Master's thesis at IIK (TTM4905)

The master's thesis in Communication Technology constitutes 30 credits. You have 21 weeks to write and complete your master's thesis, whereas one week is counted in as compensation for Christmas or Easter holiday. Read more about the course TTM4905 Communication Technology, Master's Thesis.

For contact details, see the bottom of this page.

Below is a list of practical things you must do related to writing your master's thesis.

Prerequisites for writing the master's thesis

Proof of work experience

This applies to the students at the 5-year integrated programme only.

A certificate of accomplished work experience is mandatory for all civil engineer study programs at NTNU. It is also a prerequisite for starting your thesis work. You must request such a certificate from the IE Faculty, have it signed and returned to our study contact there, Aud Bakken (aud.bakken@ntnu.no).

You can read more about this here and here.

If you have any questions regarding this, please contact the Faculty, as this is an arrangement organised by them, not the Department.

Remaining exams

If you have any remaining exams it is important that you contact the IE Faculty in reasonable time before you plan to start with your thesis. In such cases, you will have to apply for permission to continue. Questions can be directed to Aud Bakken. Make sure to read about this on the course page.

Start up phase

Find a thesis

The chosen thesis should be based upon the chosen specialization. It can also be a continuation of the specialization project (TTM4502), which is preferred. The intention is to continue the work with the topic from the project. If you for some reason need to change topic or project, contact us and we will give you further instructions.

Each year, around May, the Department announces a list of topics or project proposals that can be utilized for both specialization projects and master's theses. Please read more about this procedure here. If you are out of phase, contact us and we will provide the list.

Students may also initiate their own project or thesis if they have a specific idea or want to cooperate with a company. This must however be done in collaboration with a responsible professor at the Department. You are welcome to contact any of the professors working within the field you are interested in.

You can find the evaluation criteria for the master's thesis in Blackboard.

#Formal registration and start-up

Remember to register the master's thesis course (TTM4905) at Studentweb in the beginning of the semester - as with any other course. Please note that, if you are out of phase, or have any remaining exams, you will not able to do this by yourself. Contact the Department and we will help you.

The formal registration of the thesis is the date you register as start-up on your master agreement. The deadline for handing in the thesis is the date for start-up + 21 weeks. Make sure that these dates do not fall on weekends.

Preferably, you should follow the official study semester (January-June) and start early. This is to make sure that you get the help you need, particularly during the last weeks before the deadline. The formal and reccomended date for start-up at NTNU is January 15, you can read more about NTNU's formal deadlines and potential delays here. However, this is somewhat flexible at our Department, meaning you can set your start-up date (within reasonable time) both before and after this date.

  1. Master agreement: This is mandatory for all students and should be submitted digitally. Note that "Supervisor" is the responsible professor, while the "Co-supervisor" is your supervisor (any additional co-supervisors can also be mentioned here). You should not include other courses in the form, and make sure that you choose the right course code (TTM4905), study programme code (MTKOM/MSTCNNS/MSSECCLO) and the right Department (IIK). If you write the thesis in cooperation with another student, you still need one contract each. Include the co-student's name in the form. Find the master agreement form and more information about it here. If there is something wrong with your agreement, it will be rejected, and you will receive an email stating why, and that you have to submit a new version straight away. If you don't receive any email, this does not imply that something is wrong. Kindly wait, as the procedure may take some time. When it is approved, you will receive an email with confirmation from the system. You can follow the link and download a pdf-copy of your agreement as you wish. The Department does not need a copy of this.
  2. Standard agreement: This is only mandatory if you write the thesis in collaboration with a company. If this is relevant for you, you must fill in the related information in the master agreement. Read more about this here. After your master agreement is approved, you can simply follow the link to your agreement, where you will find a pdf of the standard agreement. You can download it from there and have it signed by all relevant parties - including yourself, the company, your responsible professor and the Department. You can also download the standard agreement form and find additional information about confidentiality here. Please make sure that the information in this form is consistent with the information submitted in Sharepoint. When you have all the signatures exept the Department's, submit the agreement to Liv Karen. She will send you a copy when the final signature is ready. Note: if the company requires original signatures, it is your responsibility to make sure that you have enough copies.

Confidentiality and delayed publishing

If you for some reason need to delay the publishing of your thesis, or if the thesis contains confidential and/or graded material of some sort, you must sign a contract in order for the thesis to be handled thereafter. These issues might be known from the initial stages of your work, but sometimes occur later in the process too. If this happens after your initial submission and approval of the master agreement, it is important that you inform us about the changes. You can find more information and read more about this procedure here.

Writing the thesis

Specify the problem statement

The final problem statement must be determined approximately one month after the official start-up date in your master agreement. The problem statement should not be revised after this, and the first page of your thesis should include the identical final problem statement as proposed by this deadline.

You can find the template in Blackboard.

The final problem statement must be approved and signed by the responsible professor, before it is submitted to Liv Karen at the Department. A copy is fine, and we accept these by mail.

Note that any changes to the problem statement should be described and/or justified in the introductory chapters of the thesis. The original final problem statement should, regardless of these potential changes, be kept on the first page of your thesis.

Reference and plagiarism

There are no specified preferences for the style of reference to be used. The most important is to be thorough and consistent throughout the thesis. You can read more about citing at VIKO. If you wish to reuse material or quote certain parts of your project report, remember to refer properly to this source, as with any other source. On this page you can find a more detailed description of this. The same information is uploaded in Blackboard.

Rent of equipment and requests for funding from the Department

If you wish to rent any special equipment from the Department, you can contact Pål Sturla Sæther (pal.sather@ntnu.no).

Any requests or questions regarding funding from the Department (for travels, software etc.) should be advised by your responsible professor. The responsible professor should handle the request further with the Department.

Oral presentation

The oral presentation is mandatory for all students writing their master's thesis at IIK. This is an arrangement where students present an overview of their work with the master's thesis, to the audience of fellow students and responsible professors or other academic staff. The presentations are arranged all together at the same day, and the presentation day is normally scheduled at the end of each semester. The exact date is decided by the exam office, and will be published at the same time the exam dates are published. Keep an eye on this page.

The oral presentation is compulsory (but not counting in the final grade), and the students must attend the whole day. Each presentation consists of 15 minutes to present the work, and 5 minutes for questions from the audience. The presentations should be targeted to your fellow students, and all students are encouraged to ask each other questions. You should give a summary of your project, starting from the plan that you had after the specialization project (if relevant). Remember to be clear and draw on the essence and main findings, as you will not have time to go deep into the details. The presentations should be held in English.

For the presentation, you may use any template of your choice. You can find one of NTNU's presentation templates.

The Department will arrange a detailed plan of the presentation day. You will receive more information about this a couple of weeks ahead.

Presentation policy

The Department of Information Security and Communication Technology has established that students must be physically present on their mandatory presentation activities, such as those related to the specialization project and the master's thesis.

Any deviance from this policy is valid only with exceptional grounds, such as severe health problems or illness, unreasonably long and expensive travels for students residing abroad, and similar cases. In such a case, contact the Department.

Request for extension or leave of absence

All requests for extension of the thesis deadline or any leave of absence must be directed to our study contact at the IE Faculty, Aud Bakken (aud.bakken@ntnu.no). All requests for extensions due to health problems requires a doctor's certificate or equivalent. You may also request for extenstion due to severe technical problems.

Finalizing the thesis

Completion and validation

This is done when you are finished writing your thesis, before you hand it in. It will make your thesis ready for submission, registering, prospective printing and/or publishing. Find more information about this here.

Please see the Department's LaTex template for the master's thesis in Blackboard.

Note that this template includes the creation of the front page - this is done by the Inspera system and should thereby be "commented out"/left blank.

Validation of the thesis is done either by NTNU Grafisk Senter or by Skipnes.

Submission

The thesis should be delivered as a PDF-file in Inspera. Read more about this process here.

Note that you are only able to submit once, and you must enter the button stating "Hand in now"/"Lever nå".

When Inspera is set-up and ready for submission, there will be one general deadline for the course. You can just ignore this date, as it only indicates when the system is open for submission. Your personal deadline, the one stated in your master agreement, is the one to which you should respond. Your personal deadline will be visible in countdown mode when you click your way into the submission page.

Printing

If you wish to print your thesis, you must cover the expenses yourself. The Department does not cover printing. Please contact Skipnes or NTNU Grafisk Senter for further inquiries.

General practical information

We strongly recommend you to have a look at this page, where you will find general information about writing a master's thesis (see Study Area Engineering/Technology), including the things listed above.

After submission

Evaluation and diploma

The deadline for evaluation of a master's thesis is 3 months after submission. You can read about the general grading scale utilized at NTNU here.

Your diploma will be sent to your registered address, and this usually take some time. You can read more about it here. Contact the IE Faculty for more information regarding your diploma.

"Sivilingeniør-ringen"

All inquiries regarding this ring should be directed to the IE Faculty. Contact Aud Bakken for more information.

Contact information

General information about whom to contact can be found here.

For study related matters, send an email to studieveileder@komtek.ntnu.no. This email is monitored by several admins at the Department, to make sure you will always get an answer. You are also welcome to contact us directly: