Data in and out

Once you have a new workspace, one of the most important first steps is to upload your research data. How do you go about this? And what are the things to look out for? Bringing data in is one thing, but getting it out is another. What if you produce files and results that you want include in research outputs, or if you have files that you need to archive? Fortunately, this is also possible in myDRE, although there are some approval mechanisms in place.

Let's start at the beginning: bringing data into the workspace. Everyone in the workspace can upload data, whether they're from Radboud UMC for example, or another organization. The most common and approachable way to bring data from your organization into your workspace, is through the myDRE portal. 

We will show you how that's done.

To ensure integrity and auditability of data, every upload is in principle wrapped up in a container, with a default title indicating the date, time and up-loader placed in the Inbox folder on the data drive (Z:). Let's discover together how this works in the video below.

Uploading through the DRE portal is by far the most popular method to bring data into your workspace. But there is an alternative option. This one works through the Azure Storage Explorer, which is an application that you can install on your own local computer. With this application you can reliably execute larger uploads to your DRE workspace.

Move files outside the workspace

We've now seen how you can bring data into the Workspace. But what if you want to move files outside the Workspace? For instance so you can use them in your research outputs, or to publish and/or archive data? This is also possible in myDRE. Workspace members can create data requests to move files outside the Workspace. It's specifically a request, as the Accountable or a Privileged Member has to approve it. By having this approval mechanism in place, the Accountable and Privileged Members can keep track of what files are copied to which places. That's part of having control over where data ends up.

There are two types of data requests: one is the download request if approved, this allows the requester to download the files to their own computer. The other is the transfer request, this is about moving files from one Workspace to the other. That can also be pretty handy sometimes!

Let's see how you can submit either type of request.