Technical report guide

MICROWAVE TECHNOLOGY CENTRE A GUIDE TO TECHNICAL REPORT WRITING 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6.

7.

8. 9.

10. 11. 12. 13.

The Title should be concise and to the point. Try to keep it to less than ten words. The Abstract is a summary of the paper, including a brief description of the problem, the solution, and conclusions. Do not cite references in the abstract. The Introduction should briefly describe the proposed solution, with explanations of how it is different from, and superior to, existing solutions. Conclusions – summarizes what have been done and concluded based on the results. Roman symbols for quantities and variables used in equations have to be written in italics e.g. W, h, t, Zo, but not Greek symbols e.g. Ω, ρ, π, λ. Symbols for units however do not have to be italics e.g. W (for Watts), H (Henry), A (Ampere), V (Volts). Explain a symbol the first time it is used, usually with the symbol in brackets e.g. “voltage standing wave ratio (VSWR).” Use the symbol only afterwards. Common abbreviations such as dc, ac, rms do not have to be defined. Do not use abbreviations in the title unless they are unavoidable. All references have to be numbered and arranged in ascending order. The reference list should contain a list of papers referred to in the paper and hence they have to be called from the text. They have to be quoted in square brackets i.e. [2], [10] etc. Refer simply to the reference number, as in [7]. Do not use “Ref. [7]” or “Reference [7]” except at the beginning of a sentence: “Reference [7] shows…” All equations have to be numbered too – they have to be in parentheses, i.e. (2.1), (10) etc. Figures and Tables – they must appear near, but not before, their first mention in the text. Use the abbreviation “Fig. 1”, “Figs. 1 and 2”. Figures should be readable – don’t make figures and legends too small. Interpret all figures. Try to explain, for example, why the curves look like they do – is it because of assumptions, or because the system behaves that way? Be sure to explain results which look strange, such as a curve which is not smooth, or a table with sudden jumps in values. Figure captions should be below the figures, table captions should be above the tables. Integers less than ten are spelled out e.g. ten, five, 25, 11. Fractional numbers are considered plurals e.g. one metre, 0.5 metres. Font sizes: 8 (author affiliation, all captions, table text, figure text, footnotes, subscripts, superscripts), 9 (abstract, keywords), 10 (body text, equations). Reference formats – use the IEEE format: Periodicals:

M. Yusof and J. Mawi, “The influence of harmonics on microwave oscillator performance,” IEEE Trans. Microwave Theory Tech., vol. 3, pp. 333-345, Sep. 1998. Books: Z. Awang, History of Deep Purple, vol. 1, New York: McGraw-Hill, 2005, pp. 12-24. Technical Reports: A. Maliki and J. Clinton, “Effect of smoking on student performance in class,” Microwave Technology Centre, Universiti Teknologi MARA, Nov. 2005. Conference Papers: Z. Awang and R. Blackmore, “Microstrip filter design using electromagnetic simulation,” in Proc. IEEE Device Research Conf., Milton Keynes, United Kingdom, Aug. 6-8, 2005, pp. 23-26. Dissertations: H. Tuah and M. Jebat, “Frequency domain system identification of helicopter rotor dynamics,” B. Eng. thesis, Dept. of Electrical Eng., Didnotgoto University, Kuala Lumpur, Nov. 2003.

14. Spelling mistakes will not be tolerated, especially since word-spelling features are available on all word processors nowadays. English and American spelling is sometimes different, e.g. ‘color’ versus ‘colour’, ‘flavor’ versus ‘flavour’. Do not mix both, try to be consistent throughout the text. If you do not have a PC to do the spell-check, buy a dictionary! 15. Grammatical error checks are not that straight forward on the word processor but it helps to pin-point potential mistakes, and hence should be used as well. 16. Avoid repeated use of words – use the Thesaurus to get alternative words. e.g. ‘… the storage required in the first case is greater than that in the second case,” rather than “… the storage required in the first case is greater than the storage required in the second case.” Berapa banyak storage dan case daa! 17. Some words are already in plural form e.g. work, research, equipment. 18. Do not start a sentence with ‘Also’. Use ‘Besides’, ‘In addition’, ‘Moreover’ instead. 19. Be especially careful with singulars and plurals, past tense and present tense – these mistakes are very common. 20. Conjunctions – they join equivalent structures: e.g. A strong but warm breeze blew across the desert, Her arguments were easy to ridicule yet hard to refute, He did not have much money, nor did he know how to get any. 21. General comments: i. Word choice, or diction, offers writers an opportunity to put their personal stamp on a piece of writing. ii. Effective writers are almost always effective readers. iii. There’s only one person a writer should pay attention to… It’s the reader. iv. If the assignment asks you to “prove” something, make sure you have done so. v. A good introduction accomplishes two tasks: it draws the readers into the piece of writing, and it presents the topic and makes some comment on it. vi. Too many short sentences, especially one after another, can sound like a series of blasts, while a steady stream of long sentences may tire or confuse readers. vii. Usually sentences in a paragraph revolve around one main idea. When a new idea comes up, a new paragraph begins. The quality of the opening paragraph often determines whether readers even bother to read further. Prepared by: Dr. Zaiki Awang, Sept. 2005

PLEASE DO NOT REMOVE