Case studies

Protein Data Bank screen shot by Amy Hodge

Advanced metadata

Learn from this real-life example about metadata creation using metadata schema, controlled vocabularies, and ontologies.

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Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences at Stanford

Data storage and backup

"As Dr. Srinivas watched the charred fragments of his lifetime's work crumble in a fireman's hands and fall to the ground, the scholar wept."

The details may be different, but a similar fate could be awaiting any researcher who lacks good data management practices. 

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Pinsky article excerpt, image by Amy Hodge

Data persistence

If you publish your data online in a place that is not going to be accessible in the future, others may discover that their efforts to find, view, and reuse your data are futile.

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File formats case study, image by Amy Hodge

File formats

Examples that illustrate some of the problems you might experience if you do not choose appropriate file formats for your data

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Bad file naming example, image by Amy Hodge

File naming

Examples that illustrate some of the problems that you might experience if you do not establish appropriate naming conventions for your files

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Image of tile in its study location at the Palmyra Atoll.

File naming done well

Example that illustrates an organized and thorough method used by one research group to name a large set of image files

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Spreadsheet bad practices, image by Amy Hodge

Spreadsheets

Examples that illustrate a number of poor practices in spreadsheet usage and how to correct them

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Hopkins weather station, photo by Joe Wible

Basic metadata

Learn from this real-life example about different types of metadata that you might choose to generate for your project.

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