Research Data Service
New Research Data Service Website
The Research Data Service’s redesigned website was released in December. The new website is more accessible and includes new and updated content in support of RDM. The new website can be visited at http://www.ed.ac.uk/information-services/research-support/research-data-service
RDM Forum Meetings
There were two RDM forum meeting held during the autumn term (7 September and 23 November). This is part of a collaborative effort that Çuna Ekmekcioglu (L&UC) and Jacqueline McMahon and Ewa Lipinska (College of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences) organised to invite staff from CAHSS and other Colleges and Schools to meet and have discussions about RDM activities, and how these can be supported. There were almost 25 people in attendance for each meeting with another one scheduled for 28 March 2017.
A RDM forum SharePoint site has also been created to accommodate RDM resources including papers, presentation slides, work flow diagrams, guides and a collection of sample data management plans.
Visits
The Research Data Service welcomed visitors from seven universities during the autumn term with two visits from Kyoto University.
The purpose of their visits was to learn more about the services and resources we provide in support of research data management at the University of Edinburgh. The Digital Curation Centre (DCC) and senior IS staff also participated during some of the visits, which included meetings, presentations and tours.
- Nanyang Technological University: 3 – 4 August
- University of Auckland: 14 September
- Kyoto University (National Institute of Informatics): 26 September
- Malmö University: 10 – 11 October
- University College Cork: 21 September
- John Hopkins University: 21 September
- Kyoto University (Kyoto University Library): 26 October
- University of Malaya: 22 November
Data Management Planning
DMPonline had 57 new registered users and was used to create 115 data management plans (DMPs); in total, 256 DMPs were created in 2016.
There were 25 data management plan consultations from August to December.
Data Management Support
MOOC and MANTRA
A total of 1,817 learners enrolled for the 5-week RDMS MOOC rolling course from August to December, with a total of 5,466 learners enrolled for the year (2016); the MOOC started in March 2016.
2016 concluded with 22,544 MANTRA sessions recorded for the year, slightly lower than in 2015, when MANTRA had 22,950 sessions.
Active Data Infrastructure
DataStore
Active users remained consistent throughout the 2016 year with data stored on a steady rise. There was a natural decline over the summer break, which has been observed in previous years.
In 2016, the College of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences (CAHSS) activity was distinct from other Colleges with a spike in usage.
DataSync
DataSync usage includes the following stats that were reported at the end of 2016:
- Number of active users: 1,740
- Number of distinct clients (IPs 2017): 5,423
- Total DataSync storage: 3TB
- Number of mappings to DataStore areas: 294
Data Stewardship
Pure
In 2016, 326 Pure records for datasets were created, which surpass the number of records created in 2014 (31) and 2015 (32).
DataShare
202 datasets were deposited into DataShare.
DataVault
DataVault closed the year with 21 deposits for 2016. There was a soft release of DataVault in February 2016 and plans are to commit resources to DataVault so that there can be a release in mid 2017.
Diarmuid McDonnell has taught a variety of research design, data management and analysis courses across a number of Scottish universities and levels. He is proficient in the use of Stata, SPSS and SAS for research and teaching purposes and is particularly experienced in the use of administrative data for social science research, which he used for his recently completed PhD thesis at Stirling University.
Bob Sanders recently completed his PhD at Stirling University looking at the relationship between dependency and care receipt in later life. He has extensive experience undertaking quantitative research, including the routine and advanced management and statistical analysis of large-scale longitudinal data. He is capable of conducting end-to-end data preparation, management and analysis using syntax-driven commands in Stata, with experience using other statistical software packages such as SPSS and Excel.