Where to find published research papers?

Question

Coming from the POV of someone who has just started his MS in CS program, but is seriously considering eventually going into for his PhD.

I am having trouble deciding what I will focus my research on when I go for my PhD (though I definitely know I want to go for my PhD). See also this question on academia.SE.

So I am thinking that reading/keeping current on what research is being done and what research papers are being released is a good source of....inspiration? Plus good knowledge to know.

Is there central place/database of/good starting place to see recently published CS research papers, or are they all hidden deep within the websites of the University they were written at?

Answer 1

See the ACM digital library, IEEE xplorer. These are the top in my opinion. Look as well in ScienceDirect (Elsevier) and Springer (for theoretical computer science, I believe these two libraries are better).

Usually, googling your research problem would lead you to papers. The journals in which these papers are published is what you are looking. Of course, use the references and citations of the paper you read. In the long term, you will restrict yourself with the journals of your field.

Answer 2

As AJed mentioned, ACM digital library and IEEE xplorer would be near the top of list.

Additionally Goggling with advanced search for the name of the reference with the option to search for PDF or PS increases the change of a hit. Also sometimes limiting the search to cs.xyz or xyz.edu increases the quality of results.

I also like to hit CitSeerX, WorldCat and Google Scholar

Don't forget to look at the patents in Google Scholar, I don't usually but every now and then companies have to give out something good they may not publish anywhere else.

If you don't attend school, you can see if a school provides access to their library for outside third parties. I found out that I can do this for Princeton University for $300 a year.

Added 3/2/2013

Microsoft Academic Search

This can also visualize publication trends in computer

Answer 3

A very large fraction of new computer science papers come up on arxiv: http://arxiv.org/corr/home.

If you are interested in complexity theory give ECCC a look: http://eccc.hpi-web.de/.

If you are interested in crypto, there is the IACR eprint archive: http://eprint.iacr.org/.

All of these are free and frankly should suffice for most of recent papers.

EDIT: Maybe I was being too positive there. I mostly know about US-type theoretical computer science.

Answer 4

Microsoft Academic search is very good. You can select a list of conferences in your area and get RSS feeds of the latest papers.

Answer 5

In the other answers good sources are given. What I like to add is that not only you should try to locate single papers in a field, but also to find in what conferences they have been published. Then you can take some volumes of recent years and browse a little what has been happening there. Conference series might be from ACM, IEEE, or Springer LNCS.

Also, Google is a good help, but single papers in the arxiv do not tell about the "status" of the research. Research must have been accepted/presented elsewhere in order to count.

Answer 6

If I'm looking for a particular topic or research problem, I usually start with Google scholar. To search for recent work by a particular author, title, or conference, sometimes DBLP is the way to go. http://www.informatik.uni-trier.de/~ley/db/

If you just want to browse recent work, then as others have said sometimes arxiv.org is a good way to go, but take care that the authors are reputable because arxiv is not peer reviewed. Another even better way to go is to follow what's been recently published in conferences in your field. I like confSearch for finding upcoming or recent conferences. You can usually find a list of accepted papers from a conference even before those papers are printed in the proceedings, and then locate the papers on authors Web pages or on arxiv. http://www.confsearch.org/confsearch/

Answer 7

In my opinion, since as you said you haven't decided yet the field of your research,starting from papers for inspiration is a bit odd. Firstly, if I were you I would search the Web for the general idea of "the state of the art" for each sector of Computer Science. Then you should go deeper reading papers, provided that you will have decided which path you would like to take.
Specifically now on which is the best way to browse a paper online, you should check IEEExplore, CiteSeerX (as the others mentioned) and CoRR and then if you can't find it for free, google the author and/or title to check if it is available on a non-charging repository. Good Luck!