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% \address{Department of CSE\\
% University at Buffalo\\
% 226 Bell Hall\\
% Buffalo,  NY  14260--2000}

\signature{Dr. Kenneth W.\ Regan}

\begin{letter}{Graduate Admissions Committee\\
Department of Computing and Software\\
Mcmaster University\\
1280 Main Street West\\
Information Technology Building (ITB) Room 202\\
Hamilton, Ontario, Canada\\
Re: M.Sc.\ applicant Xingyu Liu
}

\opening{
Dear Graduate Admissions Committee:
}

I am delighted to recommend Xingyu Liu for admission to your Master's program. I have known him as a student in my CSE396 course last spring and from other contacts.  I am an Associate Professor with long happy service at UB.

Mr. Liu earned an A- in CSE396.  He was on course for an A until the final exam where his B/B+ (tied for 30th of 198 taking the exam) left him a little short.  He had an A on both prelim exams and A- (close to A) on homeworks.  Overall he has nearly a 4.0 average.  I'm honored he asked me for a reference---mathematically he must have more than 3 courses where he earned an A (UB does not have an A+ grade) but except for one off day he was really the same in mine.  I wish I knew him better---my feeling especially after seeing his lengthy Statement of Purpose and advising him to draw out more of his personal experiences in revising it.

There is definite serious purpose behind his interests.  I can use my observations to translate what I see as some cultural factors---he is a Chinese (dual-)national and flew to China right after finishing his exams this week.  When he says he wants to work for an Internet firm in Shanghai and/or a voice-recognition firm in Hefei (a regional capital 300 miles west), we can read the following:

\begin{itemize}
\item
He genuinely has many different interests in CS and is strongly driven.
\item
He likes to write software that impacts large-scale real-world systems, be they trading or user services or etc.
\item
He recognizes machine learning and Big Data as drivers of this.
\item
Culturally this is societal duty---hence IMHO the tone of speaking from Mt. Olympus starting from his intro, which I nudged him to mellow.  But practically what it means is that he wants to make creative impacts.
\item
Hence in particular he is not committing to doctoral study at this time.  Nevertheless his grades and depth of focus give him great potential for this, and it would depend on how overtly the research project is contributing to visible applications.  
\end{itemize}

He is applying to Canadian universities for reasons of both affordability and variety.  He may have a connection to Canada that I am forgetting---in any event, his current residence in the US is not giving any special status.  His writing is more voluble than his speech, but the latter is good as well.  I did not go out of my way to fix grammar or style---the long sentences come pristinely from him.

In sum, I can give him my highest recommendation for his chosen course of study.  You might be getting quite a mover.





\closing{Yours sincerely}

\end{letter}

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