What is TDM?  

There are various definitions of Text and Data Mining (TDM) which cover both the technicalities and utilities of the practice. The UK Intellectual Property Office (IPO) usefully define TDM as: ‘The use of automated analytical techniques to analyse text and data for patterns, trends and other useful information’. Even within TDM, there are different definitions for both text and data mining. Text mining is more commonly seen as the computational process of discovering and extracting knowledge from unstructured data. Data mining, on the other hand, is the computational process of discovering and extracting knowledge from structured data. There has been a surge of interest in the use of TDM in academia across all disciplines ranging from the sciences to the humanities. Yet undertaking TDM has also entailed a whole host of legal and political issues, which have nearly threatened to hinder the practice. These issues have largely centred around copyright, intellectual property rights, licenses and download limits. 

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All applications for the UK Research and Innovation Future Leaders Fellowships require a data management plan. As the umbrella organisation of the UK’s major Research Councils, there is an expectation that all UKRI-funded research is ‘to be made available to the research community in a timely and responsible manner unless there are exceptional reasons why this cannot happen’. Researchers are also advised to consult the Research Council common principles on data policy as this provides the overarching framework for the individual UK research councils.

Researchers should use the template and guidance provided by the URKI. Plans can be up to three-page long but can be as little as a quarter of a page of A4 for less complex research projects. The data management plan must also demonstrate how ‘the applicant will meet, or already meets their responsibilities for research data quality, sharing and security’.

You can also find a template for the UKRI data management plan on DMP Online.

Further Resources

• UKRI Data Policy
• UKRI guidance on best practice in the management of research data

This guide will aim to provide some useful advice for students on finding data to re-use during their research projects.

Data Resources Online

You may want to start by using UCL Explore to search for research studies based on secondary datasets. From there, you can consult the Registry of Research Data Repositories (re3data.org) – a global repository of research data. It is also best kept in mind that different datasets require different permissions. If you are planning to use safeguarded or controlled access data, you will need to abide by additional conditions for accessing it. For example, this may include specific forms of citation, depositor permission to registration and authentication of the users of the data. There are plenty of online courses to help you navigate your way through the use of digital datasets. The University of Edinburgh run an online research data management training programme called MANTRA to help researchers learn how to manage their digital data. Furthermore, the UK Data Service provides a range of dataset and topic guides along with video tutorials on how to use data.

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We are pleased to announce the following workshops and events taking place in the up and coming weeks.

Knowledge Quarter Codes Technical Social – 21 November 2018

The popular UCL Research Programming Technical Socials are now expanding under the name ‘Knowledge Quarter Codes’ in order to welcome participation from academic and industrial organisations across the Knowledge Quarter – the area within a 1-mile radius of King’s Cross station. This is an informal event aimed at anyone with an interest in the computational methods and technology behind research and innovation. The next event will be hosted by Prof. Luca Vigano from King’s College London on Explainable Security – a new paradigm in security research.

This event will take place in UCL’s Chandler House premises on the 21 of November from 5pm to 6:30pm. You can register for the event here.

Dive into Data Challenge 2019

UCL researchers from across all disciplines are cordially invited to take part in the Dive into Data Challenge 2019. Researchers are encouraged to develop novel and innovative ways to analyse and/or data from the Consumer Data Research Centre to gain insights into UCL’s Grand Challenges priority themes through data re-use. Participants will also have the chance to win a £500 prize and present their work at the UCL Conference in June 2019. 

• Deadline for expression of interest and brief summary submission is 18 January 2019.
• Any questions you have about the challenge can be answered at the next RITS drop-in sessions on 15 November and 12 December 10am-12pm.

More information on the challenge is available here: https://www.ucl.ac.uk/research/domains/eresearch/diveintodata

Digital Skills Development Opportunities

There are new dates available for Digital Skills Development courses and workshops for both staff and students. These workshops will cover sessions on Excel, Word, STATA, R, Unix, Photoshop plus many more. A weekly drop is also provided for individual guidance. A full schedule can be found here.

The Wellcome has recently announced an updated policy on sharing research outputs. This policy develops their existing policies on Open Access publishing and research data to emphasise the importance of sharing research software and other research outputs.  This forms part of the Wellcome’s broader promotion of Open Research practices.

You can find the announcement of the Wellcome’s new policy on their website. If you need support with writing an ‘Outputs Management Plan’ for the Wellcome or another funders further guidance is available.

The new European project LEARN will raise awareness of Research Data Management and policy issues to institutions. It will do this by maximizing the visibility of the existing LERU Roadmap for Research Data, written by LERU, the League of European Research Universities. The LERU Roadmap is a guide for universities and research organizations on how to tackle the challenges which research data poses.

Researchers, research funders, research organisations and senior decision makers are cordially invited to the workshop ‘Embedding Research Data as part of the research cycle’ which will be held on the 29th January (9am-5pm) at Senate House in London. Register now.

For more Information on LEARN please visit the project website .

Two official documents are here to help UCL researchers and students understand their responsibilities regarding the preservation (or “archiving”) of the data that they produce. Check the definition of research data if you are not sure what is meant by it.

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Metadata are commonly defined as “data about other data”, i.e. a description of your data, including key information that would make them discoverable.

Research data are the original sources or material that you have created or collated to conduct your research project. The response to your research question is based on the analysis of these data. (Read more in our post on research data.)

Research Data Management covers all of the decisions made throughout the research lifecycle to handle these research data, from the planning stage of the project up to the long-term preservation of data.

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Research data are the original sources or material that you have created or collated to conduct your research project. They can be digital or non-digital. The response to your research question is based on the analysis of these research data.

The following definition can be read in UCL Research Data Policy:

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