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6023 results in Facet Publishing

Page 215 of 302

  • 17 - Use and user context of mobile computing: a rapid ethnographic study

  • from PART 3 - FOCUS ON TECHNOLOGY
    • By Jim Hahn, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
  • Edited by Mohamed Ally, Gill Needham
  • Book:
    M-Libraries 3
    Published by:
    Facet
    Published online:
    08 June 2018
    Print publication:
    23 January 2012, pp 151-158

  • Summary

    Introduction

    To understand the use and user context of mobile computing, a researcher from the Undergraduate Library at the University of Illinois Urbana- Champaign observed and surveyed students’ use of a library iPad while riding a campus bus. Using a rapid ethnographic approach to focused qualitative data collection, the librarian questioned students about the type of journey and their destination in order to understand aspects of the idea of user context. This chapter discusses the complexities of individual - ized context and the implications for application development. It will give stakeholders in university campuses an understanding of users’ prefer - ences and areas for further development of mobile information access.

    Work that focuses on the context of use and on users is absent from the m-libraries research literature. Specifically, design considerations should be informed by an understanding of the attributes of users’ locations and the extent to which users’ changing environments have an impact on information searching with mobile technologies. A recent article on urban computing points out that information access occurs in a specific place, at a specific time and on a specific device (Hansen and Grønbæk, 2010). The authors relate the importance of the mobile user being situated ‘within a physical and digital context, which changes as we move about or engage in different activities’ (Hansen and Grønbæk, 2010, 195). It is theorized that the physical context in which information searching and access take place will have an impact on the ways in which individuals search for information.

    Usability testing, as defined by Nielsen, requires small numbers, with five to ten participants being a sufficient sample group for understanding usability concerns (1993, 169). The rapid ethnographic approach is a type of usability study. The information sought in this study was about use of the iPad in the field, and a probing approach was taken in order to gather the data quickly (Millen, 2000). Millen defines rapid ethnography as ‘a collection of field methods intended to provide a reasonable understanding of users and their activities given significant time pressures and limited time in the field’ (Millen, 2000, 280).

    Methodology

    Ten participants, all undergraduate students riding the bus, were recruited for this study, which took place during three days at the end of November and beginning of December. The rapid ethnographic approach does not necessarily produce a representative sample (Millen, 2000, 281).

  • 14 - The students have iPods: an opportunity to use iPods as a teaching tool in the library

  • from PART 2 - PEOPLE AND SKILLS
  • Edited by Mohamed Ally, Gill Needham
  • Book:
    M-Libraries 3
    Published by:
    Facet
    Published online:
    08 June 2018
    Print publication:
    23 January 2012, pp 119-126

  • Summary

    Introduction

    This case study is about making the most of an opportunity, combining a traditional library introduction lesson with available mobile technology. Shepparton Campus of La Trobe University, situated in central Victoria, Australia, has a Diploma of Education programme; all students in 2010/11 were lent an iPod Touch for their year of study. The librarian needed to introduce library services to the students, as a large group, in a short period time. What better way than to make use of the iPods? The result was an easy lesson in both preparation and delivery for the librarian. Students found the session informative and entertaining. Novice iPod users were challenged to improve their skills and competent users were quickly using their iPods to navigate the library website.

    iPods in libraries

    One of the top ten trends identified in academic libraries in 2010 was that the ‘explosive growth of mobile devices and applications will drive new services’ (ACRL, 2010). University students, amongst whom ownership rates are high, expect to be able to access their institution's services easily, including the library. To meet such user expectations, librarians are being encouraged to think creatively by taking into account users’ needs and preferences. Librarians making use of iPods is an example of ‘leveraging the technology that their patrons use … to deliver robust new services without making users leave their comfort zones’ (Kroski, 2008, 33).

    McDonald and Thomas (2006) contend that libraries have actually done ‘little to embed themselves and their resources into the everyday tools, spaces and activities important to today's learners’. They identify this as a ‘disconnect’ with ubiquitous hand-held access. This paper outlines one exploration of alternatives for the delivery of library information literacy skills.

    The use of mobile devices for information literacy can be seen as an extension of Web 2.0, described as a ‘crucial deficit area’ on account of the limitations of the technology and the variety of devices owned (Godwin, 2010). Despite the perceived difficulties, other librarians are also experimenting. Cairns and Dean (2009) describe using iPods to ‘deliver some of our most basic freshman level library instruction to students’. Further explorations of iPod use in the library setting include development of the library tour as a podcast targeted to a specific audience (Lee, 2006), pre-loaded iPods for loan for listening assignments, or uploading educational podcasts to iTunes University, where an increasing range of materials are available free of charge.

  • 19 - Mobile dynamic display systems for library opening hours

  • from PART 3 - FOCUS ON TECHNOLOGY
  • Edited by Mohamed Ally, Gill Needham
  • Book:
    M-Libraries 3
    Published by:
    Facet
    Published online:
    08 June 2018
    Print publication:
    23 January 2012, pp 171-180

  • Summary

    Introduction

    Librarians are often asked by off-site patrons about their opening days and service hours. It would be helpful for both librarians and patrons for the open/closed information of various library services to be accessible on mobile phone screens.

    By using the original CGI (Common Gateway Interface) scripts and some image files, it is possible for libraries to indicate automatically whether their services are available or not. These CGI systems can be run on the mobile version of Google Maps and can also be linked with other functionalities, such as library-locating systems and RSS feeds. Using these systems, patrons can easily identify which libraries are currently open, which libraries will be open tomorrow, which libraries will be open the day after tomorrow and so on. Using other CGI scripts for library-locating systems, patrons can find libraries in specific areas and then, by means of green, red and yellow icons, like traffic signals, find out whether they are now open, closed or closing within one hour. A green icon means open, red means closed and yellow icon means closing within one hour.

    Using these visual switching systems, patrons can review the information much more quickly than via systems that show the opening and service hours using static information only.

    CGI systems can be applied not only to libraries but also to other cultural facilities such as museums and archives, and to business sectors, such as book stores.

    Why library opening hours?

    Questions most frequently asked by patrons

    Queries about library opening hours are among the questions most frequently asked by off-site patrons, and they also want to access the information via their mobile phones. This was made apparent in a survey that was carried out at Cambridge University Library and the Open University Library (Mills, 2010).

    Few library website pages display opening hours clearly

    A few library websites have top-level pages that notify whether or not the library is open now, or is open today, whenever they are accessed. Even when this information is available on top-level pages, it is sometimes buried in the lower parts of the page or in small fonts. When library opening hours are not advertised on the top-level pages but hidden on linked pages, it takes too much time to find the information.

  • 3 - Enhancing open distance learning library services with mobile technologies

  • from PART 1 - DEVELOPING MOBILE SERVICES
  • Edited by Mohamed Ally, Gill Needham
  • Book:
    M-Libraries 3
    Published by:
    Facet
    Published online:
    08 June 2018
    Print publication:
    23 January 2012, pp 23-32

  • Summary

    Introduction

    This chapter begins with a brief introduction to the University of South Africa in order to provide the background as to why the m-library development is so important for this institution.

    The University of South Africa and its library

    The University of South Africa (Unisa) is one of the world's top ten mega universities and the fifth largest ODL (open distance learning) institution. With more than 308,000 students registered already for the first semester of 2011, it is also the largest ODL institution in Africa. The Unisa student profile indicates significant diversity: of the students registered in 2011, 306,074 reside in Africa (including South Africa); 1135 in Europe, 790 in Asia, 359 in Oceania; 440 in South America and North America; and 2358 students are living with a disability (University of South Africa, 2011).

    During the last decade Unisa has transformed itself into a truly ODL institution. Previously it conformed to the correspondence model of distance learning, with merely one-way communication to students. Study and library materials were predominantly in the printed medium and delivered by post. Requests to the Library likewise arrived via post or fax and depended on the printed medium.

    The University's vision is to become ‘the African University in the service of humanity’ (University of South Africa, 2005). This drive to educate the continent in order to be of global service informs the importance of the ODL model to the realization of that vision. Unisa's ODL policy (University of South Africa, 2008) defines ODL as a multidimensional concept that, in practice, seeks to bridge the time, geograph - ical, economic, social, educational and communication distances between students and the institution, between students and academics, between students and courseware, and between students and peers (University of South Africa, 2008). In support of this definition, the Library endeavours to bridge the distance between students and the Library; to use information technology, and mobile technology in particular, to promote open learning for remote learners; and, in light of its diverse student profile, to ensure equal access to information for all its clients.

    The Unisa Library provides an important support service to the University. Its vision is ‘towards the leading ODL Library in Africa’ (Unisa Library, 2011).

  • 5 - Data management plans and planning

  • Edited by Graham Pryor
  • Book:
    Managing Research Data
    Published by:
    Facet
    Published online:
    09 June 2018
    Print publication:
    20 January 2012, pp 83-104

  • Summary

    Introduction

    I tell this story to illustrate the truth of the statement I heard long ago in the Army: plans are worthless, but planning is everything.

    Dwight D. Eisenhower

    Research funders place increasing importance on data management planning as a mechanism for improving the longevity of research data and for enabling its widespread access and reuse. As explained in Chapter 3, the majority of public research funders in the UK ask that all grant applicants include a plan covering such aspects of data management as preservation, curation and future reuse, as appropriate to the needs of their scholarly domain.

    This chapter discusses the various factors that have led to the upsurge of interest in data management planning, outlines the components that commonly make up a data management plan, and provides examples of tools and other resources that can help researchers and research support staff embarking on the round of planning activities.

    Planning can be a misunderstood and underappreciated endeavour. At its heart, the purpose of planning is to make things better, to anticipate and make provision against risks, and to help communicate these preparations and agreements. But while plans may help to protect against under-performance, crucially they stop short of ensuring a good one. Specifically, in the case of data management plans they do not guarantee or deliver good data management practice; but they do serve to mitigate risks and help instil confidence and trust in the data and its stewards.

    Planning is no stranger to the world of electronic data. Preservation planning is a function of the Open Archival Information System Reference Model (CCSDS, 2002), an influential framework for long-term preservation systems. It is also a stage in the Digital Curation Centre (DCC) Curation Lifecycle Model (Higgins, 2008), as explored in detail in Chapter 2. Data management is a facet of digital preservation, which is itself a facet of digital curation; so a data management plan will fit into a policy suite, matrix or framework alongside, inter alia, operational procedures, policies and risk registers. Consequently, data management planning can be considered a component of preservation planning, just as preservation planning can be considered a component of data management planning.

  • 4 - Sustainable research data

  • Edited by Graham Pryor
  • Book:
    Managing Research Data
    Published by:
    Facet
    Published online:
    09 June 2018
    Print publication:
    20 January 2012, pp 67-82

  • Summary

    Introduction

    It is common these days to speak of sustainable resources in areas such as energy, forests, fisheries or water. Sustainability is crucial because these resources are the raw materials that fuel economic growth and prosperity. Libraries, archives and other stewardship organizations also manage resources that we hope will be sustainable over the long term. These resources are the raw materials of research, learning and creative expression. The long-term sustainability of information resources is not a new problem, yet it is one that is complicated by the fact that an increasing proportion of the scholarly and cultural record is now manifested in digital form.

    Digital research data, along with other digital products of the research process (e.g. digital laboratory notebooks) has emerged as a significant component of both the process and output of scientific inquiry. Microsoft researcher Jim Gray identified the development of a ‘fourth paradigm’ of scientific discovery, marked by the application of intensive computing resources and sophisticated computational techniques to massive datasets (Hey et al., 2009). Support is gathering around the proposition that creating and sharing an important dataset – one that could catalyze new strands of inquiry – should be considered a first-order scientific contribution, on a par with a published article or book. The importance of datasets is evident even in the realm of commerce: Hal Varian, Chief Economist for Google, has observed that successful businesses will be those that can mine their data for useful intelligence to inform business decision making (Levy, 2009).

    As discussed in the previous chapter, the importance of research datasets is reflected in the emergence of policy measures designed to secure their long-term persistence. For example, the National Science Foundation (NSF) has imposed a requirement that grant applications include a data management plan, the merits of which would be considered as part of the overall evaluation of the application. In addition, a number of repositories, such as the UK Data Archive, the Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research (ICPSR) and Dryad have been established to provide longterm curation capacity for valuable research data.

  • 1 - Why manage research data?

  • Edited by Graham Pryor
  • Book:
    Managing Research Data
    Published by:
    Facet
    Published online:
    09 June 2018
    Print publication:
    20 January 2012, pp 1-16

  • Summary

    Consider this: every year around £3.5 billion of taxpayers’ money is spent on research undertaken by UK universities. That is a considerable level of investment and members of the public might reasonably assume that all due care will be taken to ensure this national endowment is applied wisely. Justifiably, they might also expect that the fruits from such rich endeavours will be afforded the attention necessary to ensure an optimum return on investment. So what are these ‘fruits’ and how indeed in practice is their value observed?

    A challenge for the information professional

    Way back in 1979, Dennis Lewis, then head of ASLIB, the UK's Association for Information Management, wrote what came to be known as the Doomsday Scenario for librarians. His main claim was that information professionals wouldn't be around by the year 2000, meaning that the types of information professionals he saw working in 1979 (mainly librarians and information scientists) would be long gone, swept away by a new information age that would by implication belong to computing scientists. In the event, it didn't happen quite like that and the traditional custodians of documented knowledge, with their armoury of skills in appraising, classifying, preserving, storing and retrieving information somehow managed to reinvent themselves as the purveyors and stewards of digitally encoded knowledge, albeit they have confined themselves in the main to handling published materials. But the challenge has not gone away. Inexorably it has continued to increase in scale and complexity, re-presenting itself in a multiplicity of dimensions until, most significantly today, the accessible output from scholarly research is no longer to be considered exclusively through its documented or published form. We are talking here about digital data, a component of the knowledge enterprise that is as urgently in need of effective stewardship as any of the more traditional products of scholarly research.

    This book is an attempt to explain to the library and information community what has to be done at a local, national or international level to engage with this fresh challenge, and why it is important that the traditional role of the information professional should undergo some urgent re-tooling, not only to sustain the profession but also to ensure that the research community can benefit more completely from its centuries-old reserve of knowledge management acumen.

  • 6 - Roles and responsibilities: libraries, librarians and data

  • Edited by Graham Pryor
  • Book:
    Managing Research Data
    Published by:
    Facet
    Published online:
    09 June 2018
    Print publication:
    20 January 2012, pp 105-134

  • Summary

    E-science has the potential to be transformational within research libraries by impacting their operations, functions, and possibly even their mission.

    Lougee et al., 2007, 3

    Introduction

    The management of the research data generated by e-science and e-research has replaced open access to scholarly publications as the hot topic on the academic library and information services agenda. National and international bodies have issued a succession of reports, policies and guidance on dealing with the ‘data deluge’ that have flagged the need for concerted action by research organizations. Government and other official publications have often identified roles for library and information professionals in managing data alongside the other information and knowledge resources that libraries manage or provide for their communities. Professional associations in the library world have responded positively to such suggestions and university librarians are now starting to develop services or get involved in projects to explore what libraries can do to support researchers in meeting new requirements of funding agencies to facilitate access to their data.

    Managing research data continues to be an emergent area of activity where responsibilities and practices within libraries are generally not yet firmly established, especially in the UK. However, there have been significant developments within the past few years, particularly in the USA, as a result of nationally funded project work and new requirements of research funding agencies for data management plans to be submitted with grant applications. Many libraries have seized these opportunities to form new partnerships and develop new services, which has in turn generated a growing body of literature on the subject offering insights and pointers for practitioners in other countries. In this chapter, we review the opportunities offered and the challenges presented for libraries and librarians in the research data arena, with particular reference to published reports and case studies of emerging practice, supplemented by evidence from university and library websites.

  • 8 - The national data centres

  • Edited by Graham Pryor
  • Book:
    Managing Research Data
    Published by:
    Facet
    Published online:
    09 June 2018
    Print publication:
    20 January 2012, pp 151-172

  • Summary

    Introduction

    In recent years, interest in research data as a primary output of academic work has grown substantially. So, too, have questions about the best way to ensure that such data is curated and made available in a way that allows easy reuse. This chapter examines one response to such questions: the research data centre.

    Research data centres feature as a significant component of the research infrastructure in the UK, and the data centres discussed in this chapter are all national resources that bring together datasets or databases from a variety of sources in order to provide ready, usually online, access by researchers to usable data. Beyond this, the exact nature of what they do varies considerably, reflecting the centre's holdings and the purpose for which it was established. In particular, there is a distinction between data centres that exist to collect, curate and store original research data, and those that focus on providing access to data services from a range of external sources. For this reason, it is difficult to characterize research data centres as a group; each one is a response to the specific needs of the discipline or disciplines that it serves, as well as the types of data that it supplies.

    The data centres

    Within the UK, data centres have a comparatively well established presence in the research ecosystem, with the first incarnation of the social sciences’ UK Data Archive (UKDA) emerging as early as 1967. As Table 8.1 shows, data centres support a wide range of disciplines, although coverage is by no means universal.

    Most data centres are supported by funding from one or more of the UK's research councils, seven publicly funded agencies responsible for co-ordinating and funding particular areas of research, and/or the Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC). There is considerable diversity in how such support is offered and maintained, even within the remit of a single research council. For example, the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) has six designated data centres, marked with an asterisk in Table 8.1, which are responsible for collecting and managing data and for the implementation of NERC data policies.

  • Preface

  • Edited by Graham Pryor
  • Book:
    Managing Research Data
    Published by:
    Facet
    Published online:
    09 June 2018
    Print publication:
    20 January 2012, pp vii-viii

  • Summary

    Data management is an active process by which digital resources remain discoverable, accessible and intelligible over the longer term, a process that invests data and datasets with the potential to accrue value as assets enjoying far wider use than their creators may have anticipated. In the world of research, such a value-adding process is a significant contributor to the much desired achievement of impact.

    Initially, the aim of this book was to introduce and familiarize the library and information professional with the principal elements of research data management. Traditionally, librarians have acted as the trusted and expert stewards of the nation's intellectual output but in the digital age they have lost ground in their engagement with the needs of the academic research community, which has found itself made increasingly self-sufficient by developments in information technology.

    But it soon became apparent when assembling a representative selection of chapters, with the intention of providing an adequate picture of the prevailing research data landscape, that by explaining the reasons for pursuing effective data management and by describing the measures that should and are being taken, this volume would serve as both an introduction and a summary for a much broader community of stakeholders. Hence, within these pages you will discover a wealth of information and instruction covering such core issues as the terms of compliance with funder expectations for data management and sharing, an explanation of the context and recommended approaches to individual and institutional data management planning, a discussion of the roles and responsibilities of key players in the research data lifecycle, as well as detailed reports of initiatives, strategies and organizations being deployed nationally and on a global scale.

    That initial aim remains, but in truth we all of us today ‘do data’, as information professionals, practising researchers or policy makers. I do hope this book will help you do it better.

  • 9 - Contrasting national research data strategies: Australia and the USA

  • Edited by Graham Pryor
  • Book:
    Managing Research Data
    Published by:
    Facet
    Published online:
    09 June 2018
    Print publication:
    20 January 2012, pp 173-204

  • Summary

    This chapter looks at two national approaches to research data infrastructure, responding to very different government and research sector environments: Australia and the USA.

    Australia: a national research data service

    The Australian National Data Service (ANDS) is working to enable the transformation of research data that are unmanaged, disconnected, invisible and single-use into structured collections that are managed, connected, findable and reusable. This will form a nationally significant resource so that Australian researchers can easily publish, discover, access and use Australian research data.

    The beginnings of ANDS can be traced back to one of the most significant investments made by Australia in research infrastructure: the National Collaborative Research Infrastructure Strategy (NCRIS). This was an A$542 million, seven year strategy originally spanning from 2004/05 to 2010/11 but with some investments extended to 2012/13 (the Australian financial year, referred to here, runs from 1 July to 30 June). NCRIS provides and supports major research infrastructure, allowing Australia to conduct world-class research. In November 2006, 12 priority areas (capabilities) were announced and projects have since been funded in each of these areas. NCRIS has adopted a strategic and collaborative approach to providing research infrastructure, which can be accessed by researchers across Australia. This type of collaboration is proving effective in delivering wider access to better infrastructure.

    A key enabler of research collaboration is the high performance computing, data management and electronic communication tools provided by the new information and communication technologies (ICT). The Australian Government continues to support the deployment of these ICT tools so researchers can readily share access to research data and collaborate in analysing the data. The NCRIS investment in this area was collectively called Platforms for Collaboration (PfC) and the Australian National Data Service is one of its major components. Its current status can best be understood through its four sequential stages: establishment, initial funding, additional funding and time extension.

    Establishment of ANDS

    During the course of the PfC facilitation process, a number of workshops were held to determine the activities that might be included in the investment plan to assist research data management. Following the approval of the overall PfC investment plan by NCRIS, an implementation workshop with wide representation was held to confirm the proposal to establish an Australian National Data Service. This workshop took place on 29 May 2007.

  • 3 - Research data policies: principles, requirements and trends

    • By Sarah Jones, Humanities Advanced Technology and Information Institute (HATII)
  • Edited by Graham Pryor
  • Book:
    Managing Research Data
    Published by:
    Facet
    Published online:
    09 June 2018
    Print publication:
    20 January 2012, pp 47-66

  • Summary

    The UK data policy landscape

    Data management drivers

    The open access movement underpins many of the drivers for research data management. In 2007, the 30 member countries that form the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) issued Principles and Guidelines for Access to Research Data from Public Funding (2007). Central to these 13 principles is the notion that publicly funded research data is a public good, produced in the public interest, and should be openly available to the maximum extent possible. This expectation of public access to publicly funded research data is apparent in the rhetoric of most ensuing data policies.

    Co-ordinating bodies such as Research Councils UK (RCUK) have issued similar codes and principles to inform research governance. In its publication Expectations for Societal and Economic Impact RCUK notes that those who receive funding are expected to ‘take responsibility for the curation, management and exploitation of data for future use’ (RCUK, 2008). More detailed requirements are noted in the Policy and Code of Conduct on the Governance of Good Research Conduct (RCUK, 2009). This states that researchers and their research organizations are jointly responsible for the proper management and preservation of data and primary materials, and have a duty to:

  • • keep clear and accurate records of the research procedures followed and the results obtained, including interim results

  • • hold records securely in paper or electronic form

  • • make relevant primary data and research evidence accessible to others for reasonable periods after the completion of the research: data should normally be preserved and accessible for ten years, but for projects of clinical or major social, environmental or heritage importance, for 20 years or longer

  • • manage data according to the research funder's data policy and all relevant legislation

  • • wherever possible, deposit data permanently within a national collection.

    • Similar requirements are put forward in the Code of Practice for Research issued by the UK Research Integrity Office (UKRIO, 2009). This puts forward the notion of planning data management at an early stage of the design of the project, stating that researchers should consider how data will be gathered, analysed, managed and made available to others. The Code also offers a helpful one-page checklist for researchers to support good practice.

  • 2 - The lifecycle of data management

  • Edited by Graham Pryor
  • Book:
    Managing Research Data
    Published by:
    Facet
    Published online:
    09 June 2018
    Print publication:
    20 January 2012, pp 17-46

  • Summary

    Introduction

    Digital materials are inherently fragile and need to be managed from the outset if they are to remain retrievable, identifiable and usable for the community that needs to access, use and reuse the information they contain. The set of activities required to manage data, known collectively as digital curation, aims to ensure that not only is the bit-stream maintained but that the data can be discovered and rendered throughout its lifecycle. Such lifecycle management ensures that documented policies and processes are developed, roles and responsibilities are defined, and the technical framework is in place to create, store and manage research data collections while delivering user access.

    Drivers for lifecycle management of data

    The science of archives and records management has long adopted a lifecycle approach to managing information. The imperative of an archivist is to ensure that information created in the course of a business or activity is adequately managed so that it can be identified, located and used when required, to support future activities. In the analogue world, paper or photographic materials may deteriorate over time through bad handling or poor storage conditions, allowing damp, mould, insect infestation or vermin damage to accrue. The context of their creation may be lost through divorce from their original environment, or poor documentation. The ability to find them may be hampered through inadequate cataloguing or misplacement. Capable management throughout the lifecycle ensures that these problems are minimized. The threats to digital material and the techniques for managing them may differ, but the underlying principles and the underpinning processes and policies, originally developed for dealing with the mountains of paper created in the pre-digital world, remain applicable to the digital paradigm.

    The necessity of adopting the lifecycle approach to the management of data is discussed by Pennock (2007). Digital materials rely on a combination of hardware, software and storage media to create, store, access and render them. From the moment they are created they are vulnerable to the speed with which technology advances and the possibility of the failure of these technologies, so data can rapidly become inaccessible, or even completely lost. Additionally, the ease with which data can be moved, copied, edited and deleted may make its integrity and reliability questionable and its provenance dubious, with consequent repercussions for reuse. A lack of metadata may make it unidentifiable, irretrievable and unusable.

  • 10 - Emerging infrastructure and services for research data management and curation in the UK and Europe

  • Edited by Graham Pryor
  • Book:
    Managing Research Data
    Published by:
    Facet
    Published online:
    09 June 2018
    Print publication:
    20 January 2012, pp 205-234

  • Summary

    Introduction

    Why try to predict the evolution of research data services and infrastructure? Enormous amounts have been invested in recent decades on programmes designed to strengthen the digital or ‘e’ aspects of research; the e-infrastructure for e-research or e-science. Emerging ‘research data infrastructures’ extend the reach of e-infrastructures, together with their agenda of transforming research knowledge production and use. What ‘data infrastructures’ bring to that agenda is the idea that research data itself can be provided as a utility, like computing or electricity grids. This idea envisages collaborative networks with a European and international span. Meanwhile, research funders and institutions are giving more attention to their own services for research data management and curation, in the effort to get more impact more efficiently from their investment in research.

    The infrastructures and services they comprise can be thought of as supporting a common set of curation activities, at different levels of scale – institutional, national and international. Disciplinary domains and research questions cut across these, development resources are scarce, and the relationships between the actors involved in developing e-infrastructures are complex. So good conceptual tools are needed, whether to participate in these developments, evaluate their progress, guide researchers to make good use of the results, or critically engage with the very idea of data being usable ‘any time, any place’.

    This chapter aims to describe how research data infrastructures are currently conceived and surveys recent developments. The chapter has three main sections, which aim to do the following:

  • Review the context for developing ‘research e-infrastructure’ and the problems these are intended to address. The first section then considers concepts of infrastructure and how these apply to research data, identifying data management and curation services that would utilize and sustain these data infrastructures.

  • Summarize recent action to co-ordinate research data management and curation services and infrastructure. This second section considers action on the international level by the European Union (EU) then, on the national level, by funding organizations in the UK, Netherlands and Germany. It then identifies initiatives at the level of educational institutions, focusing on the UK.

  • The final section of the chapter considers issues likely to affect the continued evolution of research data infrastructures.

  • 7 - Research data management: opportunities and challenges for HEIs

  • Edited by Graham Pryor
  • Book:
    Managing Research Data
    Published by:
    Facet
    Published online:
    09 June 2018
    Print publication:
    20 January 2012, pp 135-150

  • Summary

    Introduction

    We live in an information age characterized by a deluge of digital data (Hey and Trefethen, 2003a; Hey, Tansley and Tolle, 2009). The potential benefits to researchers are enormous, offering opportunities to mount multidisciplinary investigations into humankind's major social and scientific challenges on a hitherto unrealizable scale by marshalling artificially produced and naturally occurring data of multiple kinds from multiple sources. However, this newfound wealth of research data will be without value unless it can be managed in ways that will ensure that it is discoverable, accessible and (re)usable.

    Over the past ten years, the efforts of national e-research programmes to innovate research methods, tools and infrastructure – as in the UK e-Science Programme (Hey and Trefethen, 2003b), the Australian e-Research Programme (Treloar, 2007) and the NSF Cyberinfrastructure Program (National Science Foundation, 2003, 2006) – have raised awareness among stakeholders that research data is a vital resource whose value needs to be preserved for future research by the data generators and by others. Achieving this requires that the data be systematically organized, securely stored, fully described, easily locatable, accessible on appropriate authority, shareable, archived and curated. Fulfilling all of these research data management tasks is a complex sociotechnical challenge that all stakeholders, whether they are research funders, higher education institutions (HEIs), publishers, researchers or regulators, are currently ill prepared to meet. There are, as yet, no widely agreed, mature solutions. Moreover, given the combination of the data deluge and a world recession, the scale of the tasks is increasing while the financial and therefore human resources to undertake the tasks are shrinking.

    In this chapter we review the drivers for research data management services, consider the challenges their provision poses for HEIs and explore how these might be met, including possible pathways to sustainability. To do this, we begin by drawing on the findings from several UK studies of researchers’ everyday data management practices, which help us to understand the reasons why these practices exist and why they may not be easily changed.

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