Its relative strengths and weaknesses and how it fits against other methodologies.

Although I would love to experience another viva I don't think your examiners would welcome my presence.

Damned, sorry but you are so wrong. Some very strange things happen in the workplace, some unethical, some plain wrong and that I can tell you for sure.

You strange person! I'd have done a Qualitative PhD had it been my choice but I needed the bread and so took the crumbs that everyone else left on the table. Best of luck with the publication and for next week(up)

The difference between people. Those broad questions would have been the making of me! Instead my examiners seemed to focus on the statistics, which is my weakness, but perhaps that's why as it would have been evident from my thesis.

My advice would be to try to get at least one article submitted for publication as future employers like this but aside from that one article focus on your thesis (by all means publish more when you're finished). It took me a while to start writing up but once I started I tended to be steady and consistent (not big on speed though). I aimed for 500 quality words a day and do believe they were quality.

I'm currently unemployed and have missed job opportunities due to lack of journal publications.

Best of luck!

OK, given what you've said, your friend is entirely innocent and the best thing you can do is let it go as to do otherwise may only harm your friend and she is an innocent in all this. Her back is against the wall through no fault of her own. I actually feel very sorry for her.

I mean this in a nice way, with what you've said, you would be best keeping out of it as you don't know what can of worms you would be opening. There is a power imbalance between your friend and her supervisor and, very sadly, it does not go in your friends favour. She shouldn't have been put in this position but meeting in the middle and helping to solve the problem, could she not present this on behalf of the other authors (acknowledging it's their work but she presenting due to their absence) and she gets a share of the credit?

Although I don't agree with it, and I wouldn't feel comfortable doing such a presentation. Another way to look at it is you may think her supervisor is putting upon her but she'll get full credit for this and can put it on her CV.

It's only your business, should you decide to make it such...

I wasn't asked about them either but felt I was losing ground during the viva and so made sure when I was picked up on the weaknesses of the work that I took the opportunity to also highlight the strengths (even though I wasn't asked) and went through them one by one (its originality and contribution to knowledge etc).

You blog is excellent. I'd urge you to promote it widely, if possible.

Originality: What makes my research distinct from other research in the field, how is it different?

Contribution to knowledge: What has my research added, contributed to the field?

If it helps, I didn't have a mock viva (wasn't offered one but made it clear I didn't want one) and my supervisors offered no advice, except to say rather vaguely (and not long before the viva) that the examiners would have issues with it. That was said so close to the viva there was nothing I could do and my supervisors didn't go into any detail whatsoever about the 'issues'.

If you know the answers to those questions and know your thesis (you definitely do as you wrote it) I think you have prepared. If your brain feels like cotton wool, and I can understand that, revision is not the answer (unless it helps calm you down) but dealing with your nerves, learning to relax is the key. Hopefully, your examiners will appreciate the stress you are under and ease you into the viva with some straightforward questions to help give you confidence. The difficult thing about a viva is you only have so much control over it, even with ample preparation, and the examiners will dictate the course of events. No matter what, you can't fully prepare for viva as not everything is within your control and try to remember that but in a positive way.

Also, by all means defend your work but don't get defensive (uptight with the examiners).