Getting Residual Value Out Of Reading Technical Papers

If you're getting a Ph.D., reading technical papers is a necessary part of the process.  And when you first dive into a research area, getting up to speed may seem like an insurmountable task. Take heart; it isn't :o). 

It just takes a hella long time.

Doesn't it suck when you've read a paper some time ago, but can't quite recall what it was about?  Me too.  So here's a nice time saver you can implement.  Consider it "The Reader's Digest Method" for your research area.

A typical bib entry might look something like this:

@Book{abramowitz+stegun-64,
author = "Milton {Abramowitz} and Irene A. {Stegun}",
title = "Handbook of Mathematical Functions with
Formulas, Graphs, and Mathematical Tables",
publisher = "Dover",
year = 1964,
address = "New York",
edition = "ninth Dover printing, tenth GPO printing"
}

Using The Reader's Digest Method, the above bib entry would look something like this:

@Book{abramowitz+stegun-64,
author = "Milton {Abramowitz} and Irene A. {Stegun}",
title = "Handbook of Mathematical Functions with
Formulas, Graphs, and Mathematical Tables",
publisher = "Dover",
year = 1964,
address = "New York",
edition = "ninth Dover printing, tenth GPO printing",
tags = "TERMS TO CLASSIFY THIS ENTRY",
summary = "PROBLEM ADDRESSED, APPROACH, WERE THEY SUCCESSFUL?",
analysis = "DRAWBACKS (IF ANY) OF THIS WORK"
}

I imagine it's immediately obvious why the additional three elements at the bottom of this bib entry are useful.  But something tells me that the tags entry *may* deserve some elaboration.  Remember that your .bib files can grow pretty large over the years you're doing your Ph.D.  And you'll want to be able to quickly search for papers that are classified differently in your research area (e.g., I need to find all "Intrusion Detection" papers I've read). Tagging helps you find these papers quickly. 

Imagine if your .bib file was full of these extra bib elements!  You'd rarely have to go back and reread an entire paper!  So give this method a spin.  Get some residual value out of all the hours you spend reading a paper for a change.