On Your Record Keeping
Science and Technology archives of the future will rely on material that is being produced today, by scientists and researchers. Material that is often digital and unique to the area of expertise. Below are some general tips and further links to aid scientists (regardless of career stage) to better manage their professional and personal output.
Current and future archivists will be grateful.
Start Early! – We appreciate that planning a research project can be an intense process and thoughts about data and records management might be a secondary thought. But thinking about it early can be beneficial to you and others. Data storage, file formats, naming conventions and folder/system structures are all important to consider.
- Storage – Accidents or circumstances out of your control can lead to data loss. Having multiple copies of your data and storing it on different types of media and in different locations can help mitigate against this loss.
- File Formats – File formats can fall out of favour or stop being supported, especially vulnerable are proprietary or closed formats. Using file formats that are open source and non-proprietary can increase the chances of your files being readable in the future.
- File Naming – Clear, consistent and understandable file naming can help you and others easily locate and search your files. Avoid spaces, capitals and special characters as this can potentially cause issues when transferring between systems.
Institutional (Data) Research Archives – Does your institution have a institutional archive?
There is also a wealth of guidance from the archival community. Below are links to further information that you may find useful.
JISC Guide– How and why you should manage your research data: a guide for researchers – Provides an introduction to the research data management process.
Digital Preservation Coalition – Personal Archiving – A useful introduction and guidance for personal digital archiving.
Section on University and Research Institution Archives International Council on Archives – Management and Preservation of Scientific Records and Data – ” The handbook aims to improve communication between the research and archival communities and to deliver comprehensive directions on best practices for preservation and access to research data which are easy to look up and to apply.”