Reed's Ruminations: A Blog by Dan Reed

Impact, Not Indicators or Artifacts

N.B. I also write for the Communications of the ACM (CACM). The following essay recently appeared on the CACM blog.

Publish and/or perish; proposals and reports; research, teaching and service: these are the "death and taxes" equivalents for life in major research universities. Success -- or at least promotion and tenure – is normally measured by how well one plays the academic game, publishing frequently in the "right" places, placing students in the "right" institutions and serving on the "right" committees. All too often, however, we tend to focus on these indicators rather than the presence or absence of impact from our activities.

Counting Beans

Many of us know faculty who have published hundreds of papers, but who have not demonstrably changed the nature or direction of their specialty. Conversely, many of us can readily identify individuals who have transformed the nature of computing, but who have few – if any – of the standard beans that are counted when quantifying traditional research success.

As a department head, my guidance to young assistant professors was always simple: do something interesting and important, make a difference that is recognized, and the artifacts will come. The artifacts are just that -- things that accrue from impact, not objectives to be sought.

I was reflecting on all of this as I tracked the responses to Moshe Vardi's CACM editorial, Conferences vs. Journals in Computing Research, and Lance Fortnow's CACM article, Time for Computer Science to Grow Up. Before these two articles appeared, I had already discussed these same concerns about computing's shift from journal to conference publications in my March 2009 CRA column: Publishing Quarks: Considering Our Culture, where I bemoaned the rise of the minimum publishable unit and called for a reinvigoration of journals.

Cultural Conservatism

It is somewhat ironic that many aspects of our computing research culture are now so often conservative, especially when research itself is defined by an insatiable curiosity about the unknown and unexplained. If you have any doubt, try to secure research funding for a proposal that is controversial or try to move a curriculum revision rapidly through the academic approval process! (To be sure, there are exceptions and there are good reasons for many of these checks and balances, but the process is sometimes excruciatingly slow and often incremental.)

It is worth remembering that our field grew from the confluence of mathematics, physics, electrical engineering, psychology, information theory and management and a host of other disciplines. The founders were radicals and iconoclasts, eschewing the extant culture of their disciplines because this new notion of computing was so pregnant with possibilities that could transform society and the nature of discovery. In short, it was the most exciting thing they could imagine doing, even if it was not the "safe" thing to do. More to the point, they were not focused on getting multiple papers in this year's specialty conferences.

Remember, it's the impact that matters, not the artifacts.

Bridging Cultures for Collaboration

N.B. I also write for the Communications of the ACM (CACM). The following essay recently appeared on the CACM blog.

Several years ago, I was invited to give the welcome address to the extended community participants in a new computational science project. The meeting was being held at a facility a few blocks from the nearest hotel, which happened to be very near the ocean. On the first day of the meeting, I made my way downstairs from my hotel room, only to encounter an unexpected sight.

It seemed there were two major groups staying at the hotel, in addition to those I expected to attend the computational science meeting. One group was dressed in t-shirts, shorts and sandals and would have blended nicely with the nearby beachgoers. The second group was dressed in conservative business suits that would not have drawn a second glance in the corporate world.

Both groups streamed from the hotel, seemingly bound for recreation and business, respectively. Imagine my surprise when I saw members of both groups entering the building where I was scheduled to speak! One was a group of engineers; the other, not surprisingly, was a group of computer scientists. (Full disclosure: I am proud to say that all of my degrees are from engineering schools, and I spent twenty years in a computer science department located in a college of engineering.)

As I stepped to the podium to begin my remarks, I glanced down at my own attire: dress shoes, pants, button down shirt, and a blazer, but no tie. Recognizing the humor of the situation, I began by saying that I was a community bridge builder, the statistical mean of the audience's sartorial distribution. I continued by recommending that those wearing ties get better acquainted with those wearing sandals, as that was precisely the cross-cultural engagement necessary to ensure the success of a computational science or engineering project.

The point of this anecdote is the importance of cultural flexibility and willingness to understand the diversity of reward metrics and expectations across disciplines. Only in so doing can we realize the true power of computational science and engineering, or more broadly, of computing plus X, where X is any of the possible domains of computing applicability, from the humanities, arts and social sciences, through government, business and consumer products, to science and engineering.

All too often, our technical curricula fail to focus on the human aspect of cross-domain collaboration. Technical skills are necessary, but not sufficient. One must also understand and meld the disparate motivations of the collaborative team in a positive and productive way to achieve success.

NITRD Reauthorization: Enabling the Future

As a computing researcher, as chair of the Computing Research Association (CRA), and as a former member of the President's IT Advisory Committee and the President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST), I have spoken and written repeatedly about the state of computing research in the United States, the importance of long-term, strategic investment and the critical need for strategic, interagency planning.

Today, the U.S. House of Representatives passed H.R. 2020, the Networking and Information Technology Research and Development Act of 2009, which embodies many of those recommendations. As press release from the House Committee on Science and Technology notes, this reauthorization of the Networking and Information Technology R&D (NITRD) program

… strengthens interagency planning, coordination, and prioritization for NITRD by requiring the development and periodic update of a strategic plan informed by both industry and academia. This plan is meant to create a vision for networking and information technology R&D across the federal government, and provide specific metrics for measuring progress toward that vision.

The Road to the Present

As chair of the Computing Research Association (CRA), I was pleased to endorse H.R. 2020. Simply put, H.R. 2020 is the culmination of many years of background work, reports, discussions and Congressional hearings by diverse groups.

In July 2008, i testified before Rep. Gordon and the House Science and Technology Committee ("NITRD: Come, Let Us Reason Together"), summarizing the 2007 recommendations of the President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST) report, Leadership Under Challenge: Information Technology R&D in a Competitive World, whose production I had the privilege to co-chair. The report included the following recommendations ("PCAST, NITRD and the Future"), emphasizing the contributions of information technology to our continued prosperity and well being, something especially timely given current circumstances:

• Address the demand for skilled IT professionals by revamping curricula, increasing fellowships, and simplifying visa processes.
• Emphasize larger-scale, longer-term, multidisciplinary IT R&D and innovative, higher-risk research
• Give priority to R&D in IT systems connected with the physical world, software, digital data, and networking
• Develop and implement strategic and technical plans for the NITRD program

Thanks to the hard work of many people, all of these were addressed in the NITRD reauthorization bill. Specifically, the reauthorization includes creation of a five year strategic plan, to be updated every three years and assessed by an independent committee whose co-chairs are members of PCAST. The reauthorization also emphasizes the importance of long term, multidisciplinary research and identifies cyberphysical systems as a critical element of the research agenda.

These are sufficiently noteworthy that I feel compelled to quote from H.R. 2020, regarding the strategic plan:

(A) foster the transfer of research and development results into new technologies and applications for the benefit of society, including through cooperation and collaborations with networking and information technology research, development, and technology transition initiatives supported by the States;

(B) encourage and support mechanisms for interdisciplinary research and development in high-performance computing, including through collaborations across agencies, across Program Component Areas, with industry, with Federal laboratories (as defined in section 4 of the Stevenson-Wydler Technology Innovation Act of 1980 (15 U.S.C. 3703)), and with international organizations;

(C) address long-term challenges of national importance for which solutions require large-scale, long-term, interdisciplinary research and development;

(D) place emphasis on innovative and high-risk projects having the potential for substantial societal returns on the research investment; and

(E) strengthen all levels of networking and information technology education and training programs to ensure an adequate, well-trained workforce.

Yes, high-performance computing is identified explicitly, as a collaborative activity across government, industry and academia and with international partners.

Cyberphysical Systems

As some of you may recall, cyberphysical systems (i.e., computing systems that interact with the physical world) emerged as the top research priority from the PCAST assessment of NITRD needs. Today, our critical national and international infrastructure (financial systems, telecommunications, transportation, and utility grid), national security, and our personal lives (communications, biomedical devices, household appliances, automobiles and entertainment systems) are all computer enhanced and mediated.

Computing is an inseparable part of our culture and our prosperity, and ensuring the reliable, correct and secure operation of this cyberphysical infrastructure is central to our future. Hence, I am especially delighted that the reauthorization calls for a joint university/industry task force to develop a research and development agenda for cyberphysical systems, together with defining roles and responsibilities, suggesting funding mechanisms and discussing intellectual property (IP) mechanisms. I am especially pleased that IP mechanisms was identified explicitly, as I believe we need to rethink how our public-private sector partnerships are best organized for mutual benefit.

The Road Ahead

The work by the House Science and Technology Committee and the passage of H.R. 2020 by the full House paves the way for the future. We have defined a scaffold for the future. Now we must erect the enabling infrastructure for a knowledge-centric society. I am confident the new incarnation of PCAST, which includes my Microsoft colleague, Craig Mundie, will continue to watch the progress of the NITRD program as our ever-changing field helps shape our future.

Doctoral Comedy: Which Way Is The Door?

One of the great lessons of sociology is the power of shared experience, whether positive or negative, to create deep and lasting human bonds. From the horror and misery of war and abduction (Stockholm syndrome) through the fun and excitement of athletic camaraderie and competition to the caffeine and adrenalin fueled pressure of a "ship or die" venture-funded startup, shared experiences can define one's life. This even extends to pursuing a Ph.D., where the long, sometimes strange and unpredictable journey can create its own ethos and breed a certain gallows humor.

This is why I am enjoying the great comic strip, Piled Higher and Deeper, also known as PhDComics, drawn by Jorge Cham. As an aside, the phrase "piled higher and deeper," of course, is an old and hoary wordplay on the progression from B.S. through "more of the same" (M.S.) to – all together now – "piled higher and deeper." (Ph.D.) If you ever spent Saturday night working in the lab, and every graduate student has, you understand the stable cleaning analogy.

The first time I saw the PhDComics strip, I knew that Jorge must have been a Ph.D. student, because only someone who has experienced graduate school and faculty life, particularly in a technical discipline, could have that much insight regarding the joy and misery of graduate student life and the trials and foibles of faculty members. I spent thirty years in that world, and I recognize myself, my friends and my colleagues in the strip. (No, not thirty as a graduate student, though it certainly seemed so at the time!) Perhaps the following anecdotes will trigger some memories of your own.

The Netherworld

As a graduate student, you live in a netherworld, not quite a student nor a faculty member either. The undergraduate students see you as faculty, especially if you are a teaching assistant, and the faculty members see you as a student, especially if you have not yet crossed the River Styx, otherwise known as the Ph.D. qualifying examination. From the university's bureaucratic perspective, you are a chameleon, classified as either a student (see parking privileges and health benefits) or staff (see student discounts and athletic tickets) when convenient.

One of my Illinois Ph.D. students came to our weekly group meeting absolutely furious. He'd driven to the Digital Computer Laboratory (DCL) about 3 A.M. that morning to check on the progress of some research simulations. When he returned to his car about 15 minutes later, he found a ticket on his windshield. My student was absolutely adamant that it was unfair and that he would not pay the fine. It looked like a mano-a-mano smackdown – irate graduate student versus implacable bureaucracy.

I was sympathetic; after all, Urbana at 3 A.M. has a surfeit of parking places. I asked him on which of the streets near DCL he'd parked his car. He asked why it mattered. I patiently explained that some of the streets were within the jurisdiction of the university police, whereas others were within the jurisdiction of the city of Urbana. The city – and by extension, the U.S. government – might have the power to fine him, jail him or even deport him, but the university wielded a far more important power over his fate and future. It could prevent him from graduating by simply encumbering his records for failure to pay a parking ticket. Because he had parked on a university street, he had no choice; he wanted a Ph.D.; he paid the fine. Final score: university 1; graduate student 0.

The Weekly Meetings

If you have been a graduate student or a faculty member, you remember the weekly meetings with your advisor (advisees) and the group meetings and seminars. Each brings certain perspectives, and they become conjoined over time, whether it be foraging for free seminar food, trying to impress people by asking questions or simply staying awake and trying to look interested.

One my first Ph.D. students, a truly fantastic researcher who is now a very successful computer science faculty member himself, once asked me at a professional conference if there had ever been intervals where I had wondered if he were doing anything useful in the lab. After confessing that it had crossed my mind a time or two, he laughed and said he understood, as he now wondered the same about his own students.

How Many Years?

At some point during my graduate career at Purdue, I was having dinner with the parents of a friend of mine. Her mother asked when I expected to graduate, and I said, "In a year or so, I think." She replied, "That's what you said last year." In fact, I had said the same thing the year before, and both times I had been hoping it was true. Of course, she didn't know that asking a graduate student when they will finish their thesis is a bit like asking someone about their weight or their income. As the PhDComics strip notes, it's best not discussed in polite company.

In that spirit, I also distinctly remember leaving a Friday night, midnight campus showing of The Deer Hunter, thinking the odds were high that my tombstone would list me as an A.B.D. graduate student with the epitaph, "Felled by one last thesis revision." That one sentence captures so many elements of the graduate experience. First, I left the movie alone and on foot, because I had no date and no car. Second, I was attending a midnight $1 movie because I living on rather miniscule graduate fellowship stipend with little discretionary money. (See my previous comment about having no date and no car.) Third, it was The Deer Hunter, a great movie but a truly depressing moral meditation on war and death, perhaps not the best choice for a midnight screening, especially for a graduate student. Without hesitation, I walked directly back to my office in the Purdue Mathematical Sciences building and worked all night on my dissertation. I had to graduate, and I did!

Crazy Thesis Topics

My dissertation was on a wild and crazy idea – building parallel computers using large numbers of microprocessors and programming them via message passing. Like most dissertations, nothing came of it, because we all recognized the importance of purpose-built parallel systems that balanced computation, communication and I/O and that were programmed using new languages and tools that focused on human productivity. A long-term, industry-government-academic partnership in the early 1990s produced the balanced, highly productive, near-exascale systems we use today for breakthrough computational science and national defense.

What's that you say? You mean we are using commodity microprocessors and message passing for parallel computing? Bummer! I must have confused this reality with a parallel earth in a many worlds quantum interpretation.

Shared Experiences

Like most humor, the rueful elements of truth are what make PhDComics fun. I formed some of my most intense, lifelong friendships in graduate school, both with my fellow students and with faculty, especially my thesis advisor. (Yes, we called him Herb, and he was a great guy) The highs and lows, the parties, the late nights in the lab, the uncertainty and the satisfaction – they are what make research in academia a special place.

PhDComics captures all of this. It's a smash hit in the academic community, with appearances in Science, Nature and a host of other places. Here's to Jorge and continued success. (Hint, buy the books and read the strip.)

Extraordinary Times, Challenges and Opportunities

I write a quarterly column for the Computing Research Association (CRA)'s newsletter, Computing Research News (CRN). The following is a preview of my upcoming column, which will appear in the May 2009 issue.

The Danish philosopher, Søren Kierkegaard, once remarked, "Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards." So it is with economic and social crises; they can be understood retrospectively, but must be experienced in the moment. Without doubt, these are extraordinary times, with global socioeconomic transformations most of us have heretofore experienced only via historical accounts and the stories of our elders.

Public universities are experiencing state budget recisions and reductions, and private institutions have seen the market value and operating income from endowments decline precipitously. University staff positions are being eliminated, unpaid furloughs are common, and even tenured faculty members are worried, given the financial exigency clause in most contracts. Future students fret about the cost of a college education, current students are struggling to pay tuition, and graduates face bleak job prospects across diverse disciplines.

Reinventing the University

Although these extraordinary times bring extraordinary challenges, they also bring extraordinary opportunities. Because necessity really is the mother of invention, we have a generational occasion to rethink university programs, priorities and structures; refocus corporate governance, markets and priorities; and sharpen government policies, structures and strategies. Let's consider a few lessons, leavened by history.

The modern, American university has evolved from a finishing school for the male heirs of landed gentry to a much more inclusive engine of social change, intellectual discovery and economic growth. Each punctuated step in that evolution was triggered by social and economic upheaval, from the Morrill Act of 1862, which created the land-grant institutions, through the Servicemen's Readjustment Act of 1944, which opened college education to returning veterans, to the Great Society legislation of the 1960s, which addressed odious injustice and further democratized educational access.

The nature and importance of colleges and universities and their relation to our future continue to change. The proximate skills acquired via the university experience may help land one's first job, convey the lifelong right to cheer for the athletic teams and forever encumber one with annual calls for donations from the alumni association. However, when technological change can dissolve entire industries within just a few years, and grim statistics highlight the demise of lifelong employment, those skills alone will not suffice to land one's fifth or eighth job.

This suggests that we must ask fundamental questions about the nature and role of universities, and we must renegotiate the social compact between citizens and educators. What is the appropriate balance between intellectual inquiry and practical engagement? What constitutes engaged scholarship? What are the "mechanical and industrial arts" for the 21^st century? What are the verities, the intellectual and operational truths that now dance as shadows in Plato's Cave? In short, what is the 21^st century research university and its rightful role?

I humbly suggest that universities, government and industry must rethink the nature of university education and engagement, shifting aggressively to lifelong, rather than punctuated education, and fostering multilateral science and technology incubation and support. We are not imprisoned in the ivory tower, nor are we cloistered from personal engagement.

The American research university has changed radically and repeatedly over the past century. It emerged from Cold War as a government-funded instrument of social change, economic competitiveness and national security. There is no reason, indeed ample precedent to the contrary, to believe that it will not continue to evolve rapidly and radically. The current culture is not sacrosanct, nor should it be. We in computing should be at the vanguard, shaping the definitions and the future of education, research and service.

A Final, Personal Note

As a member of the CRA Board for the past decade, it has been my pleasure to work with all of you on a topic near and dear to my heart – the future of computing research, education and policy. Whether on the Board or in the community, you have always answered the call to service, regardless of the task. It has also been a joy to work with the CRA staff in Washington, DC. They work tirelessly for our community, often with inadequate public acknowledgment of the importance of their contributions. On behalf of the entire computing research community, to them and to you, I want to say publicly and clearly – thank you!

In addition to being a member of the CRA Board, it has been my privilege to serve as CRA Chair for the past four years, and it is time for the inevitable and always beneficial changing of the guard. I am delighted that Peter Lee has been elected as my successor. It has been my pleasure to work with Peter in a variety of roles over the past several years. In each case, I have seen him bring new ideas, passion and enthusiasm, and I know CRA will be in great hands under his leadership.

Although my term is ending, rest assured that I will continue to be an active partner and participant in computing research policy and strategy, working with CRA and other organizations to advance the cause of computing. Remember, it's the love, the passion and the wonder that make computing, indeed any calling, worthwhile and fulfilling.