ResearchCollaborationToolsforStudentsStaffFacultyCreatingaModernMemex

8/12/2019 ResearchCollaborationToolsforStudentsStaffFacultyCreatingaModernMemex

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Research & Collaboration Toolsfor Students, S taff & Faculty:

Creating a Modern Memex

Rich McCue , Systems Administrator University of Victoria Libraries

http://richmccue.com [email protected] 2012

Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License .

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Table of ContentsExecutive SummaryTable of Contents1.0 Modern Research Challenges

1.1 Proliferation of Data Formats and Silos

1.2 Capturing Electronic Data1.3 Collaborating in a Digital World1.4 Organizing Citation & Bibliographic Information

2.0 A Manhattan Project Sized Problem3.0 Capturing, Storing and Retrieving Digital Documents

3.1 Capture Anything, Access Anywhere and Find Things Fast#3.2 Zotero the Social Citation Manager 3.3 What To Do With The Left Over Paper?3.4 Copyright and Cloud Security Considerations

4.0 Finding What You Want When You Want4.1 Manila File Folders

4.2 Desktop Search5.0 Research Collaboration in the 21st Century

5.1 Voice, Video and Desktop Conferencing5.2 Real Time Collaborative Document Editing5.2 File Sharing and Document Version Control

6.0 The Right Hardware for Researchers6.1 A Second Monitor for Increased Productivity6.2 Mobile Devices & Software

7.0 Backing Up Your Digital Life8.0 ConclusionsBibliographyAppendix A Table of Software & Hardware Discussed

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1.0 Modern Research ChallengesThe digital age presents a double edged sword to students and researchers. On the one hand students nowhave almost instantaneous access to huge amounts of information and data that past generations could onlydream of. On the other hand, researchers now have to sift and sort through those mountains of information anduse their judgment to determine what is credible and useful. Then the researcher must store that information in

a easy-to-find manner, then find it again when writing a report or paper.

1.1 Proliferation of Data Formats and Silos

The first challenge is electronic information in multiple formats sitting in multiple silos of data. While this is no1

in itself a problem, it does make finding a specific piece of information much more difficult than it would be if athe data was in the same format, sitting in a single data repository. The reason for the different formats anddifferent silos of data goes back to the desire to have the best tool possible for a particular job. Having the

best tools is important, but when one can more easily find information from one's own organization through aGoogle search than via the organization's intranet, one knows that there is a problem. Fortunately operating

systems vendors are making the task of finding data on your computer easier than it was in the past.

Illustration 1: File storage? 2

1.2 Capturing Electronic Data

The second challenge is that many researchers have a hard time capturing electronic information in a format

1 From a technology viewpoint, silos are managed by computer systems that do not provide efficient machinecommunication systems to other computers. - Anon. 2012. Information Silo. Wikipedia.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Information_silo .2 Picture Source: Google Docs

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that enables them to easily find the information months or years later. Often the default method that researchersfall back on is to to convert digital content back into an analog format by printing it out.This was recently driven home to the author by an experience in a professor's office. While working on her computer he noticed a six inch stack of paper on one of her desks. The top sheet was a printout of aninteresting article from an on-line newspaper. She apparently printed the article so that she could have a copyto reference in one of her future papers. The author couldn't help but think that she would have a hard time

finding the article once it found it's way into the middle of the pile of similar articles. Why was she building thimountain of paper? Not long ago there was a dearth of quality tools available for capturing and searchingelectronic data. Fortunately it is now much easier to capture web pages, PDF documents and other electronicdocuments, so that they can be annotated and then easily retrieved and searched at a later date.

1.3 Collaborating in a Digital World

The third challenge, collaborating with colleagues, should be much easier now that there is a proliferation of personal computers, tablets and smartphones, all connected to high speed internet and research network connections. While the computers, network and software have been available for over a decade now, the3

training for end-users, particularly in the humanities, has been lacking. A revealing example of this is the professors who casually complained to the author about a collaboration problem. "My colleagues and I areworking on a paper, but it is difficult to keep track of who has the most recent version. We end up having todo a lot of integration work when one of us inadvertently works on an older version of the document."Fortunately there are now better ways to work collaboratively on documents than e-mailing them back andforth.

1.4 Organizing Citation & Bibliographic Information

The bane of a researchers existence is the tedious, but important, process of properly citing their work.Citation formatting is a particularly tedious task, especially for under-graduates who are new to the research

process. A closely related, but similarly dismal, task is that of creating a comprehensive bibliography for the paper or report. The good news is that there are a number of tools available to make citation and bibliographicwork quick and relatively painless.

2.0 A Manhattan Project Sized ProblemVannevar Bush saw the problem of information silos first hand. The year was 1945, and Bush was thechairman of the National Defence Research Committee in Washington, DC. As director of the committee that4

controlled the Manhattan Project, he was painfully aware of how difficult it could be to find specific informationin the vast stores of paper and microfilm that had been accumulated in the course of the project. The5

information was there, but to find it and to get it into the hands of the person who needed it proved difficult attimes.

The Manhattan Project was nearly complete when Vannevar revealed his vision of a device that would allowresearchers to access their accumulated store of knowledge in his essay "As We May Think". This was a6

3 Research networks like CANARIE in Canada and Internet2 in the United States of America.4 Anon. 2012. National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics. Wikipedia.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Advisory_Committee_for_Aeronautics .5 Anon. 2012. Manhattan Project. Wikipedia. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manhattan_Project .6 Bush, Vannevar. 1945. As We May Think. The Atlantic, July.

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device which would allow an individual to store "all his books, records, and communications, and which ismechanized so that it may be consulted with exceeding speed and flexibility. It is an enlarged intimatesupplement to his memory." It would also automatically cross reference one work with another. He called thisdevice a "Memex" , and it was to be an analog computer that used microfilm for it's storage medium, four 7

quick selector microfilm readers for access, and one microfilm scanner to capture documents. It camecomplete with a dual monitor display in the middle of the desk and push button controls on the right-hand side

to control the device. Unfortunately, Vannevar's prototypes were plagued with technical problems and never functioned reliably enough to be useful. The microchip and computer graphical user interface were still over forty years away from becoming mainstream.

Illustration 2: An artist's rendering of a Memex device. 8

Fortunately for us, technology has progressed beyond the mechanical devices that Bush prototyped for storing

and retrieving information, and today's computer and communications devices realize Bush's 70 year oldvision. A modern networked personal computer with two monitors, an optical scanner and video camera ismost closely analogous to his Memex. Unfortunately despite these technological advancements, manyresearchers are still struggling with problems that he was trying to solve so many years ago. Happily thoseconcerned are now much better equipped to be successful.

http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1945/07/as-we-may-think/3881/ .7 Anon. 2012. Memex. Wikipedia. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memex .8 Anon. 2012. Telecollaboration: Beyond Memex and NLS. Telecollaboration Research.http://www.cs.brown.edu/stc/resea/telecollaboration/story.html .

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Illustration 3: A modern laptop with a second monitor - Ideal for Researchers dealing with digital information.Picture source 9

3.0 Capturing, Storing and Retrieving Digital DocumentsCapturing electronic data from online resources without resorting to printing it out was the second researchissue identified above. While printing an electronic article will preserve it for the researcher, once a largenumber of articles are printed out, the issue becomes the difficulty of finding the article when needed. Shortlyafter the new millennium began, a new breed of software emerged to meet the need for capturing andorganizing digital data in its native electronic format. These software programs and related hardware don'tlook like Vannevar Bush's Memex, but they do most of the things he wanted the Memex to do.

3.1 Capture Anything, Access Anywhere and Find Things Fast 10

While there are a number of software packages and services available, the market leader for general purposeweb research assistant software is Evernote . Evernote allows the user to capture digital content, including11

web pages, PDF files or snippets of web pages, organize them, annotate them, share them, publish them andsearch them. No more worrying about whether or not the web page being looked at will still be on-line nextyear (or next week). Content can also be captured on mobile devices like smart phones, and that data isautomatically synchronized back to any computer that has Evernote installed on it. Mobile content can be text,

as well as pictures and audio. Very helpfully, pictures of text are made key word searchable, so that you cantake, for example, a photo of a white board, and Evernote will make the text searchable not only on your smartphone, but also on your computer. Here is a short video that demonstrates the basic capabilities of Evernote .12

9 Picture source: Apple Inc., http://store.apple.com/ca/product/MC914LL/A10 Anon. One Account. Many Devices. Evernote. http://www.evernote.com/about/download/ .11 Anon. One Account. Many Devices. Evernote. http://www.evernote.com/about/download/ .12 Anon. 2010. Evernote Introduction: Mac. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OlOLXWvaIy0 .

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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OlOLXWvaIy0http://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.evernote.com%2Fabout%2Fdownload%2F&sa=D&sntz=1&usg=AFQjCNFmEaCWmoaUf8TozqDjPBk13aOf9Qhttp://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.evernote.com%2Fabout%2Fdownload%2F&sa=D&sntz=1&usg=AFQjCNFmEaCWmoaUf8TozqDjPBk13aOf9Qhttp://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F%2Fstore.apple.com%2Fca%2Fproduct%2FMC914LL%2FA&sa=D&sntz=1&usg=AFQjCNEB7F5YPov7Van-YenIcHdUWBUEowhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OlOLXWvaIy0http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OlOLXWvaIy0http://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F%2Fevernote.com%2F&sa=D&sntz=1&usg=AFQjCNEtlKBsLk_Gdtj3Ms26Us5a_uwKjwhttp://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F%2Fupload.wikimedia.org%2Fwikipedia%2Fcommons%2F9%2F9d%2FDual_apple_monitors.jpg&sa=D&sntz=1&usg=AFQjCNHpusrcv-opAITRdronj9kEAJ0GYg


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There are three ways to use Evernote. The first is via a web browser plug-in for Chrome, Firefox or InternetExplorer to copy web pages or parts of web pages. This is the way the author captures data most frequently.When on a web page that needs to be saved, simply press the Evernote icon in the web browsers tool bar.Evernote also captures the available meta data from web pages, including the original web address, author,keywords and capture date, so that this information can be used as needed for citations it in researchdocuments. Additionally all the information in an Evernote account can be accessed through the Evernote web

application.

Second, Evernote can capture data from mobile devices, including photos and text. Metadata for photosincludes, date and geographic location of where the picture was taken. Note taking on tablets and smart

phones is another popular use for the mobile program. Researchers can also search for any information in their Evernote database on their mobile devices. Mobile versions of Evernote are available for iOS, Android,BlackBerry and Windows 7 devices. 13

Lastly, a feature rich Evernote desktop client is available for Windows and Mac computers (a third party program called NeverNote is available for Linux). Markup (with the digital equivalent of a yellow highlighter14

is available to annotate captured and locally stored web pages in Evernote. Researchers can add their ownmeta data to items in the form of tags, or they can put them in notebooks to help keep things organized. Thiscan be invaluable when looking at the document a year from now and having a hard time remembering why itwas so important when captured.

Illustration 4: Evernote - Capture anything, access anywhere, find things fast 15

Evernote also makes it easy to share research with colleagues or the public. Folders along with comments can be published to the user's Evernote page as new content is added. Published items and folders can also besent via e-mail to interested colleagues.

Microsoft makes a strong competitor to Evernote, called OneNote . While OneNote has many of the same16features as Evernote, it does not have native applications for as many platforms as Evernote. Interestingly, oneexception is the OneNote iPhone app. That said, the close integration to Microsoft Office may be appealing toOffice users on Windows computers. A license for OneNote for windows costs about $100. Evernote on the

13 Anon. One Account. Many Devices. Evernote. http://www.evernote.com/about/download/ .14 Anon. Welcome to NeverNote. NeverNote. http://nevernote.sourceforge.net/ .15 Picture source: http://evernote.com/16 Anon. OneNote 2010. OneNote 2010. http://office.microsoft.com/en-ca/onenote/ .

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other hand is free for users who upload less for 40mb per month.

3.2 Zotero the Social Citation Manager

While Evernote and OneNote are excellent general purpose research assistants, Zoteros feature set is aimedsquarely at the academic researcher. Zotero captures much more citation relevant information for each web17

page or document placed in it. More importantly for a researcher, it installs plug-ins for Microsoft Word andLibreOffice that allow researchers to quickly and easily cite documents they have captured. Zotero also18

works well with other word processors like Google Docs and Apple Pages, even though it is not as closelyintegrated. Finally, when the paper is complete, Zotero will create the bibliography, literally at the click of a

button, based on the footnotes in the paper.

Illustration 5: About Zotero 19

In short, Zotero assists researchers by helping them do the following:

Capture Web Pages & Citation information easily while in a web browser. Captures other files like PDF & word documents. Take notes on research materials as they are captured. If desired, Sync, Share and Collaborate on libraries with other researchers. Export formatted citations and bibliographies to papers, articles, books or websites, in the

17 Anon. About Zotero. Zotero. http://www.zotero.org/ .18 Anon. About LibreOffice. LibreOffice. http://www.libreoffice.org/ .19 Anon. About Zotero. Zotero. http://www.zotero.org/ .

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bibliographic style of choice. Search all the data and meta data in a Zotero library quickly and easily.

Here is a short video that highlights the main features of Zotero, and shows its easy-to-use interface. 20

Zotero can also be a real time saver when working with physical books. Instead of typing in the bibliographic

data for a book, simply search for the book in a library catalog, and then click on the small Zotero book iconin the URL field (see illustration 6 below) and the bibliographic information is automatically saved in theZotero library.

Illustration 6: The Zotero book icon.

In the past Zotero was only available as a FireFox plug-in, but since the release of Zotero 3 in early 2012,Zotero has also available as a native application for Mac, Windows and Linux computers. Browser plug-insare available for FireFox, Chrome & Safari. While the range of operating system and browser support is21

impressive, currently (as of early 2012) there are no native Zotero apps or web apps available for mobiledevices available. It is possible to browse your Zotero library via a mobile web browser, however the websiteis not optimized for mobile devices, and is difficult to use on small form factor devices.

Other popular academic citation tools include commercial products like EndNote and RefWorks . EndNo22 23

costs $99 for a licence, and an annual Refworks subscription costs $100. Some universities purchase a sitelicense for RefWorks to give their students access to their service for free. As an Open Source project,Zotero has no licencing cost for users. It is being developed by George Mason University , and funded by

20 Anon. 2009. Zotero 1.5 Screencast. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hLi3ZhUQDhs .21 Anon. Download Zotero. Zotero. http://www.zotero.org/support/3.0 .22 Anon. About EndNote. EndNote. http://endnote.com/eninfo.asp .23 Anon. About RefWorks. RefWorks. http://www.refworks.com/content/products/content.asp .

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grants from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation , the Institute of Museum and Library Services , and the AlfreP. Sloan Foundation .

For most academic researchers, there will probably be a place for both Zotero and Evernote in their researchwork flow, as they have complementary strengths and weakness that lend themselves to different types of research.

3.3 What To Do With The Leftover Paper?

With the ability to capture electronic research materials, and conduct full text searches on them, what is to bedone with leftover paper research documents? They could be left in their non -digital state, but this would leathem outside of the search-able data repository that has been created, and makes them more difficult to findwhen needed. They are thus less valuable because they are less accessible. Another option is to digitize thedocuments.

Illustration 7: Scanning both sides of documents in one pass & then converting them to PDF format so they arefull text search-able.

Digitizing Documents sounds more intimidating than it really is. Scanners can now be purchased that will scan both sides of a document in one pass and convert it into PDF format on the fly. For smaller jobs, most smart phones are capable of taking a high quality picture of a page, and then converting it into a PDF document.

Why PDF and not JPEG or some other format? Because Adobe Acrobat software , and Google Drive24 25

both have built-in support for recognizing text on the page. This means that scanned PDF documents can beincluded in full text searches through a desktop search, or a Zotero or Evernote search if the document has

been imported into either of those applications. Researchers will have fewer things to look for in their hardcopy files, and more documents that can be instantly searched from their computers or mobile devices.

Anyone who has been involved in a digitization project knows the time it can take for a program to recognizethe characters on a scanned page. Saving to PDF format gets around this problem because the OCR canhappen in the background after the scan has taken place so that documents can be scanned as fast as thehardware is capable of scanning. One thing to remember, however, is that the quality of the original document

24 Anon. About Acrobat Pro. Adobe Acrobat. http://www.adobe.com/products/acrobatpro.html .25 Anon. About Google Drive. Google Drive. https://drive.google.com/start .

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will affect the quality of the character recognition. If scanning a photocopy of a fax, the character recognitionof printed text will probably not be very accurate once it is in a PDF document. Hand written characters anddrawings may or may not be recognized depending on the legibility of the writing. Nevertheless, the vastmajority of documents can be converted into a digital format and thereby be made searchable. From aresearcher's perspective digital Nirvana has almost been reached.

The cost of beginning to digitize paper can be very low. For example, an excellent iPhone document scannerapp for iPhones is JotNot Pro , which costs only $2. For your desktop computer or laptop, a quality double26

sided scanner, like the Fujitsu SnapScan s1500 , bundled with Adobe Acrobat Pro now costs about $400. 27

Illustration 8: JotNot Pro

3.4 Copyright and Cloud Security ConsiderationsIt is important to remember than when using apps like JotNot or Evernote, that all the usual copyright laws andregulations need to be respected, just as a researcher would when using a photocopier. That said, many

jurisdictions have fair use or fair dealing provisions in their copyright laws that allow for limited copyingunder specific circumstances. For example, the principle of fair use has been describe as the following: In

26 Anon. About JotNot Pro. JotNot Pro. http://itunes.apple.com/ca/app/jotnot-scanner-pro/id307868751?mt=8 .27 Anon. About Fujitsu SnapScan S1500. Fujitsu Global.http://www.fujitsu.com/global/services/computing/peripheral/scanners/product/s1500/ .

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United States copyright law, fair use is a doctrine that permits limited use of copyrighted material withoutacquiring permission from the rights holders. Examples of fair use include commentary, criticism, newsreporting, research, teaching, library archiving and scholarship. Researchers, if they have not already, should28

become familiar with copyright legislation in the jurisdiction where they live.

Cloud services raise interesting security and privacy issues that researchers need to be aware of. For example,

data stored on servers in the United States are subject to the Patriot Act, no matter where the owner of the29

data resides. American cloud services like Dropbox, Evernote and Google, who store their clients data inthe United States, can be compelled by law enforcement officials to give them their clients data, withoutnotifying the client. Depending on the type of research being done, this may or may not be a concern. In some

parts of the world, like Canada and the EU, local legislation prohibits public organizations from storing of personal data outside of their boundaries. A specific example of this is the province of British Columbia, inCanada, who specifically amended their legislation to prohibit the storage of health records outside of Canada.30

4.0 Finding What You Want When You WantDocument management can be as simple as an organized structure into which files may be placed, or ascomplex as a system that requires the entry of meta data for easier retrieval. This paper will not look at largeenterprise systems, but at the familiar file folder system of organizing documents on a computer's hard drive, or on a file server, as the case may be.

4.1 Manila File Folders

Below, illustration 9 is the file structure of a typical shared hard drive. The organizing principle that it uses isfile name sorted alphabetically. The larger the subject area is, the more sub folders are created, again bysubject, until the number of documents in each folder is reduced to a manageable number. This method of organization works very well when looking for a key word in a file name, but if looking for documentsauthored by a particular person, or for a particular word inside a file, the organization actually works againstthe user as it is necessary to look through many folders to try to find the desired documents. This can be ahuge time waster if the document is important enough that it has to be found.

28 Anon. Fair Use. Wikipedia. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fair_use .29 Gallagher, Sean. 2011. Ars Technica - Law & Disorder. Law & Disorder.http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/12/patriot-act-and-privacy-laws-take-a-bite-out-of-us-cloud-business.ars .30 Munn, Larry. British Columbias Privacy Laws Amended In Response to the USA Patriot Act. Clark Wilson LLP.http://www.cwilson.com/services/18-resource-centre/190-british-columbias-privacy-laws-amended-in-response-to-the-usa-patriot-act.html .

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http://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.cwilson.com%2Fservices%2F18-resource-centre%2F190-british-columbias-privacy-laws-amended-in-response-to-the-usa-patriot-act.html&sa=D&sntz=1&usg=AFQjCNHhcxuOPd7KmOtA4t8GDUB2NRq9Ywhttp://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.cwilson.com%2Fservices%2F18-resource-centre%2F190-british-columbias-privacy-laws-amended-in-response-to-the-usa-patriot-act.html&sa=D&sntz=1&usg=AFQjCNHhcxuOPd7KmOtA4t8GDUB2NRq9Ywhttp://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F%2Farstechnica.com%2Ftech-policy%2Fnews%2F2011%2F12%2Fpatriot-act-and-privacy-laws-take-a-bite-out-of-us-cloud-business.ars&sa=D&sntz=1&usg=AFQjCNFjNLAaRdWFV6igg5ByGoLQETVbHQhttp://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F%2Fen.wikipedia.org%2Fwiki%2FFair_use&sa=D&sntz=1&usg=AFQjCNFWJoKxboEItAbbX71e9mNc-IAwWg


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Illustration 9: Traditional File Management.

4.2 Desktop Search

The first research problem identified above was data sitting in a number of different silos (e.g. file system,email, web applications) and in different formats (e.g. Word, Excel, PDF, HTML), sometimes in multipleformats in the same silo! Fortunately, starting with Windows Vista in 2007 and OS X 10.4 in 2005 , useful31 32

desktop search tools have been included in the major desktop operating systems. Before 2007, Google alsooffered desktop search software, but have recently discontinued it. These desktop search engines run in the33

background on the computer and index every file that the user creates or puts on the hard drive. Once a file isindexed, the desktop search engine can perform a keyword search on the whole document seeminglyinstantaneously. As the keywords are typed in they start to display the documents that it thinks most closelymatch the search in real time. This makes it quick and easy to refine the search. One must experience it toappreciate how well it works. Here is a video that shows Windows 7 Desktop Search in action .34

31 Anon. 2012. Windows Vista. Wikipedia. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Vista .32 Anon. 2012. Spotlight (software). Wikipedia. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spotlight_(software) .33 Anon. 2011. Inside Google Desktop. Google Desktop Update.http://googledesktop.blogspot.com/2011/09/google-desktop-update.html .34 Anon. 2009. Windows 7 - Windows Search. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JkQ7XSlC3qw .

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Illustration 10: OS X Desktop Search (Spotlight) 35

Desktop Search makes it so much easier to find documents that there is no reason not to use it. Researchers,however, should be aware of some of the limitations of both Mac and Windows desktop search tools. First of all, if you are connected to network drives at home or in a workplace, desktop search tools do notautomatically index and search share drives. On the other hand, if you use a utility like Dropbox , iCloud 36 37

Google Drive or SkyDrive the the search tools work very well, as those services put a copy of your files on38your local hard drive, thus making them searchable. Secondly, desktop search tools do not necessarily searchthe data in non -Apple or non-Microsoft applications. For example, users of the popular Evernote program39

cannot search data they have stored in that application using the Windows desktop search, but instead have touse the built in Evernote search tool (OS X desktop search does not have this limitation). This may or may not

be a problem, depending on how the search tools are used by the researcher. An interesting work around thatsome third party tools like Evernote are employing, is to create browser plug-ins to allow Google websearches to include their local application data in the results. While not an optimal search method for local data,it has proved helpful to the author.

Another issue that is becoming more prominent with the increasing use and reliance on webmail , is that40

desktop search engines do not index and search webmail data. For this reason, even if the researcher uses a

35 Robert Harder. 2011. Spotlight Serching at the Command Line. Robert Harder, Think Harder Not Smarter.http://blog.iharder.net/2011/04/05/spotlight-searching-at-the-command-line/ .36 https://www.dropbox.com/37 https://www.icloud.com/38 http://skydrive.live.com/39 http://evernote.com/40 McCue, Rich. UVic Law Student Technology Survey 2011. Richs Random Thoughts.http://richmccue.com/2011/09/14/uvic-law-student-technology-survey-2011/ .

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web interface for their email, they should seriously consider setting up a native mail client to download their email locally (typically using the IMAP email protocol) to make it visible to their desktop search engine. OnOS X the built-in mail client can be used to access webmail services like Gmail, and with Windows, Outlook isa good choice. Here is a video that shows how to setup Gmail on the OS X mail client .41

5.0 Research Collaboration in the 21st CenturyThere are many different aspects of research collaboration. Traditionally researchers have collaborated withtheir colleagues by having face to face discussions, exchanging letters, e-mail and talking on the telephone.Depending on how physically close colleagues are to each other they would use each of these methods of communication to a greater or lesser extent.

New products and services have not only made it easier, less time consuming and less expensive to collaboratewith colleagues at a distance, but have also reduced the amount of time and effort it takes to undertakecollaborative research or paper writing with colleagues who are locally based.

5.1 Voice, Video and Desktop Conferencing

For many professors, the telephone is still their primary means of real time communication with their research partners. But for a number of reasons, younger researchers are opting to use more feature -rich digital toolsinstead of telephones.

Illustration 11: Basic Skype features.

Skype is a widely used program for making free voice, conference and video calls over the internet to anyoneelse who is also running Skype on their computer or mobile device. Best of all the software is free to42

download and its basic features are also free to use. Skype does offer some fee based services, like calling toland lines or cell phones, and multi-point video conferencing. On the other hand Skype to Skype voice andvideo calls are free. Skype also allows you to share your desktop with others which can be useful for reviewing documents with colleagues in real time, showing PowerPoint presentations and reviewing web basedmaterials together. Other Skype features include:

File transfers: send that file on the screen to the person being talked to. Security: Skype automatically encrypts everything before sending it through the internet. Chat: For long distance communications, Skype is arguably easier to use than the international long

41 Anon. 2011. Mac OS X Lion 101: Setting up a Mail Account on Apple Mail 5.0.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ogA3xA2aXy8 .42 Anon. About Skype. Skype. http://www.skype.com/intl/en-us/features/ .

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distance telephone system. Skype also provides a fee based service for using Skype to make calls to aregular telephone for colleagues who do not have access to high speed internet.

Google Talk and Google Hangouts are newer products and are not yet as widely used as Skype, but they43

offer all of the features that Skype has, plus a few extras that may be useful for some researchers. First of all,for a group of researchers, Google Hangouts allows researchers to conduct private or public video conference

with up to ten people at one time, and the option to broadcast to thousands via Google+ and YouTube.44

Skype also offers group video conferencing, but at least one user needs to be a paying user of Skype, andthere is no Skype facility to broadcast the meeting beyond ten people.

Another feature built into Google Hangouts is the ability to not only share the view of a computer desktop orwindows (similar to Skype), but to share a Google Document, and allow participants to co-edit the documentin real time. Here is a video that gives a brief demonstration of the main collaboration features of GoogleHangouts , including co-editing documents while videoconferencing. 45

Illustration 12: Google Hangouts.

Google Hangouts and Skype are both available on iPhone, iPad and Android devices for when the researcher finds her or himself away from a computer. Both support audio and video calls, and Google Hangoutssupports multi person video calls for free.

43 Anon. About Google Hangouts. Google Plus Help.http://support.google.com/plus/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=1215273 .44 Anon. Hangouts On Air. Google+ Support.http://support.google.com/plus/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=1669903&rd=1 .45 Anon. 2011. Google Hangouts with Extras: A Brief Demonstration. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5SHXOjTYewo .

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5.2 Real Time Collaborative Document Editing

The ability to have a central, secure location available over the internet to store master copies of documentscan help research groups avoid a lot of coordination headaches. Many groups of researchers are still usinge-mail to distribute documents for editing. While this is a great improvement over mailing or faxing documents,it does introduce the problem of knowing who has the most current version of the document or documents.There are few things more frustrating than putting significant time into working on a document, and then findingout that someone else has also done significant work on the same section of the document, necessitating a timeconsuming manual merging of the documents.

There are several products available that allow groups to share and edit documents over the internet. Some of of the more popular products include, Google Docs , Microsoft Skydirve , Zoho Office and Microsoft 3646 47 48

. They not only allow for the sharing of documents, but they also give groups the ability to co-edit documents49

in real time from any internet connected computer. This helps groups avoid the duplicate editing of documents,and also allows more than one researcher to edit the document at the same time. If a particular document isimportant to a member of the group, he/she can subscribe to that document so that they are notified bye-mail any time someone edits the document. Here is a video that shows some of the key advantages of 50

collaboration services. The document management features alone are often sufficiently valuable to convincemany groups to use them, but there are additional features that are also useful to research groups.

Illustration 13: Google Docs. Two users co-editing a document & its comments in real time.

Basic version control functionality is built into all the products mentioned above. This feature makes it easy tosee how a document has evolved over time, and allows the group to recover sections of the document that

46 Anon. About Google Docs. Google Docs Help. http://support.google.com/docs/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=49008 .47 Anon. About Skydrive. Microsoft Skydrive. http://explore.live.com/skydrive .48 Anon. About Zoho Office. Zoho Office. http://www.zoho.com/ .49 Anon. About Office 365. Microsoft Office 365. http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/office365/ .50 Anon. 2010. Introducing a New Google Docs. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6_hJ3R8jEZM .

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may have been removed or modified at some point in the editing process. The need for version controltypically increases exponentially with the number of authors editing a document.

Illustration 14: Google Docs. Version Control.

Another feature that most collaboration suites include is an integrated commenting system for threadeddiscussions about a particular document, or individual comments about a specific block of text. These toolscan be very helpful in allowing all participants to read what others in the group think, and then weigh in withtheir own positions, without modifying the text of the document.

The collaboration suites all have basic calendaring tools so that groups can keep track of important dates andmilestones. Task managers can help a group assign responsibilities for research tasks, and then keep track of their status. Different privileges for elements of the collaboration suite can be assigned to members of thegroup. For example, some members of the group may be given only read and comment access to thedocument; they can see and review documents and participate in the bulletin board section of the site, but theycannot modify the documents.

The good news for researchers on a tight budget is that most of the collaboration suites can be used with littleor no cost. Many universities have licensed products like Google Docs and Microsoft SharePoint 2010 or later (which is a locally hosted version of Office 365) for their community members, so before spending anymoney on software or services, researchers should check with department and campus IT departments.

Service Cost Notes

Google Docs Free or $50 / year All research related functionality is available in the free versi but the paid version comes with a service level agreements(SLAs) and increased storage capacity.51

51 Internet service providers will commonly include service level agreements within the terms of their contracts withcustomers to define the level(s) of service being sold in plain language terms. In this case the SLA will typically have a

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MS SkyDrive Free

Zoho Office Free or $36 / year Basic document editing and sharing can be done for free. Othfeatures can be added for small fees as needed.

Office 365 From $72 / year This is Microsofts business version of SkyDrive. It is basical

SharePoint in the cloud, and comes with a service levelagreements (SLAs).

5.2 File Sharing and Document Version Control

Lastly, for researchers who would like to use a more a traditional, if somewhat less capable, form of documentcollaboration, there are file synchronization tools available like, Dropbox , Google Drive , iCloud and52 53 54

Box.net . All these tools facilitate document collaboration, but significantly, only one user at a time can edit a55

document (unlike the tools mentioned above in section 5.2 ). Depending on how a research group functions,

and how quickly they need to do their writing, this may or may not be an important consideration. Here is avideo that demonstrates some of the key features of this product type .56

Researchers typically use file synchronization software in the following manner: When Dropbox is installed on acomputer, a Dropbox folder is created. Any document placed in that folder is synchronized between allcomputers using the same Dropbox account. Most commonly, a researcher with a laptop and a desktopcomputer will use Dropbox to synchronize files between the two machines. The researcher can also createsub-folders for projects, and then share specific folders with other collaborators. If any file is updated in aDropbox managed folder, those changes are immediately synchronized to all computers sharing that file. If acomputer is turned off when the file is updated, then the file will the synchronized the next time it connects tothe internet. Google Drive functions in a very similar manner.

technical definition in terms of mean time between failures (MTBF) - Anon. 2012. Service-level Agreement. Wikipedia.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Service-level_agreement .52 Anon. About Dropbox. Dropbox. https://www.dropbox.com/tour .53 Anon. About Google Drive. Google Drive. https://drive.google.com/start .54 Anon. About iCloud. Apple iCloud. http://www.apple.com/icloud/ .55 Anon. About Box.net. Box.net. http://box.com/personal/ .56 Anon. 2009. Box - Business Collaboration Software. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IcjgqQTPFx4 .

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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IcjgqQTPFx4http://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F%2Fbox.com%2Fpersonal%2F&sa=D&sntz=1&usg=AFQjCNEQ0b3J3U9Kw6ITBgMvdxRYMnHI9whttp://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.apple.com%2Ficloud%2F&sa=D&sntz=1&usg=AFQjCNEf9Y8Dk1lhWgJ3UxlW_AgRMQ_ntAhttps://drive.google.com/starthttps://drive.google.com/starthttps://www.google.com/url?q=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.dropbox.com%2Ftour&sa=D&sntz=1&usg=AFQjCNH0JQfrHSm-dZ0RssUVPylaOayvKghttp://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F%2Fen.wikipedia.org%2Fwiki%2FService-level_agreement&sa=D&sntz=1&usg=AFQjCNF-0D5SorHXqHTgorgC8NnhDarwmAhttp://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F%2Fen.wikipedia.org%2Fwiki%2FMTBF&sa=D&sntz=1&usg=AFQjCNGR-YuEU35rNqFdKWaMs0o92Pz20Ahttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IcjgqQTPFx4http://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F%2Fbox.com%2Fpersonal%2F&sa=D&sntz=1&usg=AFQjCNEQ0b3J3U9Kw6ITBgMvdxRYMnHI9whttp://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.apple.com%2Ficloud%2F&sa=D&sntz=1&usg=AFQjCNEf9Y8Dk1lhWgJ3UxlW_AgRMQ_ntAhttps://drive.google.com/starthttps://www.google.com/url?q=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.dropbox.com%2Ftour&sa=D&sntz=1&usg=AFQjCNH0JQfrHSm-dZ0RssUVPylaOayvKghttp://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.microsoft.com%2Fen-us%2Foffice365%2Fcompare-plans.aspx%23fbid%3DAFI_Ju4yM0Z&sa=D&sntz=1&usg=AFQjCNFxuDZFztQJ6hRSEk_9oRtYbOi9jAhttp://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.zoho.com%2Fpricing.html&sa=D&sntz=1&usg=AFQjCNFywHT3v5gYXTZRLXNcQhtfARMVqw


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Illustration 15: Dropbox synchronizing files across multiple machines and platforms.

All the products mentioned above support basic version control, but some, like Box.net, do not include it withtheir free service. The biggest benefit to using this kind of document collaboration tool over one of theco-editing capable tools, is the minimal amount of training necessary to get a researcher up to speed and

productive.

6.0 The Right Hardware for ResearchersOnce all the appropriate software has been provided to a researcher, one needs to assess the hardware she is

using to insure that it is sufficient for the job. This step is often overlooked unless the researchers computer isobviously out of date. It should be noted that real, quantifiable productivity gains can be made for mostresearchers with a modest investment in the right kinds of additional hardware.

6.1 A Second Monitor for Increased Productivity

Here is a quotation from a law professor at the University of Victoria, Faculty of Law , after she reluctantly57

tried using a second monitor with her desktop computer: "Until you've tried working with two displays hookedup to your computer, you cannot believe how much of a difference it can make to your productivity whendoing online research." For example, on one monitor one can have a word processor to do composition, andon the other monitor, a web browser where the research is found and referenced. As was mentioned, this

same faculty member was resistant when she was first asked to try a dual monitor setup, but now she wouldhave difficulty going back to a single monitor given her estimate of a 30% time savings by using two monitors(or one very large monitor).

57 Anon. University of Victoria Faculty of Law Home Page. UVic Faculty of Law. http://law.uvic.ca/ .

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Illustration 16: A tri-monitor setup with a laptop driving two additional monitors.

Her estimate is backed up by research conducted by Microsoft where they compared the productivity of individuals using a single 15 monitor to using a customized three monitor setup. The research showed a 9%58

productivity gain for users who work with multiple windows on their desktop and need to switch back andforth between those windows on a regular basis, which is typical of many researchers. Given that the subjectsof the research were exposed to the three monitor desktop configuration for only an hour, one suspects thatadditional productivity gains would be realized over time as they modified their work habits to take advantageof the additional desktop work space. In comparing this to other hardware and software changes Microsoftresearchers have examined, this change to the desktop environment (three monitors instead of one) provided

by far the greatest productivity gain they have measured. The cost of facilitating this 10% increase in productivity is currently between $150 and $250 dollars. Laptop users can also take advantage of a dual59monitor configuration by using their laptop's built in monitor in conjunction with a second monitor. Thedifference that a second or third monitor can make for a researcher who often has multiple web browser tabsopen along with a word processor, is measurable and significant.

Another option is to use a tablet device as a second monitor. With the Air Display software running on yourlaptop (PC or Mac) and your tablet (iOS or Android), it is possible to connect the two devices together over the wi-fi network they share. For most research tasks, this setup works quite well. It should be noted60

however, that because of the slight lag between the devices, playing video on the tablet screen, is notadvisable. The small tablet screen size and the slight lag make this a good solution for researchers looking for a portable dual monitor setup. For a researchers primary workstation it is recommended that a second

58 Hutchings, Dugald Ralph, Greg Smith, Brian Meyers, Mary Czerwinski, and George Robertson. 2004. Display Space Usageand Window Management Operation Comparisons Between Single Monitor and Multiple Monitor Users. In Proceedings of the Working Conference on Advanced Visual Interfaces, 3239. AVI 04. New York, NY, USA: ACM.doi:10.1145/989863.989867. http://doi.acm.org/10.1145/989863.989867 .59This assumes the extra monitor will cost between $200 and $300 dollars, and that the computer the researcher is usingcomes with a "dual head" video card. Dual head video cards typically come standard on most mid range desktop computers,and are typically a $50 option on most enterprise desktop computers. Ask about this before you buy your next computer tomake sure that you can easily upgrade to the second monitor.60 Anon. About Air Display. Air Display. http://avatron.com/apps/air-display .

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monitor be purchased.

6.2 Mobile Devices & Software

When a researcher is away from her office, mobile devices can be of great value in allowing her to continueresearching and collaboration as desired. The most useful, but also the most bulky device for mobile use,especially in libraries and when traveling to conferences, is a laptop. That said there is a wide range in laptopsize and capabilities, ranging from a 2.4lb, 11.8 screen MacBook Air to a 7.1lb, 17.3 screen Dell Inspiron61

17R . In the past laptops were often noticeably less powerful than their desktop counterparts when62

performing typical research tasks like switching back and forth between browser tabs, and editing a documentin a word processor. Fortunately all but the least expensive of modern laptops can now comfortably handle thetypical work load of a researcher just as easily as can a desktop computer.

Additionally almost all laptops can power a second external monitor if the laptop is also the researchers primary computer. This puts the power and flexibility of all the collaboration and research tools alreadymentioned in the hands of the researcher no matter where she finds herself. An added bonus for theenvironmentally conscious is that laptops typically consume about a quarter of the energy of a comparably

powerful desktop computer.

61 Anon. Apple MacBook Air. MacBook Air. http://www.apple.com/macbookair/ .62 Anon. Dell Inspiron 17R. http://www1.ca.dell.com/ca/en/corp/Laptops/inspiron-17r/pd.aspx?refid=inspiron-17r&s=corp .

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http://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F%2Fwww1.ca.dell.com%2Fca%2Fen%2Fcorp%2FLaptops%2Finspiron-17r%2Fpd.aspx%3Frefid%3Dinspiron-17r%26s%3Dcorp&sa=D&sntz=1&usg=AFQjCNFGi8-USioWxxU4I7z5c6TH8nsvEQhttp://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.apple.com%2Fmacbookair%2F&sa=D&sntz=1&usg=AFQjCNEW-98wDWgsIuWXwVjcIFD99ZpNEAhttp://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F%2Fwww1.ca.dell.com%2Fca%2Fen%2Fcorp%2FLaptops%2Finspiron-17r%2Fpd.aspx%3Frefid%3Dinspiron-17r%26s%3Dcorp&sa=D&sntz=1&usg=AFQjCNFGi8-USioWxxU4I7z5c6TH8nsvEQhttp://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F%2Fwww1.ca.dell.com%2Fca%2Fen%2Fcorp%2FLaptops%2Finspiron-17r%2Fpd.aspx%3Frefid%3Dinspiron-17r%26s%3Dcorp&sa=D&sntz=1&usg=AFQjCNFGi8-USioWxxU4I7z5c6TH8nsvEQhttp://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.apple.com%2Fmacbookair%2F&sa=D&sntz=1&usg=AFQjCNEW-98wDWgsIuWXwVjcIFD99ZpNEA


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Illustration 17: The size difference between 11, 13 and 17 laptop computers. 63

Smart phones are another valuable tool for the modern researcher. Besides the obvious voice call capabilitythat has been the primary use for cell phones for years, newer devices like the iPhone and Android phonesallow researchers to participate in person to person video calls, as well as video conferences using Skype andGoogle +s hangout feature respectively. 64

Much of the software already recommended for laptop and desktop computers is also available on most smart phones: Evernote, OneNote, DropBox, Skype, Google+. There are other mobile apps like Documents to GoPremium - Office Suite that allow a smart phone to access and edit documents in a researchers DropBox65

and Google Doc accounts. Additionally, using an app like JotNot Pro can turn your smart phone into a66

photocopy like device, that can capture pages of text and put them into a PDF file . Lastly, the latest iPhone67

and Android phones feature built in dictation software so that researchers can avoid the painful process of typing with their thumbs and simply dictate to their phone and allow the phone to convert the voice to text.While not 100% accurate, this software can be extremely useful when a researcher is not able to easily accessa computer with a keyboard. Here is video of Apples Siri software .68

Tablets and eBook readers are being used more and more as research tools. While not as flexible and powerful as laptops, tablets are typically lighter, easier to carry, have a longer battery life and are better

63 King, Alex. 2010. 11 Air, 13 Air, 17" Pro (size Footprint). http://www.flickr.com/photos/alexkingorg/5120598161/ .64 Anon. Google Mobile. Google Plus Mobile App. http://www.google.com/mobile/+/ .65 Anon. Drocuments To Go Premium - Office Suite. Drocuments To Go Premium - Office Suite.http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/documents-to-go-premium-office/id317107309?mt=8 .66 McCue, Rich. How to Edit Docs on Your iPad or iPhone & Sync Them with Your Computer. Richs Random Thoughts.http://richmccue.com/2011/05/17/how-to-edit-docs-on-your-ipad-sync-them-with-your-computer/ .67 Anon. About JotNot Pro. JotNot Pro. http://itunes.apple.com/ca/app/jotnot-scanner-pro/id307868751?mt=8 .68 Apple Inc. 2011. Apple iPhone 4S Siri Video Tutorial 1st Look. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nZSkvwpBBok .

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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nZSkvwpBBokhttp://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F%2Fitunes.apple.com%2Fca%2Fapp%2Fjotnot-scanner-pro%2Fid307868751%3Fmt%3D8&sa=D&sntz=1&usg=AFQjCNGAMdc7AeI5JhbLn2r4aEj0q6Cvbghttp://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F%2Frichmccue.com%2F2011%2F05%2F17%2Fhow-to-edit-docs-on-your-ipad-sync-them-with-your-computer%2F&sa=D&sntz=1&usg=AFQjCNF03cu4B1KuVARK09P8FGmo-ZE3BAhttp://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F%2Fitunes.apple.com%2Fus%2Fapp%2Fdocuments-to-go-premium-office%2Fid317107309%3Fmt%3D8&sa=D&sntz=1&usg=AFQjCNEH3DgDXLhDj5pyloy7WX6IpjaaHwhttp://www.google.com/mobile/+/http://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.flickr.com%2Fphotos%2Falexkingorg%2F5120598161%2F&sa=D&sntz=1&usg=AFQjCNGfjo-izKdUmVkHoa1xr4BRrVO5ughttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nZSkvwpBBokhttp://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F%2Fitunes.apple.com%2Fca%2Fapp%2Fjotnot-scanner-pro%2Fid307868751%3Fmt%3D8&sa=D&sntz=1&usg=AFQjCNGAMdc7AeI5JhbLn2r4aEj0q6Cvbghttp://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F%2Fitunes.apple.com%2Fus%2Fapp%2Fdocuments-to-go-premium-office%2Fid317107309%3Fmt%3D8&sa=D&sntz=1&usg=AFQjCNEH3DgDXLhDj5pyloy7WX6IpjaaHwhttp://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F%2Fitunes.apple.com%2Fus%2Fapp%2Fdocuments-to-go-premium-office%2Fid317107309%3Fmt%3D8&sa=D&sntz=1&usg=AFQjCNEH3DgDXLhDj5pyloy7WX6IpjaaHwhttp://www.google.com/mobile/+/


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reading devices. Their smaller form factor does make them a better device for reading books and longer documents than laptops. Depending on an individuals personal preference, a back-lit screen,like that of theiPad, may be suitable for reading long documents, but for some these screens cause eye strain. If eye strain isan issue, tablets that use eInk , like the Amazon Kindle Touch, are an option to consider as they are not69

back-lit and are reportedly easier on many peoples eyes even after reading for long periods of time. The tradeoff is that eInk devices are strictly for reading, while most back-lit tablets support the same books, plus

multi-media text books, web browsing, video, email and more.70

Illustration 18: A plethora of table devices 71

Another area where back-lit tablets can be helpful is in note taking. While their virtual keyboards take somegetting used to, and for many make note taking less efficient, an app like Notability allows the researcher to72

record the audio of a class, and sync it with the text that was typed in. This enables the researcher to skip toany point in the audio recording via pointing at any note. This is particularly useful if the researcher is havingtrouble deciphering the notes, or if he only wants to take light notes and refer primarily to the audio recording.

7.0 Backing Up Your Digital Life

69 Wikipedia contributors. 2012. E Ink. Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=E_Ink&oldid=485278546 .70Falcone, John P. 2012. Kindle Vs. Nook Vs. iPad: Which E-book Reader Should You Buy? Cnet, March 13.http://news.cnet.com/8301-17938_105-20009738-1/kindle-vs-nook-vs-ipad-which-e-book-reader-should-you-buy/ .71 Keith, Jeremy. Tablets. http://www.flickr.com/photos/adactio/6005668024/sizes/l/in/photostream/.72 Anon. Notability. Notability. http://itunes.apple.com/ca/app/notability-take-notes-annotate/id360593530?mt=8.

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The authors dentist years ago told him, dont brush all your teeth, just the ones you want to keep. Id saythe same thing about your digital documents and photos. Dont backup all your files, just the ones you want tokeep! For most researchers, this will be all their data files.

A couple of years ago a student visited the authors office with a new laptop, and a sad story. She related thatthere had been a fire in the basement suite where she was living, and her laptop, and the external hard drive

she had been using to back up her hard drive both were both destroyed in the fire. A very sad story, especiallysince she had made a real effort to backup her data, but still lost it all. What could she have done differently?Having an off site backup along with her external hard drive backup would have made a decisive difference.An off site backup service nowadays means using an internet based service like CrashPlan , or Mozy .73 74

Another option would be to use services like DropBox (2gb free) , Google Drive (5gb free) , iCloud (5gb75 76

free) or Skydrive (25gb free) to synchronize your key Documents folder across computers, via an77 78

internet based cloud service (effectively backing up your key documents off site).

Illustration 19: Laptop catches fire... 79

Fire, theft and natural disasters are difficult to predict, however hard drive failure is predictable. On average, if someone owns a computer for four years, they have an approximately 1 in 10 chance of loosing their data dueto hard drive failure. Those odds alone should be sufficient encouragement for anyone who is pointed in the80

direction of a potential solution, to do something about it. For all important data, researchers should implement

73 Anon. Crash Plan. Crash Plan. http://www.crashplan.com/ .74 Anon. Mozy Home. Mozy Home Free. http://mozy.com/home/free/ .75 Anon. About DropBox. DropBox. https://www.dropbox.com/ .76 Anon. About Google Drive. Google Drive. https://drive.google.com/start .77 Anon. iCloud. Apple iCloud. http://www.apple.com/icloud/ .78 Anon. SkyDrive. Microsoft SkyDrive. http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/skydrive/home .79 Butterfield, Stewart. 2006. Obey Your Battery Recall Notices. http://www.flickr.com/photos/stewart/248442701/ .80 Bryan, Chaffen. 2010. French Retailer Data Offers SSD Failure Rates. The Mac Observer.http://www.macobserver.com/tmo/article/french_retailer_data_offers_ssd_failure_rates/ .

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a 3-2-1 backup strategy .81

Keep 3 copies of important files (one primary and two backups). Have files on 2 different media types (for example one on your hard drive and one in an internet

backup service). At least 1 copy should be stored off site (in case of disaster or theft).

This backup arrangement makes if very unlikely that someone would not be able to recover their files in almostany scenario imaginable, including a fire, theft and natural disasters like Hurricane Catriona.

8.0 ConclusionsVannevar Bush had some amazing insights into how to solve the problem of dealing with large quantities of documents and large amounts of information accumulated over the course of a project or the course of acareer. The technology he used to try to solve the problem was not up to the task, but the seeds were planted.We can now realize his vision in our digital, wired age; all that is needed is to acquire the hardware and the

software necessary to capture, organize and share information in ways that even Vannevar would have had ahard time imagining. The productivity gains he foresaw are ripe for the taking.

The two major benefits that come from effectively using digital capture, search and collaboration tools, are anincrease in the speed and quality of the research being performed. Less time is spent looking for informationthat has already been identified or created, so that more time can be spent in analyzing and associatingdisparate pieces of information. Modern electronic research tools, like Zotero & Evernote , make the collectioof research data, and collaboration between colleagues possible that in the past would have been difficult,expensive, or impossible. They also save large amounts of time citing and creating bibliographies. Free voiceand group video conferencing services, like Google+ Hangouts and Skype , can facilitate real timecollaboration at a fraction of the cost in time and money of flying members of a research team to a central

location. Online collaboration tools like Google Docs and Microsoft SkyDrive can greatly facilitate groupdocument creation and editing, in real time if needed.

Once researchers have the appropriate software to manage their data and help them collaborate, they need tomake sure that they also have the appropriate hardware and infrastructure to take full advantage of the benefitsthe new software will give them. Access to an uncongested high speed internet connection is a must for videoand voice conferencing, as well as real time document editing. An average desktop computer with twomonitors (or one very large monitor), instead of the traditional single monitor, will give researchers a 10% +

boost in productivity . Mobile devices, including laptops, tablets and smart phones can be of great value inallowing researchers to conduct their research & collaborate with colleagues where ever and when ever theydesire. With more and more research materials being created and remaining digital, the backup of researchdata is becoming increasing important. Fortunately, easy to use online backup services are making it simple toautomatically backup all a researchers data.

Whether they realize it or not, most researchers are struggling with the mountains of digital data that they aregenerating and have accumulated during their studies and careers. If shown the tools available to them to find,capture and collaborate, many, if not most, will be able to use these tools to increase their productivity and

81 Krogh, Peter. 2012. Backup Overview. Digital Photograpy Best Practices and Workflow.http://www.dpbestflow.org/backup/backup-overview#321 .

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effectively manage and collaborate with their data.

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