As I near the midpoint of this research project it will become increasingly important to keep track of my efforts and organize them to ensure that I can attain my original schedule goals. The first three weeks were probably the easiest; selecting the topic and surveying its landscape and finding relevant sources and information.
This past week (week 4) I spent some time verifying my research scope (via mind map) and concluded that there was one additional area that I would need to address in my paper, at least briefly; the area of hashing algorithms. I don't expect to get into all the technical details but rather provide a quick summary of the current state of prominent hashing algorithms covering aspects such as; key lengths, time costs, collisions, recommendations, etc. Hashing algorithms have tremendous impact in password authentication implementations and attacks, a bit of time spent here will be well spent. It is important to build a strong foundation for any research paper; one should aim to address all areas relevant to a topic or consider restraining the topic.
Another activity that I have undertaken this week is to start reading and organizing my sources for relevant information. I think I have some very solid sources that are relevant to my work so finding enough supporting material should be no problem, I just need to be sure that I understand the entire context of each piece to help avoid focusing on individual fragments that are interesting. I will continue to do this through the next week to help prepare me for outlining the research paper, something that is scheduled to start at week 6.
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