Information on degree projects at DIDA and DIPT

Responsible for page: Michael Unterkalmsteiner

This page provides information, instructions, and templates for the following degree project courses:

Bachelor Thesis in Computer Science (15 ECTS)
Bachelor Thesis in Digital Game Development (15 ECTS)
(Degree Project in Computer Science for Engineers (30 ECTS), handled separately since spring 2016, Swedish only)
Master Thesis in Computer Science (15 ECTS and 30 ECTS)
Master Thesis in Software Engineering (15 ECTS and 30 ECTS)
Master Thesis in Telecommunication Systems (15 ECTS and 30 ECTS)

Please check back regularly to assure that you have the most recent versions of the provided documents, templates, and materials. Each degree project course has further course specific materials that are available from its particular Canvas course page.

All submissions of course documents must be done through the particular course's Canvas page. Other submissions are not accepted. Please note that you must be formally registered or re-registered to submit course documents.

All questions concerning the degree project courses shall be directed to a suitable discussion forum on the particular course's Canvas pages.

Important dates

-- 2023 --
2023-01-08	DEADLINE: Submission of Thesis draft + "OK to present" from supervisor
2023-01-16	Start of spring term (LP3)
2023-01-16	Introduction lectures for students starting VT (09:00-12:00, J1630)
2023-01-22	DEADLINE: Submission of opposition report
2023-01-23 - 2023-01-27	THESIS PRESENTATIONS AND DEFENSES*
2023-02-05	DEADLINE: Submission of final thesis for grading DEADLINE: (Re-)Submission of project plan DEADLINE: 3-week-roll-call (for students starting or re-registering LP3
2023-03-19	DEADLINE: (Re-)Submission of project plan
2023-03-27	Start of LP4
2023-05-07	DEADLINE: Submission of Thesis draft + "OK to present" from supervisor
2023-05-21	DEADLINE: Submission of opposition report
2023-05-22 - 2023-05-26	THESIS PRESENTATION AND DEFENSES*
2023-06-04	DEADLINE: Submission of final thesis for grading DEADLINE: (Re-) Submission of project plan
SUMMER BREAK
2023-08-28	Start of fall term (LP1)
2023-08-28	Introduction lectures for students starting HT (Time and room TBD)
2023-09-10	DEADLINE: Submission of Thesis draft + "OK to present" from supervisor
2023-09-17	DEADLINE: 3-week-roll-call (for students re-registering LP1)
2023-09-24	DEADLINE: Submission of opposition report
2023-09-25 - 2023-09-29	THESIS PRESENTATIONS AND DEFENSES*
2023-10-08	DEADLINE: (Re-) Submission of project plan (Not ET2606) DEADLINE: Submission of final thesis for grading
2023-10-30	Start of LP2
2023-11-05	DEADLINE: (Re-)Submission of project plan (Not ET2606)
-- 2024 --
2024-01-07	DEADLINE: Submission of Thesis draft + "OK to present" from supervisor
2024-01-15	Start of spring term (LP3)
2024-01-15	Introduction lectures for students starting VT
2024-01-21	DEADLINE: Submission of opposition report
2024-01-22 - 2024-01-26	THESIS PRESENTATIONS AND DEFENSES*
2024-02-04	DEADLINE: Submission of final thesis for grading DEADLINE: (Re-)Submission of project plan DEADLINE: 3-week-roll-call (for students starting or re-registering LP3
2024-03-17	DEADLINE: (Re-)Submission of project plan
2024-03-25	Start of LP4
2024-05-05	DEADLINE: Submission of Thesis draft + "OK to present" from supervisor
2024-05-19	DEADLINE: Submission of opposition report
2024-05-20 - 2024-05-24	THESIS PRESENTATION AND DEFENSES*
2024-06-02	DEADLINE: Submission of final thesis for grading DEADLINE: (Re-) Submission of project plan

*Presentations will start in the morning of the first day and continue as needed. Room numbers will be published on schema.bth.se and in the respective Canvas course pages.

Instructions and templates

Instructions/guidelines for degree projects v4.0.4 (includes rubric for grading) (PDF)
Make sure to use version 4 or above.
Degree project process overview (PDF)
Typical timeline (20 weeks) (PDF)
Lectures
- Lecture 1 (Introduction) / Video recording (2023) / Video recording (2022)
- Lecture 2 (Research Methodologies) / Video recording (2021)
Topic suggestions (for supervisors)
- LaTeX
- Word
Project plan template
- LaTeX
- Word
Opposition report template
- LaTeX
- Word
Rejoinder template
- LaTeX
- Word
Thesis template
- LaTeX
- Word

Resources

This page contains links and references related to the different stages and perspectives of research projects. The aim is to focus on computer science and software engineering research but many items are generally applicable to scientific research. Please notify us about any broken links or other errors.

There's a nice set of tutorials from the publisher Springer about authoring and reviewing that will help you in writing your thesis and performing a good opposition: https://www.springer.com/us/authors-editors/authorandreviewertutorials

Books

Berndtsson et al. (2008). Thesis Projects: A Guide for Students in Computer Science and Information Systems. 2nd Edition. Springer.
Blomkvist, P.; Hallin (2015), A. Method for engineering students, Degree projects using the 4-phase Model. Studentlitteratur. (This text is available in Swedish and in English).
Cunningham, D. and Wallraven, C. (2011), Experimental Design: From User Studies to Psychophysics. CRC Press.
Dawson, C.: Projects in Computing and Information Systems – A Student's Guide, 2nd Edition, Addison-Wesley, 2009
Dobelli, R (2014), The Art of Thinking Clearly. Reprint edition. Harper Paperbacks.
Murray, R. (2011), How to write a thesis. 3rd Edition. Open University Press.
Rienecker, L. and Stray Jørgensen, P. (2014), Att skriva en bra uppsats.3:e upplaga. Liber. (In Swedish)
C. Robson: Real World Research, 3rd Edition, Wiley, 2011
Språkrådet, (2008), Svenska skrivregler. 3:e upplaga. Liber. (In Swedish)
Strunk, W. (1999), The Elements of Style. 4th Edition. Longman.
Williams, J. M. (2006). The Craft of Argument. 3rd Edition. Pearson.
Williams, J. M. (2014). Style: The Basics of Clarity and Grace. 5th Edition. Pearson.
Wohlin et al. (2012). Experimentation in Software Engineering – An Introduction. 2nd Edition. Springer.
Zinsser, W. (2016). On Writing Well: The Classic Guide to Writing. 30th Anniv Rep edition. Harper Perennial.
Zobel, J. (2014). Writing for Computer Science. 3rd Edition. Springer.

Papers

Demeyer, S. (2011). Research Methods in Computer Science. IEEE International Conference on Software Maintenance.
Ramesh, V.; Glass, R. L.; Vessey, I. (2004). Research in Computer Science: An Empirical Study. Systems and Software, 70:165-176.
Klaas-Jan Stol and Brian Fitzgerald. 2018. The ABC of Software Engineering Research. ACM Trans. Softw. Eng. Methodol. 27, 3.

Web links

Amaral et al., "About Computing Science Research Methodology" (very high level overview)
Comer, "How to Write a Dissertation"
Demeyer, "Research Methods in Computer Science"
Dodig-Crnkovic, "Scientific Methods in Computer Science"
Ryerson University, "Research Methods for Computer Science"
Smith and Smith, "Empirical Research Methods in Computer Science"
ACM Computing Classification System ToC
Thesis guide, Collection of best practices and recommendations by thesis supervisors (different universities)

Resources for finding publications

LaTeX

Andrew Roberts' "Getting to grips with LaTeX" set of tutorials.
Create LaTeX tables online.
Interactive LaTeX tutorial.
Detexify - an easy way of finding LaTeX symbols :).
Overleaf - an online LaTeX collaborative editor.

Language/ grammar

Grammarly.com. A free tool that helps you finding and correcting errors in your writing.
Academic writing course at Lund University. YouTube playlist.
BTH’s Språkverkstaden. Read first the information published here (https://writingguide.se/) and then contact Språkverkstaden (sprakverkstaden@bth.se) if you have further questions.

Referencing and plagiarism

Students who start their degree projects are expected to fully and clearly understand what plagiarism is and how it can be avoided. Teachers at BTH are instructed to report all cases of suspected plagiarism to BTH's disciplinary board. Ignorance will not be accepted as an excuse.

Please consult the Plagiarism and cheating page for more information.

Publishing your thesis

All theses will be stored in DiVA where they are publicly available. When your final report has received a passing grade, you need to register your thesis in DiVA, following this guide.

Please note that your grade will not be reported in LADOK, before it is registered in DiVA.

If you are contacted by a publisher who offers to publish your thesis, be advised to be careful. Many companies "out there" are not very reputable. Please read about publishing your thesis or publishers in the grey zone before transferring the copyright to your work. In the worst case, this can be academic suicide.

Degree projects at DIDA and DIPT