The second Lunchtime Seminar session for 2024 took place on Tuesday, 27th February, with contributions from Research Services and the Open Science Framework.
- Slides are available via our SharePoint
- Video recordings are available via our media hopper channel here
What became apparent from the seminar is that the UoE offers a broad range of resources, services, and tools to organise and store your data.
- The resource finder was developed to address this problem, allowing everyone to build their personalised digital research toolkit
- Facilitators are here to discuss your needs and signpost you in the right direction
- The Digital Research Lunchtime seminar series was designed to offer an overview of what’s available across the research lifecycle
Mike Wallis, Research Services Support Lead, briefly referred to the breadth of research computing in today’s academic environment, before explaining the available storage options. Digital Research Services offers DataStore, a resilient and backed-up large data storage facility. Each researcher (including PGRs) has access to 500 gigabytes free allocation and additional storage space can be purchased for data-intensive research projects. Shared spaces for research groups can be set up to enable smooth collaboration. DataStore integrates with DataSync, a free Dropbox-like service, which allows working with data, both receiving and sharing data, with external collaborators. DataStore also integrates with Globus, allowing researchers to transfer large quantities of data. In addition to these data storage and transfer options, Mike also mentioned GitLab, the internal University Git service, which is useful for collaborative coding and keeping track of changes.
You might find the information available at the Research Services wiki and the connecting to University file storage instructions helpful. Moreover, our infographics DataStore vs SharePoint and Essential guide to Data Tools offer good high-level overviews on the data storage services available at the University If you wonder how researchers are using these services, head over to our case studies pages.
The second speaker, Gretchen Gueguen, introduced open science, highlighting that the term refers to a suite of ideas for open, transparent, inclusive research practices, that improve quality, reproducibility, and impact. The Open Science Framework (OSF) is a free open-source research platform that accommodates preregistrations, projects and preprints. Those three can be linked together covering the full research lifecycle. Members of the UoE community can log in using University credentials. OSF at the University of Edinburgh is managed by the Library, alongside a selection of other open research tools. Visit this page for an example of OSF use.
Our next seminar is on 13th March 2024 and will focus on how to analyse your data efficiently. Book your place (in-person) or online now!
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