Events

Upcoming workshops

Workshop at Branner Library

Hands-on intro to SQL (Structured Query Language) workshop

Amy teaching SQL workshop, photo by Julie Sweetkind-Singer

Do you need to ask complicated questions of your data? Do you need sophistication and a spreadsheet just won't do? Then a relational database may be for you! Join us for a hands-on, interactive introduction to SQL, the language for querying structured data. Computers with all the necessary software will be provided for you.

Topics will include: importing content into a SQLite database (DB); info on relational DBs, DB management systems, and DB design; basic queries, including unique values and calculations; filtering; building complex queries; sorting; nulls; order of execution; aggregating; joining; and set operators.

Upcoming workshops

Automating tasks with the shell workshop

Screen shot of the terminal window showing a script that has run

The UNIX shell is a great tool for automating tasks. This workshop will walk you through an example of how to divide up a particular task into its component parts, use shell programs to complete those individual tasks, string together those individual tasks, and then run the entire workflow using a single command. This is not a hands-on workshop, but the files used in the workshop will be made available so that you can attempt to duplicate this later on your own.

Upcoming workshops

Hands-on intro to data cleaning with OpenRefine workshop

Open Refine logo

Life is messy. So is your data — especially if multiple people have contributed to the content. Inconsistent data leads to inaccurate analyses, and software programs are often particular about the precise format of your data.

If you need a quick way to assess and clean your data without having to write customized scripts to perform all those task, look no further!

Join us for a hands-on workshop on OpenRefine to learn about many of this tool's great features, including: sorting, faceting, cell transformations, handling multi-valued cells, clustering, and splitting data into multiple cells.

Upcoming workshops

Software Carpentry and Data Carpentry workshops

Software Carpentry Boot Camp, image by Amy Hodge

Data Management Services hosts two-day Software Carpentry (SWC) and Data Carpentry (DC) workshops for graduate students, post-docs, and other researchers on Stanford's campus. These workshops are designed to help attendees become more productive scientists by teaching them basic computing skills. If you are interested in working with us to host a SWC or DC workshop for your students, please contact us at ask-data-services@lists.stanford.edu. We would love to talk with you!

Previous workshops

    • SWC: Jan 27 & 28, 2014: Experimental physics (read about this workshop)
    • SWC: June 30 & July 1, 2014: Biophysics & Stanford Bioscience Student Association
    • SWC: July 28 & 29, 2014: Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences
    • SWC: August 14 & 15, 2014: Biophysics & Stanford Bioscience Student Association
    • DC: April 23 & 24, 2015: Stanford Bioscience Student Association
    • SWC: July 23 & 24, 2015: Hopkins Marine Station & CEHG

Data Day 2015

Data Day logo

Hear from Stanford faculty about the latest developments that make data sharing easier and advance the progress of reproducible research and data reuse. Find out what's happening in biomedicine, psychology, sociology, and engineering at this event on April 13, 2015 at the Li Ka Shing Conference Center.

Visit dataday.stanford.edu for more information.

Best practices for your research data workshop

Person practicing the violin, image by Flickr user Chronon6.97

Join Science Data Librarian Amy Hodge and learn practical information about best practices for your research data, including better ways to organize and name your files, why you should think about file formats, the value of versioning and documenting your files, how to keep your spreadsheets in tip-top shape, some freely-available (and easy to use) tools for describing your data, and what to do with all your great data when you publish or leave your lab. You should expect to leave this session with some best practices you can implement right away, as well as others you can work toward implementing in the coming weeks or months!

This workshop is not currently scheduled.

If you would like to schedule this workshop for your class, research group, etc., please contact Amy Hodge at amyhodge@stanford.edu.

Learn more about best practices for your data and check out our managing data FAQ.

Practical guide to data sharing workshop

Two women sharing head phones, photo by Sigfrid LundbergJoin Science Data Librarian Amy Hodge and learn practical information about how to share your data with others, including why to share your data, how to decide what data to share, getting necessary permissions for data sharing, good sharing practices, why and how to assign a license to your data, and where to share your data.

This workshop is not currently scheduled.

If you would like to schedule this workshop for your class, research group, etc., please contact Amy Hodge at amyhodge@stanford.edu.

Learn more about data sharing.

DMPTool: Craft a data management plan workshop

Data Management Planning Tool logo

Walk-through of the functions and features of the online Data Management Planning Tool, designed to assist researchers with composing data management plans for research grant applications for NSF, NIH, the Moore Foundation, IMLS, NOAA, and NEH Office of Digital Humanities. Appropriate for any faculty, post-docs, students, or research staff involved in writing a data management plan. Bring your laptop and follow along if you like!

This workshop is not currently scheduled. If you would like to schedule this workshop for your class, research group, etc., please contact Amy Hodge at amyhodge@stanford.edu.

Learn more about the data management planning tool and check out our data management plan FAQ.

Forum on the Future of Scientific Publishing

Panel discussion, photo by Paul Lim

In June 2013, Stanford Libraries co-sponsored this day-long forum event. You can read more about the event and download slides and video of speaker presentations.