OMG I so feel for you :-( I can totally understand how you're feeling right now, I guess this is the stuff of nightmares for all of us. Please though, listen to the others, try not to stress too much (I know....) until you have seen the report. Could it be that the chair has to say what he said? A four hour viva is just uncalled for, that is ridiculous, you can't maintain clarity of thought and energy under fire for that long, its just impossible.

Go with the report - for goodness sake eat something, you need your strength and you need to keep well to handle this. Have you met with your sup yet? If so what did he/she say? I totally understand your anger about this too - your sup should never have allowed submission if it was likely to result in this. Its the one thing mine has promised me, unless he is pretty much certain of a pass he won't allow submission...

Guy, get up, get a shower, get something to eat and think positive. Fight the panic until you've seen that godforesaken report and had a chance to speak in depth with your sup then just get your head down and go for it. All isn't lost - major corrections can easily end up at a PhD, you didn't get an outright fail so you're still in the game. I'm just so sorry you're in this position xxx

Ouch!!!! For goodness sake don't go there! Nasty :-( i can't answer your question I'm afraid but would urge you to reconsider, they just want your money, and lots of it!

I think that education for education's sake and the joy of knowledge is sadly not a driving force in the world today. I wish that personally I could learn for the noble reasons that universities were initially set up but that's never been a luxury that I've been able to indulge in. I can't afford to not look to a good job (hopefully) at the end. Its always been a juggling act as to what the next step would open up for me in terms of employability (having said that the PhD is a step too far lol) but I do agree that unis give students a false idea of the levels of employability their degree will offer them. I think its a great shame that the world is like this now, but then that is the reality when university education is opened up to the working and middle classes. In the good old days when only the rich could enter job prospects at the end wasn't really a priority in the same way that it is today so education alters (or so my sup told me lol). Having said that the way things are now, although not as pure as it once was means that countless thousands of us have had the opportunity to discover new things, learn, improve our minds, develop passions but I know for me there is always that carrot at the end which I sincerely wish didn't have to be there. People have asked me if I won the lottery would there be any point continuing - errr HELLO!!!! That would be amazing, to be able to do this without that constant nagging worry about employability and job prospects at the end..... I have a friend who did her PhD in her 60s just for the pleasure and challenge of learning - heck I envy her!

Lol Cheekybint, I manage by tying my hands to the armrest of my chair to ensure i don't throw the damned thing out of the window ;-) Its incredibly difficult - to date I've kind of got around it by sending my work as email attachments to myself and sending work to my mum to print off for me but its certainly not ideal! I've had it explained to me how to do it, and my computer engineer friend has tried without success - its so locked down that its hard to access anything, and no, I can't access my registry ;-) The trouble is that there's no way I can afford to replace it - they reckon the problem was caused by the laptop overheating due to the fan being complete s**t which has caused a problem on the motherboard or something like that - I don't understand a word of it lmao - I'm a historian not a computer scientist (wish I was!!!) As it is the laptop has to live here permanently on a cooling tray that blows cold air into it - great fun :-(

I should write a book, 'How to do a PhD without an operational computer' - but then I couldn't print it off and would be likely to lose it due to stupid computer :p

I find Ibid really problematic when I'm writing, especially if I then edit, I've had the nightmare before of using Ibid, then edited a page, realised the Ibid doesn't relate at all to what's above it and had to go through wasting ages trying to find where I got the flipping quote from lol. I normally use short referencing instead and I think in my rules and regs it does state no Ibids. Having said that, when I'm reading a book I have found short referencing problematic if it isn't done well, but nowhere near as frustrating as Ibid ;-)

I don't use Endnote - I reference manually, but maybe I should look into it - is it freeware?

Lol, there's no way to do it Sneaks, its the main running programme for the computer systems. It drives me mad, I'm told to open the updates and to update if necessary (does it automatically anyway) but when you click on updates it thinks for a bit, then says Windows Explorer has stopped worked, restarting, still not working.... it hasn't been since Christmas :-( You literally can't open a thing - I can't get into any of the main operating systems, can't even check my hardrive cos I can't open the 'my computer'. Had someone look at it who also can't do it - suggested restoring back to November or something - computer said no - Windows Explorer is not working..... went in another way, still couldn't do it - utter nightmare :-(

Not internet explorer, that works fine :-) Windows explorer - its the main running programme I think - its what is activated if you click 'my computer', 'control panel', open documents, print, etc etc - basically anything like that. i can open Word and Excel individually and then open documents from within there but I couldn't open 'My Documents' and open files in that way - utter nightmare - can't print, can't open anything, can't backup etc etc - can't do sod all come to think of it!

The answer to my question is no! You can't use it if your windows explorer isn't working and its for some reason added 6 files to dropbox and I can't find out what they are :-( I'm hating my computer so much right now

Can you use dropbox if your windows explorer isn't working?

I have HUGE problems with my computer, my windows explorer isn't working, so the only thing that I can do is to email things out to save them, I can't backup onto my external hardrive that is sitting here and daren't use a USB stick as I lose them!! Backup is a big worry as I'm horribly aware that my work since Christmas isn't properly backed up and is floating around in the computer that's threatening to die any minute (its been declared terminal) and in email attachments :-/

I have one and they do work a bit, I have a jug thermos thingy that I keep my tea in, it isn't too bad and is better than cold tea. The other thing you could do is invest in a small microwave to keep in your study - then you don't have to go downstairs near the food, but you also have hot tea - win win situation :-)

Lmao at the reformating :-) Earlier this year I had to write a board paper, not supposed to go over 40 pages lol, trouble was I couldn't find anything to remove and my sup recommended dropping to 1.5 spacing with a slightly smaller font and removing the gaps between paragraphs lol lol lol, he started doing it for me and then left me to it - got it down to page count if not word count.... not sure it'll work for the final thesis though ;-)

OMG Congratulations!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! (up)(up)(gift)

I'm so pleased for you, that is just the best news :-)

I feel for you DanB - I was hoping to meet Cleverclogs but he seems to have disappeared altogether - very sad :-(

This is a question that I've pondered on quite a bit - we all advise getting a top sup over a top uni, but how do newbies to the academic world get to be a top sup if students don't want them? I guess that maybe you prove yourself over time as being a top sup by having students who choose to work with you as they are interested in your speciality and yes, you may well then go on to be world renowned and head hunted by people like us :-)