What is research data management and why does it matter?
As a researcher, your research data is the most important piece of your scholarship. It needs to be protected so you do not lose all your hard work and so that your results can be verified by other scholars in your field. This page will provide a basic overview of how to care for your research data as well as links to more in-depth resources that can guide you as you prepare your research data management plan.
Research Data Management Glossary
CamelCase: A file naming strategy that avoids spaces by beginning each new word with a capital letter.
Checksum: A generated numerical value representing the correct contents of a file that can later be verified against itself to watch for changes in the data.
Fixity: The state of being unchanged over time.
Lossless File Format: A file format that does not lose data when compressed.
Lossy File Format: A file format that loses data when compressed.
Naming Convention: A consistent formula used to create file and folder names.
Non-proprietary File Format: A file format that is not owned by a particular company or that does not require special software to access.
| For this kind of file . . . | Use this file type . . . | Instead of this . . . |
|---|---|---|
| images | .tiff or .png | .jpeg or .bmp |
| documents | .pdf or .txt | .docx,.odt, or .rtf |
| datasets | .csv or .tsv | .xslx or .ods |
Advanced Research Data Management
The links below will take you to resources that go further in-depth regarding research data management. Here you will find detailed information on how to engage with the various components necessary for good research data management and how to craft a research data management plan.