Time to explore the world of graph software :)
Thank you all for the suggestions, will try them all out now.

Hi all,

apologies if this has already been asked on the forums, but I couldnt really find a similar post.

I was curious as to what software everyone out there uses for creating graphs in their papers. I have some results of a experiment I conducted and wanted to represent them in a graph. In all honesty Microsoft Excel can do the job, but having read many Evaluation/Results sections of papers in my field, they all seem to be using some other software to create their graphs (resulting in some rather professional looking graphs!)

I was hoping people could point me to some (ideally free) software that they use.

Thanks all! :-)

thanks guys, appreciate everyones reply.

feel reassured now :-)

hi all!

I started a PhD about 4 weeks ago. Before I started, I was told by current PhD students in my school that the first year is generally spent reading up on your topic area to get familiar with the area and to find some interesting aspect of current work that I wanted to actually 'further' through my research.

Upon starting I knew I wanted to do my research in a particular area, so at the moment I am reading broadly (and in some cases deeply) around the topic and briefly documenting areas which I find interesting and where there is some possible scope for further work.

I was curious as to how long it took for you guys (from starting the PhD) to exactly know what you were going to base your thesis/research on? Is it usually the case that people start a PhD knowing very little about exactly what they want to do? or did you guys all know exactly what you wanted to do, and are effectively just going through the motions of getting it done formally?

Is it still early days for me to be worrying that I haven't yet had that eureka moment?

Hey Mm and Heifer, thanks a lot for your prompt responses, I've got a much better picture of them in my mind now.

Thanks(up)

Hi all,

I am a new phd student and have come back to education after a considerably long time. I've heard of workshops and conferences and was wondering if someone could provide a short explanation of their differences? Am I right in saying conferences are generally larger gatherings, and on an international scale? Whereas workshops are smaller and tend to focus on a certain specific topic for a few days?

If I attend a workshop what would I typically expect to see or do, compared to a conference?

I was told to look into workshops that are close by and relevant to my topic, is there any central registry that I should be looking at to find a workshop? How do people generally go about looking for relevant workshops in their areas, is it simply word of mouth?

Hi A116 - thanks for your reply, liked your approach in taking notes... the dress-code question made me laugh, probably because it's something I'd ask, ha.

Hi jouri - thanks for your reply, not really sure on what my supervisor is like yet, so yeah it'll be a good chance to see which direction our relationship is heading. No overly silly comments, point noted!

Hi smoobles (smoobles sounds amazing by the way), great advice thanks... I've started preparing a few questions...

Hi phdbug, thanks for the info on your meeting, I doubt I'd be having anything remotely like an intellectual discussion...

Thanks again to all, genuinely appreciated the time you all took with the comments (up)

Hi everyone.

I recently started a PhD and have my first official meeting with my supervisor in 2 days time. I was wondering if people could share some information on what their first meeting was like, what it was about, how long it lasted etc?

Is the meeting agenda completely up to me? Am I expected to have a list of questions to ask him (i.e. direct the meeting) or is it just a small informal chat that maps out what I'll be doing over the next week?

I've never had a supervisor/student relationship before so I'm not sure on what to expect. I'd appreciate any info you guys could share. (up)

Thanks for clearing that up

I'm hoping to start a PhD in September (in the UK) and I'm just trying to get an overall picture of what a PhD is really like. Hopefully my question isn't too silly.

Do PhD students get similar holidays to undergraduate students or is it more like actual employment, in the sense that you get allocated a certain number of holidays which you can book off? How does it work?

Thanks!

Thanks shani that was very helpful

Hi kronkodile,

Thanks for your reply, I'll contact my school and see what they say about it.

Hi everyone,

I am in the process of applying for my PhD (Sept 2008) and have been followed these forums for a while now - very useful. I had a question to which I couldnt find an answer myself so hopefully someone could help me here.

I'm an EU student and I seem to have missed most of the funding deadlines. Financially I am OK for the first year of my PhD, therefore I was wondering if its possible to apply for funding for my 2nd/3rd years? Is this permitted? Does this usually happen?