Data Management: Home

A data management plan describes the data that will be authored and how the data will be managed and made accessible throughout its lifetime. The key to understanding your data management needs is to know what you are creating and how. Ask yourself the following questions; the answers will be the content of your data management plan:

• How am I creating the data? 
• What type of data is it? (experimental, computational or observational)
• In what format is the data? Standards applied (ASCII, jpeg/tiff, xls, other)
• What kind of metadata will I collect?
• Do I need to share this data with anyone?
• What are the end products of my research project?
• How long will I keep this data?
• How will I archive and preserve the data?
• What are the access policies and provisions? 
• What are the plans for eventual transition or termination of the data collection in the long-term future.