Digital research data and Figshare

• Metadata is data about data; it helps others understand your data.
• Metadata gives answers to the questions of why, what, when, where, how and by whom the data was collected. so they can be used by other researchers.
• Data is only citable only when deposited in an online repository accompanied with metadata.

OneDrive is a file-hosting service that is available to all City staff and students as part of their Office 365 Email Service and it can store 1TB of data. You can access it by following these steps:

• Log into your City webmail
• Select the menu button on the left-hand side of your screen
• Select the OneDrive icon.

If you are working on a project with external collaborators, you can share your document through OneDrive so multiple users can access (and work) on the same document simultaneously.

Once you have accessed OneDrive, you can share a document in the following way:

• In OneDrive, select the document you want to share by clicking the white circle that appears before the file name
• Select 'Share' in the toolbar above the document list
• Select 'People you specify can edit' from the menu
• Adjust permissions according to your needs (for example if you want to make the document editable only to specific people) and select 'Apply'
• Use the 'Send' function to send a link to participants, or select 'Copy link' to copy a link for you to use in other communications.

Data responsibilities of the Principal Investigator

Responsibility for the accuracy, completeness and security of research evidence during a project should lie with the principal investigator.

Figshare can also be used as a private storage space.

It is important to highlight that if you are working with collaborators and you want to edit the same files simultaneously, it is better to use OneDrive instead of Figshare More information is proved in the next section.

You can store any types of digital content on your private account securely. The storage is as safe as if you stored your files on the University's OneDrive and much safer than a local hard drive or memory stick.

You can set up collaboration spaces on Figshare and control who can access and edit the files. This could be useful if many researchers work on the same files and version control is important. However, if people need to edit the same files simultaneously it is better to use OneDrive instead of Figshare. Final files could then be uploaded to Figshare for storage or publishing.

• The primary aim of the service is to showcase research outputs to the world by making them more discoverable and accessible.
• Publishing an item on Figshare will generate a permanent digital object identifier (doi) for that item, so it's easy to cite by you or other researchers.
• Publishing your research outputs on Figshare will give you credit for all your work and increase the visibility and impact of your research.
• Published items are harvested by Google Scholar, ORCID as well as City's CRO system, so your items will appear on your academic profile on the City website.
• Do not publish anything on Figshare that has already been published elsewhere or has a doi.
• Published academic papers should be uploaded to the CRO system 3 months within their acceptance.

You can restrict access to your files but still make the basic metadata publicly available. This way you could protect the confidentiality of the content but still let the world know that the research material exist, when it was created and by whom. If anyone is interested in accessing the material they would need to liaise with City for access (if appropriate).

There are many valid reasons why you want to keep your research outputs confidential, for example to:

• maintain confidentiality of commercially sensitive information;
• protect participants' privacy;
• maintain exclusive use of the data for an embargo period before writing up the research;
• maintain confidentiality of intellectual property;
• protect the researchers' or participants' safety or national security;
• respect the primary data owner's license restrictions (if you work with secondary data e.g. NHS or ONS).

• You can use Figshare as a catalogue to record all of your outputs (non-digital and digital).
• You can use Figshare as a catalogue for digital outputs stored elsewhere (e.g. in the UK Data Archive or a subject specific repository).
• Recording all your research outputs on Figshare would ensure you get credit and more visibility for all your research and the University has a full picture of all research outputs generated at City.