Course:PHYS341/Archive/2016wTerm2/Projects

Email 1.

Imagine you are going to write a paragraph on Musical Acoustics somewhere on Wikipedia. It may be a new article but more likely it will be an addition to an existing article (likely but not necessarily one about a musical instrument). The topic must be interesting, quite specific, must contain information backed up in the scientific or mathematical literature, and must not already be on Wikipedia! It must written for a lay-audience but scientifically correct (as I strive to make PHYS341).

Use your browser to find http://wiki.ubc.ca/Course:PHYS341/Wiki_project_ideas

Login to CWL

Edit the page. Fear not; you cannot break anything permanently.

Add your name, title and reference in the same manner as I have done. The reference is to the literature you wll use as a basis for your paragraph.

If your topic is similar one already posted by another student, go to the history tab, find the user name (unless you know the person already) and use the Talk facility to propose a merger into a group. Every individual should contribute ideas.

Final groups must be no more than 4. I will merge any remaining that are less than 3.

Duplicate topics not allowed.

Start early! Ask questions.

Due before class start Feb 3.

Marking:
3/3 Good idea is the basis for a project
2/3 Idea needs considerable modification to become the basis for a project
1/3 Idea won't work at all
0/3 No submission or its already on Wikipedia

Email 2.

Let me give some more explicit guidance for Wiki project topic choices. Many of you are finding difficult-to-read, often ancient, primary physics literature, i.e. journal articles where results are first reported. In addition, some of you are choosing topics that are only distantly related to the physics of music - stuff that seems to me as dry as dust and way less interesting than music.

- Stay away from primary literature!

- If you have an idea of a topic (say a musical instrument that fascinates you), search for articles using google and not google-scholar.

- Find a review article, say in a popular science journal like Physics Today, Scientific American or a quality newspaper. Material in here will be "pre-digested". Acoustics Today has some good recent articles (piano, brass).

- Latch on to a piece of the science which is important for that instrument but ignored in Wikipedia. I know this is not easy, so ask.

- If you are trawling for ideas, use the websites given on the PHYS341 homepage (UNSW's is great, mine is OK).

- Try UBC Library! Sit in the stacks and browse the many books on music and acoustics, written at various levels of accessibility.

- Choose something that interests YOU, not something that you think will impress ME. (That said, I would love to see someone write about a non-Western instrument).

- This is not easy, there will be a lot of to-ing and fro-ing with me, and Friday will not see the end of it, but I want you to make an initial effort to dig in.

- Ask questions. Run ideas past me.