Software & Systems | News

Desktop Tool Aims to Help Academic Researchers Organize Scientific Data

• By Sharleen Nelson
• 05/23/13

Digital Science has released a desktop application designed to help academic researchers manage their scientific research project data.
  
Organized in a hierarchical-structured common folder format, Projects, which integrates into the user's existing workflow, makes data easily accessible and allows researchers to efficiently organize their research output.

File previews, stars that indicate favorite items, and notes that link directly to projects, experiments, folders, or files also help researchers streamline their daily project processes. A snapshot backup function allows researchers to save an entire project at a particular point in time and manual and automatic snapshots can be set for important stages during the project's workflow. A chronological timeline tracks when files or folders are added to a project, when notes have been created, and when important files have been flagged with stars.

Available initially for Mac users only, the application allows access to files from Finder or other Mac applications, which can be shared or synchronized with remote backup options.

"Projects will fill a critical gap in an academic researcher's arsenal of desktop tools. It will aid researchers at the starting point of the research data lifecycle and ensure all their work can be attributed from the outset, avoiding any issues regarding the provenance of research in the long run," said Mark Hahnel, Projects user and founder of figshare, in a prepared statement. 

For more information about Projects or to sign up for a free 30-day trial, visit projects.ac.