueless.

From a security point of view, the content a url points to can be updated after inspection, which can beprevented for posters. I doubt that's the reason of the organizers though.

@Mark let's have always a moment of WTF for "A man in Germany was surprised when the QR code on the back of his Heinz Ketchup bottle led to a porn site" (2015) https://www.businessinsider.com/heinz-ketchup-bottle-qr-code-links-to-porn-site-2015-6

Presumably they don't want hyperlinks because you can't click on a physical poster.  As to eschewing URLs, that's unclear, particularly since posters frequently refer to external sources in the bibliography.  I guess if you want to find out why they don't like URLs you'll have to ask them.  Alternatively, you could be really cheeky and use QR codes instead.

it's an online conference, no physical poster will be printed :)

You can also use DOIs in the bibliography, without expanding them to URLs.  A PDF is more likely to make those copyable (compared to QR codes, which would mean photographing on screen, then the citation is on your phone not your PC)

@MiG: ...and what about after the conference, when both virtual and physical copies will be made for publication?

@MiG: Ah!  These days I should have guessed!

@Vikki I have yet to attend a conference where physical copies of posters are made available to attendants :)

@MiG I've never been to one where it's done systematically, but I have seen people bring printouts.

This would be presenters taking printouts themselves, and bears no relation to conferences banning the use of URLs (nor would it prevent them from adding those to their posters) :)

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text:
What are the primary causes of conflict between PhD advisors and their students?
Here's a very interesting analysis from a professor's point of view on the primary causes of conflict between PhD advisors and their students:

In my experience, incompatible personalities account for a large
  fraction of the conflicts that I have run across over my 13 years
  since college.  Basically, the student has the wrong advisor.  No one
  is at fault – it's like a marriage that doesn't work out.

I would like to get some more perspectives on this question though, as graduate students may perceive this question differently.

The biggest causes of conflict, beyond personality-related issues, I believe stems from a point made in the linked article—lack of communication.
When advisors and advisees are not on the same wavelength, either because goals have not been clearly communicated, or because the frequency or quality of contact and correspondence between the two has broken down, conflicts can result. This is especially true when it comes time to graduate: the advisor may have specific expectations on what the student is required to provide; however, unless this is directly communicated to the student, there will potentially be a lot of conflict in getting to a point where both are satisfied with the final results.
Often, this can be solved by having a direct discussion about the unresolved issues. However, if there is a pathological problem—in other words, one that can't be resolved through communication between the student and advisor—it may become necessary to invoke the thesis committee, graduate officer, department chair, or other authority who can help to resolve the problem.

I've observed three main failure modes:

Different research interests. Even if nominally in the same subfield, it's difficult to work on a years-long project if both advisor and advisee are not really engaged. Both will try to subtly pull the project in a more interesting direction, and it's easy for both to have a different understanding of what the goal is.
Different working styles. If the professor expects 9-5 hours and the student likes to work in the middle of the night, there may be conflict. Or, the professor may be interested in rigorous theory while the student takes an "if it works, it works" attitude. The latter can be a good opportunity for learning, but it can also just lead to conflict.
Poor behavior. Laziness and abusiveness are difficult to negotiate. Note, this goes in both directions - plenty of examples of diligent students with lazy professors.

I agree with @aeismail that basically all of these can be resolved by better communication (and exacerbated by poor communication). It's sort of counter-cultural to do performance reviews and written-down goals, but it's not a bad idea, at least occasionally.
Edit: just realized this was 6 years old. But, the question was recently modified, so I'll leave my answer.


text:
Maintain scientific output after having a baby
I could have written this question in some other stack places, but prefer to do here because the affinity with the audience. I am the head of a research group, 38 years old, engaged in a lot of things and working on average 12 hours per day on research and all related stuff. My son (first one) was born last week and we really enjoy it. My only concern is: how will I be able to cope with my workload and scientific output after my paternity leave (in two weeks)? I really never thought about this and wonder whether other academics could give advice.

The first 6 months require much care for the baby and less fancy research hours. You are not alone anymore; there is someone crying who needs milk!; after hours (s)he needs changing diapers. At least this is what I went through.. I spent less hours at university but because I knew I can't study at home, I did my best to be productive during these hours.

@JordanMahar: I wish that taking a time management course was sufficient to regain traction after having a baby. With a baby, there's so much more to manage than time.

Can you produce as much, or even more, with less time available? Yes.
Is it easy? No.
What generic advice can be given? Little, especially in such short space. Numerous entire books have been written on the topic of time management. Read the advice of others, decide whether it can apply to you, try it out.

Now, the above isn't very helpful. Not in the short term, at least. Below are a few tips from my own experience, maybe you will find them helpful:

First, decide what your priorities are, what you are willing to compromise, what you aren't. When I read “engaged in a lot of things”, it sounds like a warning to me. Honestly, the first two years of a baby's life are hard on the parents. Social life is hard to maintain, work output too, etc. Decide which you want to keep most, and focus there. Don't set your expectations too high across the board.
Second, learn to say no. People at your department probably ask you to participate in all sorts of research-related work (committees, etc.). If you have been playing ball ’til then, probably they can understand if you say “I'm sorry, right now is not a time I can take some extra work, I need to focus on my family”. Don't use that as an excuse to get out of every commitment, or avoid anything that is thrown your way, but strategically get a bit more time that way. Most people are quite understanding of the hardship of having a newborn baby. (Or my colleagues and bosses are extraordinary people; knowing them, it's also quite possible!)
Delegate stuff. You lead a team, so you have some responsibility in sharing the load. You can try to offload yourself a bit, by getting others to step in.
Work whenever you can (read: when the baby sleeps). Adjust your work style. I'll give only one example: when the baby gets to cry real bad in evenings or at night, I noticed I could get her to sleep if I had her in a sling against my chest and rocked from one foot to the other:

(the sling was as in the picture, except I needed to be standing and rocking). Well, I put my laptop on top of a high table (bar table), and quickly adapted to type and rock the baby. That way, I had time to work at night, while her mother could rest. I wrote quite a few grant proposals and articles that way.

I was close to vote to close for this question, however, in view of the upvotes, I'll give my two cents.
I think you are asking yourself the wrong question. You should not ask "How will I be able to keep up with my workload and scientific output?" but rather

What I am willing to do for my work and for my family? How do I and the rest of my family should arrange our life including work hours, family time and all the rest?

You may come to the conclusion that a reduced scientific output may be a "good price to pay" for a richer family life. On the other hand, if you are pre-tenure for example, you may also reach the conclusion that a year or two of "not so rich family life" and more hours at work are worth it.


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Move from my current university or stay with a longer term proposal?
I'm currently in a disjunctive regarding my professional life, and I would like a bit of an advice.
I'm finishing my PhD next March (is Japan, so is 99.9999% sure that I will finish), and I have 2 proposals.
One is to move away to US, with a very demanding professor in an experimental environment (I do mostly simulations), he seems well connected there with people in good Universities (MIT, Stanford, UPenn, etc). Yet, he himself is not very well known in my particular field, he is in his own application field though. The University is in California with what I guess is a standard PostDoc salary for a one year Post Doc program.
The other is to stay in my current University, with my professor in a more stable and long term proposal (4 years). The problem, is that my professor was never very engaged in my project, and I got mostly marginal help from him. He was always really helpful, and had good resources (conferences, equipment, etc).
I would like to know the opinion of more experienced people. I would really like a future in academia, so I'm open to any suggestion.

So your choice is a current professor who's not engaged in your particular project, or a new professor who's not even engaged in your particular field? Maybe it's time to look for a third option?

I read “I got mostly marginal help from him. He was always really helpful” as self-contradicting. Could you clarify?

If you don't mind me asking. How much is a salary for a post-doc in California?

@user4050 that has the potential to be a really good general question. Why don't you ask it as a separate question.

He was marginally helpful in the sense that he offered little insight regarding my research (ideas, experiments, etc) but the guy (as a person) is great and has enough money to send you to any conference, buy any book, or computer you might need without even asking the validity of the conference, book or a 3000 USD computer

@Leonpalafox marry him! ;-)

I beg you and everyone else, never use statements like "99.9999% sure that I will finish". I bet that chance of dying (not to mention other serious personal, health, university, national or global problems) makes it much, much less. "I'm very, very sure that I will" is very, very rarely more than "95%".

Noöne but you can make this decision, so here are a few thoughts that sprang in my mind when reading your description. I hope they can be of help in your decision-making.
It looks like your option #1 is more of a gamble (which might be a pro or a con depending on your own character!). It seems that you would go to this new group and change your research topic: if so, you have to realize that a one-year position is quite short for learning/adapting to a different area of research. I think it's good for a post-doc to actually pursue something different than he did during his PhD, but it is more risky on a one-year contract.
Second thing: if you go option #1, would you be burning bridges with your current place? Or would they welcome you back after your one year of US experience, if you don't find another post-doc in this new (sub)field? If you think you can pretty much fall back to option #2 in one or two year's time, then option #1 sounds a lot less risky.
Finally, being a rather “independent” post-doc (i.e. working with a professor who's not fully involved) has some advantages if you can handle it and find intellectual support in other ways (collaborations, conferences, visiting positions, …). It allows you to establish yourself as an independent researcher, which is a first step to become a group leader yourself.

Option #2 sounds like dream to me!


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How to write a reference request for a candidate that I see unfit for the application?
This question is a bit different from this question: What to do if asked to write a letter of recommendation for a weak candidate?
Instead of not knowing the student well enough, I know the student too well that I think he is not a suitable candidate. I have a good relationship with the student, it is just that I know I cannot comment highly on this application as he lack one skill that is particularly important for that post... I have suggested to him to try something else but he seems to be very keen in applying for the post. I cannot turn down his request because he said he could not find anyone else (He need 3 references) I never read a poor reference before; how honest usually are people in writing them?
(He is not a bad student, and I have written him a good reference on another application before, so I do not want to write him a poor reference...)

What is the skill that he lacks

the skill is a bit specific -- let's say he is not patient, the post he wanna apply for need lots of patience...

I never read a poor reference You never read a poor reference because people choose not to write one as opposed to writing a poor one. If you don't think he should go, then your writing a letter to help him go, despite your better judgement, is a disservice to him.

Do you mean that this particular position requires an abnormal level of patience, or simply that he is in general abnormally impatient? Those are two utterly different scenarios warranting two different courses of action. You're not being clear.

Is the skill he's missing a character trait, such as being impatient, or a nonmoral technical skill, such as knowing a particular programming language or being familiar with a particular research technique?

See the last part of this paper.

Other important missing information: a) What does "I know the student well" mean? Are you their supervisor, in any position of responsibility wrt their work, or their senior colleague? Or you just play squash with them once a week. b) How long have you been their supervisor/senior colleague? c) Is this for a permanent position, or just a summer job/ internship/ research contract? What is the foreseeable career damage of writing a lukewarm/ negative letter? d) Do they need this job or money?

e) Is their unfitness something you were already aware of when you became their supervisor? How is it that it's never come up in the years you've been their supervisor/senior colleague? Basically: did you lead them to believe/rely upon/depend on this job and you writing a recommendation for it? If yes, at what point did you change your mind?

I cannot turn down his request because he said he could not find anyone else. — This is simply not true. Being his only possible reference is not sufficient reason to provide a reference.

@ceoec, this might be a good time for you to do some serious procrastination!  Normally, I wouldn't recommend this, but in this case, it might buy you some time.  Maybe while he is waiting, your student will come across another opening that is more suitable, and he will get so excited about it too that he will have an easier time listening to your point of view about the position that requires patience. - - - Note, you can also point to his impatience and pressuring of you, as evidence that a position requiring patience would not be the best fit for him.

@smci, the post need patient, not an abnormal level but need it, I wrote the student a good reference before because the other post he applied do not need patient.

@aparente001, haha I like your idea...

@aparente001 that sort of behavior is well-known and is called passive-aggressive. IMO it's nonsensical to do that instead of just talking to the guy.

@JeffE He's the only possible reference because everyone else has already seen he's unsuitable and won't write a reference.

@LorenPechtel Right. That doesn't mean he has to write a reference.

@aparente001 I think that the problem with your idea is less that it's "nonsensical", as was suggested, but more than it's simply unfair to the student. I've encountered similar situations (both as an outside observer, and involved once myself, as the student), and in all those cases the student would have been much better off if they knew exactly what the professor thought, which would have allowed said student to look for alternative options, instead of wasting time hoping for something which, based on the information on their hands, is going to happen at some point.

Here's how it typically works (at least in the U.S.).  First, you should warn him that you don't feel you can write a strong enough recommendation for him to get this job, and that you're convinced he'd be better off with another recommender.  You should try to explain why, so he can learn why you think this position is not a good fit for him.
If he insists that he wants to apply and has no other options for a recommendation, then you should try to write a supportive but honest letter, typically by taking your previous letter and strategically modifying it to fit this particular job.  By "supportive but honest", I mean making the best case you reasonably can under the circumstances, but being honest about any weaknesses and not endorsing him in any way you'd regret.  Often, instead of saying "I don't recommend hiring him" you can instead say something with enough qualifications that anyone can read between the lines.
For example, suppose an excellent teacher is applying for a job he simply doesn't have the research accomplishments for.  You can send a letter that comments in detail about his teaching and concludes by saying "Although Bob does not yet have any peer-reviewed publications, I'm confident that his work in progress will lead to a publishable paper.  When combined with his excellent and enthusiastic teaching, this makes him a good candidate for a faculty position that prioritizes teaching over research."  If you send this to a faculty search at a research university, they will read it as an automatic rejection, without your having to say so explicitly.  (Note that if Bob actually applies to an appropriate teaching position, then you should not send this text, but rather a more enthusiastic version with fewer qualifications.)
Of course you may not want to set up an automatic rejection, but rather just to make sure the hiring committee is aware of your concerns.  Another possibility is to conclude by saying "Bob is in many ways a strong candidate for this position.  My one reservation is..."  If the hiring committee agrees with you that this is a concern, then they will reject him, but at least you gave him a chance to find out whether this issue worries the committee.

In general this is good advice, but don't you think the OP has an obligation to immediately give the person the feedback, verbally? Before writing lukewarm letters of recommendation, etc.  "If possible, you should try to explain why..." I don't understand the qualification with the word "If" in that sentence. If that conversation doesn't get the point across, then one or both parties to it has major communication problems. In which case, they've been putting off that discussion for way too long - months if not years.

That's a reasonable point.  I removed the "if possible" since I can't think of a good reason why it wouldn't be possible to at least try.

@AnonymousMathematician, thanks I agree I would just let the hiring committee aware of my concern with a supportive letter -- as I have already told the student already about it. May be the hiring committee does not see that as an issue.

Don't write a negative reference letter. Don't beat around the bush with fogging like "the position is not suitable for you". Set up a conversation where you tell him clearly and assertively what his negative trait is (you said impatience), and be constructive about how he can improve, and how to manage his career in the meantime (avoid or handle such situations). Do this very urgently, don't delay - it's already hurting his career. Do it verbally, behind a closed-door. Keep it constructive. Make it a two-way conversation, not a firing squad. Suggest or agree actions or metrics for the future.
One important duty of a supervisor is giving negative feedback. That means you. If you don't do that you're a bad supervisor and you're not serving him well. If you're consistently uncomfortable doing that with people, the issue is primarily with you, not him.
Do you mean:

that this particular position requires an abnormal level of patience ('patience of Job'), or
simply that he is in general abnormally or pathologically impatient?

Those are two utterly different scenarios warranting two different courses of action. You're not being clear. Or assertive. Impatience is potentially a very good trait for some positions (and bad for others), so do you really mean he lacks the social skills or communication style to mask his impatience? Really focus on being clear and specific. Was it foreseeable that 1a) he should have been able to figure out said position requires an abnormal level of patience (in which case, help him figure that out), or 1b) is it that you somehow know this via the grapevine and are trying to secretly "help him" without telling him why? (in which case, teach him how to do his own background check on a position)

I cannot turn down his request because he said he could not find anyone else. (He needs 3 references)

EDIT: based on discussion with @Corvus, here is a major cultural difference between academia and industry:
[In academia] References have a standard set of things, and it's considered ok to write a reference which intentionally omits some of those.
[In industry] Absolutely you can! In fact, arguably you're obligated to, ethically. Arguably, the moment you detected a sufficiently seriously negative personality trait that would harm his career under your supervision, you were obligated to tell him promptly - not delay until the last minute when it damages his career or livelihood - as it is now. There's a pair of you in this situation, as they say.

Tobias K.: "You may also want to contact the people you send the letter to and tell them that you did warn him that the letter would be bad"

This is all too weird and avoidant for words. If you're that unassertive and uncomfortable being a supervisor and giving essential feedback, you should step down immediately from being a supervisor, or at very minimum warn anyone when they start under you that you're incapable of giving negative feedback, and that their career will suffer for it. If people saw such a weird cover-your-ass but-I-told-him-so follow-up letter, they might conclude that the referee has basic issues supervising and communicating with people, and that the department is aware of this and doesn't care. Don't create that situation. Set up the conversation with him immediately. Don't be afraid of that conversation. Handled right, it may be the most important and constructive of his career. It may also equally be an important learning experience for you.
You may want to try the book/audiobook/course: "Crucial Conversations: Tools for Talking When Stakes Are High, Second Edition"

To our downvoter: please state constructive criticisms. (It's kind of weirdly meta-, on this topic, to have someone anonymously veto me for suggesting that anonymously vetoing other people and damaging their careers is not a good course of action)

I'm not the downvoter but your answer comes across as attempting to have a debate with the other people who have answered or commented on this page. Stack Exchange is not a discussion forum: it's a question and answer forum.

I think this is good advice. Everybody is looking for reasons to reject candidates. Writing a letter which is in any way negative is a waste of time for everyone involved.

The downvote was partly for the way you berated the OP and other respondents in your original version pre-edits, but more importantly because I don't think there is any ethical obligation whatsoever to decline writing a letter. Why would there be? The nice to do would be to decline. But I strongly feel that a student would be a danger to patients as a doctor (yes, I've had some of those). If the student begs me to write a recommendation letter for medical school, why shouldn't I warn the school in question about my concerns?

@Corvus I didn't "berate" the OP. I disagreed strongly with their premise that their problem rests solely with the student, not also them. But to be clear: I think you're suggesting a supervisor has no ethical obligation whatsoever to a) decline writing some sort of letter rather than b) decline writing a positive letter of recommendation for someone they strongly believe to be unfit for the position. "Why would there be?" Well you already cited the obvious medical/patient-harm example.

@Corvus do you believe that writing a lukewarm or negative letter of recommendation without ever having given the candidate any prior negative feedback while having been their supervisor (or in some position of responsbility wrt them) for months or years, is ethical? Or indeed do you believe that to decline both to write any letter or tell them any reason would be a "nice" course of action/

@smci Let's be clear: I am saying that if I am asked to write a letter, I have no ethical obligation to either decline or write a good letter. Rather, I  every ethical right to accept the request and then write a negative letter -- and I will do that if I truly believe that harm would come if I don't act. Is it a nice thing to do? Of course not. But sometimes (e.g. where human lives are concerned) there are more important things than being nice.

@smci Things get more complicated if I am this person's direct supervisor. (Note that the OP did not claim this). In this case I probably do have an ethical obligation to give negative feedback directly to the person, as early as possible, where merited (though even this could be debated). But suppose I've already failed in this regard? My ethical obligation to warn a potential school or employer may still trump my ethical obligation to make up for my earlier failure by refusing to write, let alone writing an undeserved positive letter.

^ Ok I agree with the first two sentences. The OP was unclear whether they were the candidate's supervisor, although they implied they were. "But suppose I've already failed in this regard" - I don't understand that premise ("How did we get here from there, over several years?"). It sure sounds from the OP's account like they never even bothered trying that, and are pathologically averse to trying. Which IMO would be a serious ethical failure on the part of a supervisor (and the department and other colleagues) - if that is in fact the situation.

I am not the candidate's supervisor, he is an UG student in my class. UG student always have difficulties in finding reference. I have tried to talk to him about the problem already as I said he was still very keen in applying.

@ceoec: ok, that is essential missing information you need to add to your question. As his lecturer you do have some ethical responsibility to him. How long have you known him and when did you form the opinion he is unacceptably impatient? And what will be the impact to his career if this application fails?

If you do not feel that you can avoid writing him a letter, then tell him precisely what you wrote here: That the letter will not recommend he gets the position, for the reasons you wrote (which will pretty much guarantee that he does not get the position). Chances are that he will then no longer want you to write the letter.
You may also want to contact the people you send the letter to and tell them that you did warn him that the letter would be bad, or they might get the idea that you betrayed the student by writing such a bad letter.

This may sound silly, but I find it hard to tell him "my letter will not recommend him get the position". I did tell him I think the position is not suitable for him....  Thanks for suggesting me to contact the people I send the letter to.... Didn't think about it.

"You may also want to contact the people you send the letter to and tell them that you did warn him that the letter would be bad" This is all too weird for words. Don't write a negative reference letter. Don't beat around the bush with fogging like "the position is not suitable for you". Set up a conversation where you tell him clearly and assertively what his negative trait is, and be constructive about how he can improve, and how to manage his career in the meantime.

@ceoec : in academia, people knowingly recommend people who aren't suitable every day of the week. It is in no way equivalent to telling him "my letter will not recommend he get the position".  That's an issue of clarity and basic assertiveness on your part.

This may sound silly, bit I find it hard... — Of course it's hard. Nobody likes to be the bearer of bad news. But it's your job to be a grownup here.

Others have already stated ways to write what you want to say, in terms that are typically found in recommendation letters. Another piece to it is that lukewarm letters are often short: they describe the candidate in positive but general terms, but they do not go into the details you find in good letters. (Such as: "Specifically, among his publications, the one on homeomorphic indeterminate tangential operators stands out in its creativity: it introduces a new class of operators that ... ... ... . This paper, despite having been published only two years ago, already has 170 citations." This would obviously be for a more senior researcher, but you can find similar detail in good letters for students.) In contrast, letter writers who don't feel like saying very much because there is not much positive to say, often keep the letter to the most basic content -- not negative, but not detailed and positive either. A reader of the letter will clearly read between the lines why you are omitting the details.

Are you suggesting writing a skimpy letter, which while avoiding being incorrect, fails to communicate an accurate appraisal of the candidate including your reservations? Is your intent that this results in their application failing?

I'm not suggesting, it just seems to be general practice. Positive recommendation letters often have a fairly predictable set of things in it. If parts are omitted, then this is a statement in itself, and the parts that are omitted are in a sense a statement about the reservations of the writer.

As far as wanting the application to fail: it's a question I tend to avoid when writing a letter of recommendation. It's a decision others have to make. My job is to convey my assessment of the candidate, not to suggest what they do. In fact, I find letters that say things like "You must absolutely hire my graduate student as he is actively being recruited by others already" pretty obnoxious to read -- don't pressure me. I much prefer reading statements like "I believe that her potential clearly makes it an excellent candidate for a position at any university."

"Positive recommendation letters often have a fairly predictable set of things... omitting parts is a statement in itself " - I suppose academia is much more formal than industry in general. Recommendations in industry come in all sorts of different forms - most aren't even on paper. I guess this is a major cultural difference.

Yes, I'm willing to believe this.

Aha. Interesting culture shock.

It is as much about what you don’t say as what you do say.
So write a reference that lists all his skills in the same order as the job spec, maybe even use the same headings as the jobs spec.   But leave out the section he is week on.
Writing a bad reference or refusing to write an reference could lead to legal problems…

Could you clarify what sort of legal problems could result?

In the UK the libel laws make giving reference high risk, but there have been cases when refusing to give a reference, hence making the requester thinking you only have bad things to say have also lead to legal action.   Employment discrimination law also comes into it -  it mostly assume the employer (or ex employer) is guilty until proven otherwise.

If you refuse to give a reference, how would a prospective employer know that?

Because you told the employer you  would not provide the reference when they phoned you or wrote to you.

That would mean that someone had mentioned you as a reference without getting your permission. Anyway, the question seems to be about a letter of reference, not about being just listed as one.