[HN Gopher] Papers We Love
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       Papers We Love
        
       Author : wallflower
       Score  : 196 points
       Date   : 2021-12-26 06:48 UTC (4 days ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (paperswelove.org)
 (TXT) w3m dump (paperswelove.org)
        
       | resters wrote:
       | Chicago, anyone?
        
         | [deleted]
        
         | hieronymusN wrote:
         | There used to be a Chicago chapter
         | https://paperswelove.org/chapter/chicago/ - would be great to
         | get it restarted
        
       | evacchi wrote:
       | I have organized PWL in Milan at the end of 2019 / start of 2020,
       | then we-know-what happened and put the entire thing on stand-by,
       | because of Zoom fatigue. If anyone is interested, just ping me,
       | though.
        
         | hieronymusN wrote:
         | Milano: https://github.com/papers-we-love/milano
        
       | magikaram wrote:
       | I attended some pwl Kansas City chapter meetings, but the
       | pandemic put the meetings on hold as we started out end of 2019.
        
       | zeeshanlakhani wrote:
       | Also wanted to link to the copious amount of PWL videos around
       | (incl. diff chapters, the conference):
       | https://www.youtube.com/c/PapersWeLove/videos. Having run a few
       | internal reading groups at various jobs myself, I know so many
       | who watch the related videos while reading a specific paper (or
       | use the morning paper as cliff notes).
        
       | lincpa wrote:
        
       | adamgordonbell wrote:
       | In 2017 I went to StrangeLoop and Papers We Love was collocated.
       | Such a great experience. I saw a talk about how type inference in
       | OCAML worked (Hindley-Milner type inference) and I basically
       | didn't understand any of it, but talked briefly to the presenter
       | after.
       | 
       | I left so excited by both conferences and started on pulling on
       | threads around type systems and eventually started a podcast as a
       | result.
       | 
       | The podcast changed over the years, but originally it was just a
       | way for me to investigate things I had heard of at Paper We Love
       | and Strange Loop. As a community, PWL is a nice on-ramp into CS
       | Theory. Thank you Zeeshan Lakhani.
        
         | adamgordonbell wrote:
         | PWLconf vidoes are up here: https://pwlconf.org/#videos
        
         | serverlessmom wrote:
         | Thank you so much for the work you put into your podcast! I
         | frequently recommend CoRecursive to new and old tech folks so
         | they can have an insider eye on how the industry and especially
         | company culture works. Educational, entertaining, and
         | interesting!
        
         | muggermuch wrote:
         | Your podcast is very useful - I have been a subscriber for a
         | couple of years now!
         | 
         | Thank you for doing what you do.
        
         | sgeisenh wrote:
         | Really enjoy Corecursive. Thanks for all the work you've put
         | into it. A really great resource for learning all about
         | fascinating ideas and personalities in computing.
        
         | parentheses wrote:
         | this!!!
        
       | jeanlucas wrote:
       | I'm shocked there's no chapter in my city!
       | 
       | Sao Paulo has so many universities and computer science groups.
        
         | hieronymusN wrote:
         | There was initial attempt in 2017: https://github.com/papers-
         | we-love/sao-paulo
         | 
         | Maybe you could get some people together and start one
         | https://github.com/papers-we-love/organizers
        
       | atarian wrote:
       | Any have any tips for getting started on reading a paper? It's
       | like reading something in a different language.
        
         | HenryR wrote:
         | This might be useful:
         | https://web.stanford.edu/class/ee384m/Handouts/HowtoReadPape...
         | 
         | If you find there is just too much unfamiliar technical
         | language, it's a good idea to pause and look up a definition.
         | You might need to follow that chain several steps, but that
         | will help you get to an understanding of new terms.
        
         | mellavora wrote:
         | Plan on reading it 4-5 times. The first time it is going to be
         | a whole bunch of new words/concepts -- "a different language"
         | as you put it.
         | 
         | Only read the introduction.
         | 
         | The first reading is to inventory the words, where they are
         | used, and how important they are. Don't try to understand
         | except in the most vague of ways.
         | 
         | The second time you can start to make some sense out of it
         | because hopefully you think you might understand 1/3- 1/2 of
         | the words.
         | 
         | Now look up some definitions. Google might help, otherwise the
         | difficult word(s) might be cited, in which case you need to
         | read the abstract of the relevant paper (only enough to get a
         | definition of what the word might mean).
         | 
         | The third time you read it, you should know 1/2 to 2/3rds of
         | the words and be able to make good connections between them,
         | you start to see the ideas take shape.
         | 
         | The fourth read you fill in the gaps from the outline you made
         | in the third read.
         | 
         | If the paper is well written, the introduction lays out the
         | relevant current thought on the topic, and suggests a way by
         | which some conflict in this thought can be resolved.
         | 
         | The discussion presents that resolution.
        
         | zeeshanlakhani wrote:
         | This Sean Cribbs talk, The Refreshingly Rewarding Realm of
         | Research Papers, also has a ton of good thoughts on the process
         | of getting started:
         | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8eRx5Wo3xYA.
        
         | pramodbiligiri wrote:
         | The 3-pass approach mentioned in the Stanford page linked in a
         | sibling comment is a good way to start. It's also worth knowing
         | _why_ you want to read a particular paper. They 're usually
         | written for communicating tersely with people "already-in-the-
         | know" so you shouldn't expect to get much out of _most_ papers
         | you come across.
         | 
         | Murat Demirbas a prof at SUNY Buffalo has described his method
         | - http://muratbuffalo.blogspot.com/2013/07/how-i-read-
         | research...
        
       | jimmyed wrote:
       | Is there any active pwl group that has regular zoom meetings to
       | discuss papers? Would love to join in.
        
         | hieronymusN wrote:
         | Seattle does https://paperswelove.org/chapter/seattle/
        
       | jiangplus wrote:
       | I have been organizing the Papers We Love Beijing Chapter with a
       | group of engineers. It is a good place to share wonderful ideas
       | that are not necessary useful.
        
       | chirau wrote:
       | The NYC PWL chapter is pretty awesome. The organizers do a great
       | job in finding speakers and venues. I've made many friends from
       | the group. Darren, Andrew, Sean and David are amazing. So was
       | Zeeshan before he left for his PhD.
        
         | zeeshanlakhani wrote:
         | A truly amazing team indeed :).
        
       | throway453sde wrote:
       | Somethings I don't understand. How do they cover the cost for the
       | event?
       | 
       | Does the attendees pay for this and is it enough to cover the
       | cost or is it profitable?
       | 
       | How is meeting people who are not authors of the paper more
       | useful than organizing online?
        
         | HenryR wrote:
         | Companies usually provide the space and will sponsor pizza and
         | drinks, at least in SF. That's about all the costs beyond the
         | time of the organizers which is offered for free.
        
           | hypertexthero wrote:
           | I went to some Papers We Love meetups here in NYC a few years
           | ago and learned a lot not only from the presenters but from
           | other attendees ranging from database experts to sound
           | engineers. Some very nice, kind people!
           | 
           | Plenty of pizza and beer, too :)
           | 
           | Warmly recommended.
        
           | zeeshanlakhani wrote:
           | Yep. For many other chapters as well.
        
         | zeeshanlakhani wrote:
         | To the last question, just having people put in the work to
         | present and understand a paper, or a theme around a set of
         | papers, can make a huge difference for others to understand the
         | ideas put forth. We've even had events where presenters
         | demonstrated an implementation of the paper or called out
         | interesting references or historical associations that may not
         | have been apparent initially.
        
         | hieronymusN wrote:
         | Companies love to sponsor the local meetups because they see
         | them as recruiting pools. They will usually provide the space
         | and some $$ for food (pizza)
        
       | hieronymusN wrote:
       | The pandemic has been tough on Papers We Love as many of the
       | local chapter meetups had to shutdown. This had an adverse impact
       | on the Papers We Love Conf (https://pwlconf.org/) as well.
       | 
       | Some chapters (Seattle, Chattanooga, Bangalore) have managed to
       | keep up a semi-regular cadence of Zoom meetups. NYC tried but has
       | a hard time getting speakers (which is a bit surprising tbh.)
       | 
       | If you're interested in running a meetup, being a speaker or
       | volunteering your time hit up @papers_we_love on Twitter.
        
       | melkael wrote:
       | Anyone from Paris ? I'd be glad to take part to sessions
        
       | bschne wrote:
       | If you want to get into reading some CS papers, I can also
       | recommend these sources:
       | 
       | 1. The unfortunately defunct blog "The Morning Paper" that
       | provides a short write-up/explainer of each paper.
       | https://blog.acolyer.org
       | 
       | 2. Will Larson's favorite CS papers. https://lethain.com/some-of-
       | my-favorite-technical-papers/
        
       | lghh wrote:
       | Are there any good "baby's first CS papers"? I read maybe 1 paper
       | in college and have not thought about anything more than the very
       | practical, day-to-day applications of my degree since then. If I
       | wanted to dip my toes into reading some CS papers are there any
       | good places anyone would recommend to start?
        
         | lifefeed wrote:
         | There's this nice mix of technical and opinion papers: 10
         | Papers Every Developer Should Read
         | https://michaelfeathers.silvrback.com/10-papers-every-develo...
        
         | hieronymusN wrote:
         | I have heard good things about
         | https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/ideas-created-future
        
         | nesarkvechnep wrote:
         | "Why Functional Programming Matters" by John Hughes.
        
         | hgh wrote:
         | I think the original DynamoDB paper is a good choice - some
         | interesting CS/systems engineering content but relatively
         | accessible.
         | 
         | https://www.allthingsdistributed.com/files/amazon-dynamo-sos...
        
           | ryanworl wrote:
           | Notably, the Dynamo paper is _not_ a description of how
           | DynamoDB (the product available from AWS today) works. They
           | are fundamentally different, and it is not possible to
           | implement notable features like conditional updates using the
           | algorithms described in the Dynamo paper.
        
             | lghh wrote:
             | That's interesting. I was going to take a stab at reading
             | that first since I frequently use DynamoDB (Amazon product)
             | at work.
        
         | robotresearcher wrote:
         | 'Time, clocks and the ordering of events in a distributed
         | system' by Leslie Lamport 1973. This is my favorite intro to
         | distributed systems paper. Gives you a new tool to think with,
         | and it's a straightforward read.
         | 
         | https://lamport.azurewebsites.net/pubs/time-clocks.pdf
        
         | bluedays wrote:
         | https://www.cs.cmu.edu/~crary/819-f09/Strachey67.pdf
         | 
         | Fundamental Concepts In Programming by Christopher Strachey is
         | awesome. It's a lot less technical because it was based on a
         | series of lecture notes. Christopher Strachey is also an
         | inspiring figure in CS to me as someone who was a perpetual
         | fuck up and a late bloomer.
         | 
         | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christopher_Strachey
         | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fundamental_Concepts_in_Progra...
        
         | loeg wrote:
         | If you've worked in the systems space, the Flash HTTPD paper is
         | a classic:
         | https://www.usenix.org/legacy/events/usenix99/full_papers/pa...
        
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       (page generated 2021-12-30 23:01 UTC)