skip to content
 

External Resources

There are plenty of external organisations that offer guidance and support on Research Data Management. Browse below for some of the resources we thought might be particularly useful to you. Additionally, at the bottom of the page you will find direct links to external support providers, so feel free to check out their webpages and look for new interesting tools and resources.

Also, if you come across interesting resources that are not listed on this webpage, please get in touch with us, and we will add them to this website.


Support available:

  • DMPonline - online tool for easy creation of data management plans

DMPonline is provided by the Digital Curation Centre (DCC). DMPonline is pre-populated with various funder templates. You can simply choose your funder template (depending on what grant are you applying for) and prepare your data management plan online. Afterwards the only thing you need to do is to export your plan in a desired file format and attach it to your grant application. Your data management plan will be also stored on DCC website, so whenever you want, you will be able to go back to your plan, adjust it (treat it as live document) and keep notes of all your data locations. Therefore, DMPonline can be extremely useful not only at the grant writing stage, but can also help you to keep track of your datasets.
For the first time you use the DMPonline use the institutional login option, search for Cambridge and you will automatically asked for your Raven credentials. You will have to register your account, but any time after the first registration, you will be simply able to log in with your Raven account to use the tool.

 

User-friendly online training modules (you can select and follow the modules that you are interested in). The training is developed and provided by the University of Edinburgh in association with the UK Data Archive, Digital Curation Centre (DCC), and Distributed Data Curation Center at the Purdue University Libraries. Anyone can access and follow the online training (you do not need to be a member of the University of Edinburgh).

 

Short presentations about 23 things that Librarians can do to support researchers in data management created by Michael Witt, Purdue University Libraries. The presentation contains plenty of useful references and links. A handout accompanying the presentation is available here.

 

 

A thorough guidance on various aspects of research data management (with information on available resources) prepared by the UK Data Archive. The booklet has plenty of case studies to illustrate different aspects of data management. Additionaly, all topics are thematically groupped into chapters, so it is easy to search for information in the booklet.

 

  • Data Archiving - online five step guidance helping you to decide what data to keep

Developed and provided by the Digital Curation Centre.

 

A useful resource prepared and shared by the UK Data Archive. The resource is based on four case studies and provides real life examples on how to prepare your data for deposition. Case studies were chosen to provide guidance on dealing with different types of data, including sensitive data.

 

  • File naming - 8-minute video with guidance on file naming and version control, especially relevant for software developers

Provided by the Software Carpentry.

 

  • File naming - explanation of a useful file naming convention

Guidelines on file naming developed by Queensland University of Technology’s (QUT) Technology, Information and Learning Support (TILS). The Research Data team found the document extremely useful - we are following these guidelines internally.

 

  • How to license research data? - information on the type of licenses available and guidance on how to choose the most appropriate license for your data

Developed by the Digital Curation Centre.

 

  • Cloud computing - everything you should know about the risks and benefits of cloud computing

Prepared and shared by Jisc.

 

Provided by the NYU Health Sciences Library.

 


External support providers:

 

DCC provides numerous resources and training for individual researchers as well as for research data management support staff. DCC also organises regular meetings on research data management topics and shares webinars from these meetings - so even if you cannot join their events in person, you can always stay up to date with what is going on and what resources are available to you.

Main provider of digital solutions for education and research in the UK. Jisc also provides advice in the form of guidelines (thematically arranged, so that you can easily find what you are looking for).

Numerous research data resources, specificall tailored for research in Social Sciences and Humanities. 

 

Guidance on metadata

Detailed guidelines, divided into discipline-specific recommendations, developed by the Digital Curation Centre.

  • ISA Tools - metadata tracking tools for life sciences

The open source ISA metadata tracking tools help to manage an increasingly diverse set of life science, environmental and biomedical experiments that employing one or a combination of technologies.

Built around the ‘Investigation’ (the project context), ‘Study’ (a unit of research) and ‘Assay’ (analytical measurement) general-purpose Tabular format, the ISA tools helps you to provide rich description of the experimental metadata (i.e. sample characteristics, technology and measurement types, sample-to-data relationships) so that the resulting data and discoveries are reproducible and reusable.

  • BioSharing - searchable portal of inter-related data standards, databases, and policies for life sciences

BioSharing is a curated, searchable portal of inter-related data standards, databases, and policies in the life, environmental, and biomedical sciences.