Data Library Services at the University of Edinburgh
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The Data Library at the University of Edinburgh was established in the early 1980s to provide access to datasets like UK census data. It has since evolved to support research data management across its lifecycle through services like consultancy, a dataset catalogue, and training. The Data Library is now part of a research data management program that includes an institutional data repository called Edinburgh DataShare that has deposited around 250 datasets so far. A key part of training is the open online Research Data Management course called MANTRA.
Data Library Services at the University of Edinburgh
- 1. Data Library Services at the University of Edinburgh ROBIN RICE, DATA LIBRARIAN, R.RICE@ED.AC.UK SHINE MEETING, EDINBURGH, 28 MAY 2015
- 2. Overview What is a data library? The Data Library in context How the Data Library service has evolved Research Data Management and the University Edinburgh DataShare repository Research Data Management Training (MANTRA) course
- 3. What is a data library? A data library refers to both the content and the services that foster use of collections of numeric, audio-visual, textual or geospatial data sets for secondary use in research. A data library is normally part of a larger institution (academic, corporate, scientific, medical, governmental, etc.) established to serve the data users of that organisation. The data library tends to house local data collections and provides access to them through various means (CD-/DVD-ROMs or central server for download). A data library may also maintain subscriptions to licensed data resources for its users to access.
- 4. Edinburgh University Data Library: History Established out of the Program Library Unit in early 1980s to provide access to data on mainframes, e.g. 1981 population census data. Was part of Computing Services, now (merged) Information Services Part of long tradition of sharing digital data for secondary analysis in the social sciences Became a national data centre as EDINA in 1995/96 - data library continues University remit ◦ celebrated 25th anniversary in 2008
- 5. EDINA & Data Library within IS Divisions IS Corporate Office User Services Library and University Collections IT Infrastructure IS Applications Learning, Teaching and Web EDINA and Data Library Digital Curation Centre Information Services (IS) is led by the Chief Information Officer and Librarian to the University, and organised into 8 divisions. Total of ~550 staff EDINA and Data Library ~90 staff Data Library team: • Data Librarian • Associate Data Librarian • 1.5 FTE Data Library Assistants • 0.5 FTE Software Engineer
- 6. International membership org: IASSIST IASSIST is an international organization of professionals working with information technology and data services to support research and teaching in the social sciences.
- 7. Data Library perspective: supporting data users Data Library established in 1983 to provide Population Census and other datasets for analysis Follows a North American model of institutional support We help users with queries like Does such data even exist? Where can I locate it? Who will pay for it? How can I access it? What does this documentation mean? How do I use it in X software?
- 8. Data Library service at UoE Consultancy (direct help for users) Catalogue (Drupal) – free and purchased/licensed datasets IS Skills training Part of IS service catalogue: Drill down to our services from Research Support Research Data Support ◦ Data Library & Consultancy ◦ Research Data Management 8
- 9. Data Library key development projects Each of these projects informed the evolution of the UoE Data Library services in a significant way.
- 10. What is Research Data Management? An umbrella term to describe all aspects of planning, organising, documenting, storing sharing, and preserving data. It also takes into account issues such as data protection and confidentiality. It provides a framework that supports researchers and their data throughout the course of their research and beyond. A data lifecycle:
- 11. Our RDM Programme: support throughout the data / research lifecycle
- 13. Edinburgh DataShare Built in 2007-09 with JISC funding as a pilot institutional open access data repository, with Oxford & Southampton Now core service of the University RDM programme - multidisciplinary Based on DSpace, metadata profile developed from dcterms (Similar to DataCite) ~ 250 datasets deposited so far; handles batch ingest, large file sizes (>10 GB) New features being developed, on our own and via open source community Pursuing trusted digital repository status via Data Seal of Approval Harvested by Thomson-Reuters Data Citation Index Issues DataCite DOIs
- 15. Research Data MANTRA course Openly licensed, free, online self- paced course in RDM for researchers Embedded in at least 3 graduate schools at UoE Video stories from researchers in variety of settings Interactive quizzes make it fun Data handling exercises in four software analysis packages Four releases in 4 years
- 16. Academic Service Librarian Training Data Library & User Services Division piloted training with 4 liaison librarians – then all (12 more) Aimed to reuse MANTRA in a blended learning approach for academic liaison librarians Materials gathered together in the DIY Training Kit for Librarians on the MANTRA website http://www.mcphee.com/laf/
- 17. For further exploration UoE Data Library Services ◦ http://www.ed.ac.uk/is/data-library UoE Information Services ◦ http://www.ed.ac.uk/schools-departments/information-services RDM landing page ◦ http://www.ed.ac.uk/is/data-management MANTRA online training ◦ http://datalib.edina.ac.uk/mantra Edinburgh Data Blog (can subscribe) ◦ http://datablog.is.ed.ac.uk