ST 502 Project outline or pseudo template:

Your chosen article should have a simulation study section.  This is the part 
of the paper your group is responsible for reproducing. 

To do so, the general outline of steps are:

(1) Generate 1 synthetic data set from the model presented in the paper
(2) Estimate the model as described in the paper (i.e., MLE, EM, MCMC,...)
(3) Evaluate the estimated model (i.e., RMSE, AIC, BIC,... on test set)
(4) Repeat steps (1)-(3) N times (larger N is better, but may not be feasible)
(5) Use the output from (4) to produce plots and/or tables as in the paper

You can use the authors' code for steps (1)-(3), and you are encouraged to do so
for complicated statistical models and estimation procedures.  However, you will
be responsible for writing the architecture  of your simulation study.  What 
that means is that you should write three script files:
(a) simulate.r  # This script contains code for generating the data 
(b) run_file.r  # This script contains code for running the estimation procedure
(c) out_file.r  # This script contains code for producing the plots/tables

The code contained in simulate.r and run_file.r can include some of the authors'
code, but the out_file.r must be exclusively written by your group members.  
The output from simulate.r should be saved and then loaded by run_file.r.  Next,
the output from run_file.r should be saved and then loaded by out_file.r.  And,
the output from out_file.r should be saved, and then loaded (or copy-and-pasted)
into your LaTex file to be compiled into the pdf file of the write-up of your 
project.

Next, your project submission should include a workflow file, which includes 
ALL of the steps for reproducing your computations and plots/tables.  For 
example, it will look something like:

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
# This is the workflow to reproduce the results of the ST 502 project for group
# members Student 1, Student 2, and Student 3.

for seed in {1..N}
do
Rscript simulate.r arg_1 arg_2 ...
Rscript run_file.r arg_1 arg_2 ...
done

Rscript out_file.r arg_1 arg_2 ...
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Note: This will require knowledge of how an interpretable language works 
outside of a GUI environment (i.e., you should know how to run R outside of 
Rstudio).  This is not hard, but is important for understanding how programming 
skills fit into the broader application of problem solving in industry and 
academia.  

Finally, your project write-up will include a 4-10 page summary describing the
statistical model, estimation procedure, and inference on your simulation study.
You will also need to send me all script files INCLUDING your workflow file.
Everything, including your LaTex files, should be zipped and emailed to me by 
the last day of classes.  However, you are responsible for pre-compiling your 
LaTex file prior to zipping.

Visit me periodically during office hours as your group progresses through your 
project.  THERE IS NO REASON THAT YOUR GROUP SHOULD NOT GET FULL POINTS ON YOUR
PROJECT BY THE END OF THE SEMESTER.  If you learn nothing else in grad school, 
learn to be resourceful.  It will make you more employable, and a more 
productive member of society.