Not That Kind of Doctor - Upgrade Your Academic Technology Game: Must-Have Tools & Smart Backups
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02/09/2024
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In this episode of Not That Kind of Doctor, Guy and Nick dive into the often overlooked, yet crucial, tools that can streamline your academic life. From managing your references to analyzing data and backing up your work, they cover the essential technologies every researcher should consider.
🎓 What You'll Learn:
Why starting with a Reference Management System (RMS) early in your academic career can save you time and headaches down the line (5:00)
The benefits of various RMS tools like EndNote and how they can fit into your writing workflow (7:00)
How to choose the right data analysis software for your qualitative and quantitative research needs (16:00)
The importance of backing up your data regularly and strategies for ensuring your work is secure and accessible (30:00)
Practical tips for navigating the learning curves of new academic software and integrating them into your routine (26:00)
Whether you're a grad student just starting out or a seasoned researcher, this episode is packed with advice on how to make technology work for you, not against you. Join us as we discuss the tools that can help you be more efficient, effective, and prepared for the challenges of academic life.
Like, comment, and subscribe for more episodes where we explore the tools and strategies to thrive in academia. 🎓✨
#AcademicTools #ResearchTech #DataManagement #EfficiencyInAcademia #GraduateStudentLife #AcademicLifeHack
Technology - Not That Kind of Doctor with Nick Husbye and Guy Trainin
www.youtube.com/@tltenotthatkindofdoctor
Searchable Transcript
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- [00:00:00.233](bright upbeat music)
- [00:00:10.873]I just listened to a podcast about human sacrifice.
- [00:00:15.180]Anyway.
- [00:00:16.890]What am I supposed to do with that information?
- [00:00:19.620]What I'm saying is
- [00:00:21.270]that it took us a long time to figure out
- [00:00:26.760]how the civilization thing works
- [00:00:29.850]and how it makes people's lives better.
- [00:00:33.150]I'm not sure if we figured that out, though.
- [00:00:36.990]Anyway.
- [00:00:38.790]Yes.
- [00:00:39.960]I feel like I'm gonna need a link to this podcast.
- [00:00:42.060]Yes. Because.
- [00:00:42.893]So this is a podcast
- [00:00:44.430]that right now is focused on early, prehistory, really.
- [00:00:50.580]In early, early history across, right now, China,
- [00:00:54.450]but across the world.
- [00:00:56.100]And you can see from records that,
- [00:00:59.580]especially in the last 20 years,
- [00:01:01.110]people have looked at that life when civilization emerges,
- [00:01:05.730]life actually gets worse.
- [00:01:07.560]Not better for most people.
- [00:01:09.780]For the people on top, it's fantastic, or it's better.
- [00:01:13.290]But for the vast majority of people,
- [00:01:16.020]it's actually worse than it used to be before.
- [00:01:18.450]From a health perspective, from all kinds of perspectives,
- [00:01:23.430]it is not as good and often much, much worse.
- [00:01:28.680]Diet is worse, life expectancy is worse.
- [00:01:33.507]It's an interesting thing
- [00:01:35.280]because I think we've been,
- [00:01:38.250]we have this vision of progress
- [00:01:40.620]and civilization as improving the outcomes for everybody.
- [00:01:44.970]That whole idea about lifts all boats.
- [00:01:48.810]And turns out not so much, not even remotely.
- [00:01:53.619]Really? So,
- [00:01:54.452]so, it really points out
- [00:01:56.160]that maybe the last 150 to 200 years were the anomaly
- [00:02:01.110]to the way history worked and not,
- [00:02:04.590]anyway.
- [00:02:05.423]Okay, well, to segue. (Guy laughs)
- [00:02:07.410]To segue into what you wanna talk about.
- [00:02:08.668]To segue, right, like,
- [00:02:11.100]so civilization doesn't necessarily improve life.
- [00:02:15.930]However, we're gonna talk about technology,
- [00:02:18.660]which is one of the tools that we utilize
- [00:02:20.970]to make our lives more efficient,
- [00:02:23.250]make our lives more streamlined,
- [00:02:24.660]make our lives, like, happier,
- [00:02:26.880]maybe, possibly? Happier.
- [00:02:28.260]I don't know.
- [00:02:29.640]This podcast might have.
- [00:02:30.570]Well, and I think there's a difference.
- [00:02:33.000]So if we want to draw back to that picture,
- [00:02:36.300]there's a difference between the big picture,
- [00:02:38.730]which may be that things are not as fantastic
- [00:02:42.270]and the individual lives
- [00:02:43.980]that within the structures that exist,
- [00:02:47.340]there are certain things about civilization,
- [00:02:49.950]in this case, technology,
- [00:02:51.030]that can improve your immediate life.
- [00:02:53.550]Does it improve everybody's life or life of humanity?
- [00:02:56.730]That is a different question.
- [00:02:58.680]And that question is more challenging,
- [00:03:02.040]but it's definitely true.
- [00:03:03.320]Do you know what's challenging?
- [00:03:04.560]Yeah?
- [00:03:05.393]Is making a link between starting with human sacrifice
- [00:03:10.020]and research technologies.
- [00:03:12.300]Yes. And yet I managed to do it.
- [00:03:15.390]Props.
- [00:03:16.380]Go me.
- [00:03:17.730]Super excited.
- [00:03:18.960]So today on "Not That Kind of a Doctor,"
- [00:03:20.700]that is exactly what we're talking about.
- [00:03:22.350]We're gonna talk about some of the technologies that we use-
- [00:03:25.410]And we will not be talking about human sacrifice,
- [00:03:27.840]just to clarify.
- [00:03:28.673]But maybe thinking about it potentially.
- [00:03:31.710]I don't know.
- [00:03:32.933]Preferably not.
- [00:03:34.590]I'm Guy Trainin, I'm a professor here at UNL.
- [00:03:37.110]I'm Nick Husbye, I'm an associate professor
- [00:03:39.180]of elementary literacy education K-6 here at UNL.
- [00:03:42.720]And we're gonna talk about different kinds of technologies
- [00:03:45.600]that can actually help you when you are in my emphasis.
- [00:03:48.810]So this idea is,
- [00:03:50.250]Nick and I were talking about
- [00:03:51.330]what are we gonna talk about today?
- [00:03:52.890]I came up with the idea of talking about software
- [00:03:56.040]that can make your life better as a researcher,
- [00:03:59.670]even as an instructor.
- [00:04:01.290]And I come to it from a realization I actually had,
- [00:04:04.920]and that is the time in my life
- [00:04:07.290]that I learned the most about software
- [00:04:08.940]that still carries me to this day
- [00:04:10.680]was when I was a graduate student
- [00:04:11.997]and a young assistant professor.
- [00:04:14.340]That's where I learned, and I kind of set a foundation.
- [00:04:17.220]And ever since then,
- [00:04:18.780]I've been using more or less, with some changes,
- [00:04:23.130]the same or a similar set of tools.
- [00:04:25.290]So they've become foundational to the way I work.
- [00:04:27.900]And I think partially it's because
- [00:04:30.930]that is a good time to start.
- [00:04:32.850]And that is the time where you have,
- [00:04:34.620]it feels like you don't have any time,
- [00:04:36.210]but it's actually the time that you have the most time
- [00:04:41.940]to dedicate to setting things up.
- [00:04:44.580]And because you're just starting out,
- [00:04:47.730]you have less to set up.
- [00:04:49.170]So I have right now, 20 something years of data
- [00:04:52.530]and things I've collected and all of that.
- [00:04:54.690]It's really hard to backfill that
- [00:04:57.450]into the first thing we're gonna talk about,
- [00:04:59.970]which is the reference management software.
- [00:05:02.670]RMS, I've learned. RMS.
- [00:05:04.890]Yes.
- [00:05:05.723]And so if you have a long career
- [00:05:09.000]and you've always kind of managed to search thing
- [00:05:11.790]and find them and drop them at the last minute into a paper
- [00:05:14.970]or collect them as you go,
- [00:05:17.280]then it's hard to take all of that that I've written about
- [00:05:21.660]and all the references I have and backfill it into a system.
- [00:05:24.990]But if you're starting out,
- [00:05:26.250]or if you're in the first few years of starting out,
- [00:05:29.040]it seems like a much more achievable project
- [00:05:32.190]that becomes just the way you work.
- [00:05:34.680]And my understanding is you do not use an RMS.
- [00:05:37.320]No, I do not.
- [00:05:38.460]I have tried multiple times,
- [00:05:41.580]but I always feel like this is too late for me.
- [00:05:45.420]And so- Okay.
- [00:05:46.860]So I wanna talk through a couple of things
- [00:05:48.450]that I think might be- Yes, absolutely.
- [00:05:49.283]might be helpful.
- [00:05:51.480]So one, let's talk about the different kinds of RMSs
- [00:05:54.660]that are out there.
- [00:05:56.550]RMS, reference management system.
- [00:05:59.130]When you're thinking about building
- [00:06:02.010]a sustainable writing practice in academia,
- [00:06:06.600]like, there's the reality
- [00:06:09.450]that you don't have these uninterrupted blocks
- [00:06:13.440]of time any longer.
- [00:06:15.240]You don't have, you know,
- [00:06:17.460]these huge spaces within which to do that work.
- [00:06:22.050]So really, you need to be able to be
- [00:06:24.270]as efficient as possible with the half-hour blocks
- [00:06:27.570]or the 15-minute blocks as you possibly can.
- [00:06:29.940]And RMS is our one way to do that.
- [00:06:34.230]And essentially, a reference management software
- [00:06:37.950]is going to allow you to, as you read articles,
- [00:06:44.370]log all of the bibliographic information
- [00:06:46.980]around those articles.
- [00:06:49.050]And typically, when we think about an RMS,
- [00:06:51.810]we think about the construction of the bibliography,
- [00:06:55.650]the construction of intact citations as you write,
- [00:07:02.070]which is super helpful, right?
- [00:07:03.690]When we're thinking about an efficiency standpoint,
- [00:07:06.480]that's one less thing that we then have to do.
- [00:07:09.540]And a really good RMS is going to allow you
- [00:07:14.220]to reference in a variety of different styles,
- [00:07:17.910]whether it's APA, or MLA, or Chicago, what have you.
- [00:07:21.870]So it's a nice piece of software to have
- [00:07:27.630]and to invest in as a,
- [00:07:30.930]it's kind of like, it is a little bit like a pet.
- [00:07:33.210]Like you have to feed it, you have to keep it,
- [00:07:35.550]you have to keep it up,
- [00:07:36.690]and just continually utilize it, right?
- [00:07:42.840]It's one thing to have it, it's another thing to utilize it.
- [00:07:47.460]It's like the Weight Watchers app.
- [00:07:50.111]You have to use the Weight Watchers app in order to,
- [00:07:53.430]you know? Yeah.
- [00:07:54.870]Lose the weight if that's what your weight goal is, right?
- [00:07:56.496]Watch your weight.
- [00:07:57.329]So, like, if my goal
- [00:07:58.560]is to be more efficient in my writing process,
- [00:08:01.410]I need to utilize my RMS.
- [00:08:03.600]So one of the first things that I look for
- [00:08:05.520]is really the features
- [00:08:08.220]of that reference management software,
- [00:08:12.060]and kind of the pinnacle of reference management is EndNote.
- [00:08:17.857]EndNote's been around forever. Forever.
- [00:08:20.490]It's probably one of the,
- [00:08:22.140]if not the first RMS that was out there.
- [00:08:26.490]And the nice thing about that,
- [00:08:31.170]the other thing to be thinking about
- [00:08:32.250]is the cost of this software, right?
- [00:08:35.070]So EndNote, you can buy just as a flat standalone.
- [00:08:40.110]Like, I'm kind of over subscriptions, can't tell a lie.
- [00:08:44.190]That's part of the reason I got rid of my last RMS.
- [00:08:47.340]Like I've moved from RMS to RMS to RMS
- [00:08:52.380]as features have evolved, right?
- [00:08:55.410]What works well with the Google Docs,
- [00:08:56.940]that's the environment within which I work.
- [00:08:58.620]Think about the environment within which you work.
- [00:09:00.870]Typically, if you're a Word person, EndNote's great.
- [00:09:05.524]If you're a Google Doc person now, EndNote is also great,
- [00:09:08.340]but it wasn't always great, right?
- [00:09:10.890]So be aware of what the features are
- [00:09:13.650]and what the limitations are.
- [00:09:16.290]And beyond that bibliographic element,
- [00:09:21.300]the other thing that I find that I look for
- [00:09:24.780]is integration with, particularly my iPad, my tablet.
- [00:09:31.620]That's where I read, that's where I annotate,
- [00:09:34.170]articles that I've collected.
- [00:09:37.020]I typically index all my subscriptions on browsing
- [00:09:40.170]and then import articles that are of interest,
- [00:09:43.590]read them, annotate them, upload them into my EndNote.
- [00:09:48.060]And that has created a much more streamlined process for me
- [00:09:54.720]as I try to shift reading to feed my writing
- [00:10:00.420]within the same system.
- [00:10:02.820]So if you are someone who, like yourself,
- [00:10:06.330]is like, "Oh, it's too late to get started."
- [00:10:09.090]Like, part of the friction there is,
- [00:10:12.367]"Oh my gosh, I can't use this
- [00:10:13.710]unless all of my back stuff is in there."
- [00:10:16.650]And I wanna push you- Okay, I'll be pushed.
- [00:10:20.010]to what happens if you just- Start it now.
- [00:10:24.960]start it with the stuff you're actually using
- [00:10:28.020]and the writing that you're doing, right?
- [00:10:30.300]Just the articles, the book chapters,
- [00:10:34.170]the websites that you are using for that piece right there,
- [00:10:38.970]'cause that's really all you need,
- [00:10:40.980]like, in order to get through
- [00:10:44.130]and make that piece of technology useful
- [00:10:46.860]for the writing that you're doing,
- [00:10:47.970]that's really all you need.
- [00:10:50.040]And the whole,
- [00:10:52.327]"Oh, but I need everything in there," is a distraction.
- [00:10:54.960]Yeah, it is a distraction.
- [00:10:56.190]And it can be a time waster.
- [00:10:58.020]So one of the things that I'm interested
- [00:10:59.880]when I look at the software package like that
- [00:11:02.160]is how easy it is to transition
- [00:11:04.440]from this software to another.
- [00:11:06.150]Because one is, EndNote has been with us for a long time,
- [00:11:08.880]but we're not sure it's gonna be here forever.
- [00:11:10.680]What happens if one day it ends
- [00:11:12.510]and you still need to take all your information
- [00:11:15.360]and go somewhere else?
- [00:11:16.193]It also allows you, if you decide this is not good enough,
- [00:11:19.770]to pack it up and go.
- [00:11:21.300]And I think most RMSs are pretty good
- [00:11:23.460]about being able to export.
- [00:11:25.980]Yeah, having, I was in a situation,
- [00:11:28.080]I was using an RMS called Papers.
- [00:11:32.190]It played really well with Macs.
- [00:11:33.570]This was at a time
- [00:11:34.440]where not all the RMSs played well with Mac.
- [00:11:37.680]Mac was becoming more and more of a power player
- [00:11:41.160]in terms of machines,
- [00:11:42.930]and it got bought out, and overnight this update happened,
- [00:11:47.430]and I didn't recognize what my RMS was anymore,
- [00:11:50.730]so I switched over to a different RMS Paperpile,
- [00:11:54.390]and I've moved, I've jumped from,
- [00:11:58.830]I'm kind of the opposite where I've jumped from RMS to RMS,
- [00:12:02.772]to RMS, to RMS to RMS.
- [00:12:04.530]And for the most part, it functions well.
- [00:12:11.490]Like, I think in this last I'd recently,
- [00:12:14.580]I recently went into EndNote this summer,
- [00:12:17.190]and as I am importing 20 plus years of citations,
- [00:12:24.840]I had maybe like 5% that were like, "This is incomplete."
- [00:12:30.990]Okay, I'll deal with those when I have to.
- [00:12:33.360]I'm not gonna worry about them right now, right?
- [00:12:35.040]So, like, I find it productive
- [00:12:40.170]to keep in mind what the technology,
- [00:12:42.300]the purpose of the technology
- [00:12:43.380]is not for me to collect all these things.
- [00:12:44.850]These are not Stanley cups, right?
- [00:12:48.150]But it is to help me write more efficiently.
- [00:12:51.450]Are the articles,
- [00:12:52.860]are the book chapters that I need right now in there,
- [00:12:56.280]and are they accurate?
- [00:12:57.450]Great. Moving on.
- [00:12:59.820]I will deal with those, that 5% when it becomes important.
- [00:13:04.020]Do I even need that 5%?
- [00:13:05.392]If it becomes important.
- [00:13:06.598]If it becomes important, right?
- [00:13:07.710]Yeah. Yeah.
- [00:13:09.240]So I think there's,
- [00:13:10.980]it's a use the tool, don't let the tool use you.
- [00:13:14.670]Yeah, and that's a really important thing
- [00:13:16.440]about any of these pieces of software.
- [00:13:18.420]There's always going to be a painful learning curve
- [00:13:21.870]and usability curve that's going to happen early on.
- [00:13:26.130]And that's fine.
- [00:13:27.480]But if that pain continues indefinitely,
- [00:13:30.120]you're just doing the wrong thing,
- [00:13:31.890]and you need to choose something that is a better fit.
- [00:13:36.960]And it's also, I've learned, for some people,
- [00:13:39.660]it's a way to really procrastinate
- [00:13:45.510]while seemingly productive.
- [00:13:48.060]And that is, you can overspend time on a piece of software
- [00:13:51.930]and avoid the real work that needs to be done
- [00:13:54.150]because you are going back 20 years
- [00:13:56.430]and trying to fix all of this.
- [00:13:57.390]Productive procrastination, right?
- [00:13:58.863]Yes. Yes.
- [00:13:59.696]If my kitchen is sparkling clean,
- [00:14:01.140]I have been engaging in productive procrastination,
- [00:14:03.330]that is a sign.
- [00:14:05.160]Yes.
- [00:14:06.150]That is a sign.
- [00:14:07.140]Yeah. Right?
- [00:14:08.160]So yeah.
- [00:14:09.926]Don't do that.
- [00:14:10.759]But also recognize that as you're using that tool,
- [00:14:16.890]and I've become more and more aware of this
- [00:14:18.690]as I moved from one system to the next,
- [00:14:21.960]is when you're starting to utilize a new tool,
- [00:14:26.940]it's going to take time.
- [00:14:28.410]Yeah. For sure.
- [00:14:29.550]It's going to feel like,
- [00:14:31.897]"Oh, this is not saving me any time."
- [00:14:35.499]I've found myself as I'm moving into EndNote,
- [00:14:38.553]and, I mean, it's what?
- [00:14:42.510]I've been using it now for six months.
- [00:14:45.292]Oh, that's all? Six months-ish.
- [00:14:46.860]Okay.
- [00:14:47.730]And it is,
- [00:14:51.000]I remember when I first started it, going,
- [00:14:54.397]"Oh my gosh, this takes so much time."
- [00:14:57.090]Well, of course it does.
- [00:14:57.923]I'm learning a whole new system.
- [00:14:59.190]Like I need to be able to suck at this
- [00:15:01.800]for a little bit before it becomes efficient.
- [00:15:04.800]And now it's so much more efficient, right?
- [00:15:07.830]Like, I've gotten the EndNote click thing figured out,
- [00:15:11.850]and I've got it speaking to my,
- [00:15:14.940]I've got it speaking to my Google Drive.
- [00:15:18.657]And dah, dah, dah, dah.
- [00:15:19.490]Like, all of that is figured out.
- [00:15:21.270]But I would say the first three months
- [00:15:23.070]was a lot of reminding myself of this is new, this is okay.
- [00:15:29.190]And this is probably why I haven't engaged.
- [00:15:31.650]Because the truth is that the citation,
- [00:15:34.380]really, the emphasis on citations happen
- [00:15:36.450]at the end of writing.
- [00:15:38.250]And so you can ignore it for the longest time
- [00:15:41.430]and just put empty parenthesis
- [00:15:43.380]or, you know, something that reminds you of,
- [00:15:46.530]and then at the end, you suddenly have a pile of work
- [00:15:49.350]that you could have completely avoided
- [00:15:50.880]by having a good piece of software
- [00:15:53.880]that would just make that transition so much easier.
- [00:15:56.640]And then you don't get the comments about, you know,
- [00:15:59.460]you're formatting on your references.
- [00:16:02.610]And it's just fairly painful to go through
- [00:16:05.880]and attend to all of those details.
- [00:16:08.490]So that's where it comes super,
- [00:16:11.460]I would argue super helpful at the end point.
- [00:16:14.670]And that's easy to avoid at the beginning, so.
- [00:16:17.817]And I think about that as we transition from that,
- [00:16:21.900]if that's okay, to talk about data analysis.
- [00:16:24.900]So in data analysis,
- [00:16:26.670]there are great pieces of software, quote,
- [00:16:28.297]"for quantitative analysis,"
- [00:16:29.880]that have been there for a long time.
- [00:16:31.530]And again, I think that learning them
- [00:16:33.540]while you're taking the classes
- [00:16:34.920]that do that work is fantastic
- [00:16:37.140]because then people help and guide you
- [00:16:39.030]and give you a lot of references,
- [00:16:40.800]probably a few books that help you work through them.
- [00:16:43.800]So that's useful.
- [00:16:44.880]And that has been done a lot.
- [00:16:46.230]On the qualitative side,
- [00:16:47.700]there are quite a few interesting pieces
- [00:16:49.770]of software out there.
- [00:16:52.650]But I know a lot of people who don't work with any software.
- [00:16:56.190]And I think it's the same problem as with the RMS.
- [00:17:00.150]And that is, if you have a piece of software,
- [00:17:03.380]it really becomes easier to go back
- [00:17:07.440]and reinforce and add to, and be more agile with it.
- [00:17:12.090]And if you don't, can you do the analysis? Absolutely.
- [00:17:15.480]People do that all the time.
- [00:17:16.680]And it also depends, obviously, in qualitative,
- [00:17:19.800]what kind of qualitative analysis you do.
- [00:17:22.650]But that ability to add to it, to layer it,
- [00:17:27.270]to ask interesting questions depending on where the data is,
- [00:17:31.980]becomes much, much stronger
- [00:17:33.780]where you have a piece of software.
- [00:17:35.280]Because if you do it manually,
- [00:17:37.260]there's a point where your brain is saying,
- [00:17:38.917]"That's enough," right?
- [00:17:40.777]"You can't add to this
- [00:17:43.050]because it's more than I can contain."
- [00:17:45.090]And software just leverage that, leverages that.
- [00:17:48.077]Right, software helps you manage, right?
- [00:17:50.850]And make sense of in slightly different ways,
- [00:17:56.010]and this is again,
- [00:17:58.920]if you're a grad student
- [00:18:00.090]and you're thinking about qualitative data software
- [00:18:04.950]or SPSS, a quantitative software,
- [00:18:08.850]any kind of software really
- [00:18:10.050]is going to cost some amount of money
- [00:18:12.270]if it's not provided to you by your institution.
- [00:18:16.830]And so the first thing that I always try to think through
- [00:18:20.730]as I'm thinking about a software for analysis is,
- [00:18:23.670]what are the functions that I need?
- [00:18:24.990]What are the demands of the project that I'm working with?
- [00:18:28.560]And then two, what is my budget?
- [00:18:31.200]And do I have, again,
- [00:18:33.720]can I sustain a subscription model for a piece of software?
- [00:18:37.980]I really like Deduce.
- [00:18:39.000]Deduce is a qualitative software platform,
- [00:18:44.970]but it's a subscription.
- [00:18:46.530]So every month it's- Yeah, I know.
- [00:18:48.990]like $17.
- [00:18:50.713]I get that announcement on my Deduce.
- [00:18:52.920]You have not paid in a while.
- [00:18:54.510]Yep. Yeah.
- [00:18:55.470]And so I've, not sponsored,
- [00:18:58.530]the qualitative software and analysis
- [00:19:03.180]that I like the most is Transana.
- [00:19:07.920]I've used them since grad school, which is a very long time.
- [00:19:15.180]There's two things that are important with Transana
- [00:19:17.700]that I've really appreciated is one,
- [00:19:22.440]it handles a wide variety of data and data format.
- [00:19:27.000]So, like, I can analyze PDFs, I can analyze audio,
- [00:19:30.660]I can analyze video, I can analyze text,
- [00:19:33.300]it tackles it all.
- [00:19:36.120]And David Woods,
- [00:19:38.640]who's one of the original creators of the software,
- [00:19:41.400]like, if you email him, he responds back
- [00:19:45.300]within, like, 48 hours.
- [00:19:47.160]Like, that's what I aspire to
- [00:19:50.340]is returning email in 48 hours.
- [00:19:52.440]And he somehow manages to do it
- [00:19:54.540]and will literally talk you through
- [00:19:56.970]or be like- Whatever you're doing, yeah.
- [00:19:58.391]here's the tutorial.
- [00:19:59.700]And, or take feedback.
- [00:20:01.340]'Cause like PDFs was something I was begging for,
- [00:20:05.250]and he was like, "Yep, no problem.
- [00:20:08.036]Here it finally is.
- [00:20:09.660]Like, thanks for thanks for being patient."
- [00:20:12.660]And it works well, right?
- [00:20:15.690]And so, thinking through not only cost,
- [00:20:19.320]but like, what is going to give you
- [00:20:22.050]the most bang for your buck?
- [00:20:22.950]What is gonna be not just for this project
- [00:20:26.310]but adaptable to other projects?
- [00:20:28.080]And that's where asking around
- [00:20:30.600]and looking at comments online.
- [00:20:33.420]Because one thing that is hidden until you get the product
- [00:20:36.330]and start interacting is the customer support.
- [00:20:39.720]And customer support is critical
- [00:20:41.250]because all of these pieces of software,
- [00:20:43.680]there's a moment where you're like,
- [00:20:45.007]"I need to help figuring this out.
- [00:20:47.490]And I can probably do that, but I don't have the time."
- [00:20:50.130]And somebody has figured that out.
- [00:20:52.020]So understanding if there are user groups,
- [00:20:55.470]that's one option.
- [00:20:56.400]And the other option is how long before they respond to you
- [00:21:00.150]and give you support.
- [00:21:00.983]I started with ATLAS.ti as a graduate student.
- [00:21:03.510]It's still my preference,
- [00:21:05.010]although I've used Deduce.
- [00:21:06.000]I've used a number of them,
- [00:21:07.590]but they've always been fairly responsive.
- [00:21:10.530]And so it was,
- [00:21:13.890]and they have the two options.
- [00:21:15.540]So they, for example, just as an example,
- [00:21:17.580]again, thinking about cost,
- [00:21:18.870]they have a permanent license, just buy, download.
- [00:21:22.590]You don't get a lot of updates.
- [00:21:23.880]So you get an updates up to a point,
- [00:21:25.680]but it'll keep working on your machine.
- [00:21:28.320]They'll keep supporting it.
- [00:21:29.760]You just won't have the newest best thing maybe,
- [00:21:33.240]or maybe you will,
- [00:21:34.650]but they also have a subscription model
- [00:21:36.810]that you can start off
- [00:21:38.460]and keep paying on whatever annual, semi-annual, or monthly.
- [00:21:43.470]Everybody's got all of these pricing structures.
- [00:21:46.020]I agree with you.
- [00:21:46.980]I like paying once
- [00:21:48.090]and knowing that I have a piece of software
- [00:21:49.680]instead of trying to remember to renew every month
- [00:21:52.710]or just when I need, and all of that.
- [00:21:55.500]That creates just more friction where I need no friction.
- [00:21:58.590]I just need to be able to go and do the analysis.
- [00:22:02.430]And I'm also a little bit worried
- [00:22:04.200]about having our data floating in the ether,
- [00:22:06.750]and we trust them to create,
- [00:22:10.590]to make sure that there's protections.
- [00:22:12.480]But the minute it gets sent into the cloud,
- [00:22:15.090]I'm a little bit worried, so you need to de-identify before.
- [00:22:18.600]And there's just more layers that you have to go through
- [00:22:21.960]to make sure that if anything happens,
- [00:22:25.230]that your participants are predicted as you promised to.
- [00:22:28.800]Right, right. And that's-
- [00:22:30.540]And that's something to consider.
- [00:22:31.770]So those are the things that I think about.
- [00:22:33.750]But again, starting early.
- [00:22:35.700]Buy it when you're a graduate student, or try it out.
- [00:22:37.920]It's usually priced for graduate students
- [00:22:40.080]in a different way,
- [00:22:41.400]so that's easy.
- [00:22:42.480]And if you get a position and you're starting somewhere,
- [00:22:46.710]use your startup funds to get your basic software needs.
- [00:22:49.650]And again, perpetual licenses are better
- [00:22:51.600]because startup funds are once.
- [00:22:53.910]You get them when you start, and then you don't have them.
- [00:22:56.400]So not having to maintain licenses
- [00:22:59.970]would make your life a lot easier to manage
- [00:23:02.610]when you're earning less
- [00:23:04.590]and you're very likely to use these pieces
- [00:23:07.290]of software repeatedly.
- [00:23:09.840]Right.
- [00:23:10.673]And I think to,
- [00:23:14.730]to come back to a larger theme,
- [00:23:16.620]like, don't worry about starting early.
- [00:23:18.600]Just worry about starting.
- [00:23:19.740]Yeah. Yeah, absolutely.
- [00:23:21.270]Wherever you are.
- [00:23:22.380]Like, just start,
- [00:23:26.220]and use it as you need in that moment.
- [00:23:30.030]Like there's no need to backfill, right?
- [00:23:34.320]I also recently updated my Transana.
- [00:23:37.530]The other thing that I like about, again, not sponsored,
- [00:23:40.500]not a subscription,
- [00:23:42.810]but they do have this process by which you get the next,
- [00:23:47.130]I believe it's the next update
- [00:23:48.808]for a very reduced price, Reduced fee.
- [00:23:52.440]which is always nice, that that's out there.
- [00:23:58.140]But like the,
- [00:24:00.210]with some of the new features, again,
- [00:24:02.250]that notion of like,
- [00:24:03.690]it's taken me a little while to get used to them,
- [00:24:05.670]and they're really handy.
- [00:24:07.500]But again, I'm wrestling with that.
- [00:24:09.210]Like, I already know this software, this should be easier.
- [00:24:13.440]Yes, but this is a new feature,
- [00:24:16.170]and this is something that's gonna really help me
- [00:24:18.810]so it's worth investing in.
- [00:24:21.480]I also did not backload all of my old projects.
- [00:24:26.340]Oh yeah, for sure. That's an easier thing.
- [00:24:28.680]Those all live on my external hard drive.
- [00:24:30.810]If I need them, they're there.
- [00:24:32.550]But because I've worked with Transana for so many years,
- [00:24:37.350]they're there.
- [00:24:38.280]I know I have them.
- [00:24:39.540]Like my dissertation,
- [00:24:40.590]I still have all those Transana files,
- [00:24:42.480]so, like, I can go back to those if I need to.
- [00:24:45.630]Yeah.
- [00:24:47.580]But yeah, I think the biggest thing is,
- [00:24:51.570]is start and take advantage of free trials of things.
- [00:24:58.440]And if they give you two,
- [00:25:01.560]I know a lot of RMSs, for instance,
- [00:25:04.230]I'm working with RMSs with grad students in 953,
- [00:25:08.760]our academic writing class.
- [00:25:10.710]And I ask them to take different RMSs for test drives
- [00:25:15.180]and for two weeks, really use those RMSs,
- [00:25:19.320]and what do they look like,
- [00:25:20.250]and what do you like about this one,
- [00:25:22.230]and what do you like about this one?
- [00:25:24.330]And if they already have an RMS,
- [00:25:27.554]they tend to stick with the one that they've already got.
- [00:25:29.550]Which makes sense, right?
- [00:25:31.020]Up to a point.
- [00:25:31.890]But I think that idea of a test drive with an RMS,
- [00:25:36.810]because there are issues around ease of use
- [00:25:39.930]on both on the entry
- [00:25:41.640]and on how easy it is to merge into your software.
- [00:25:44.790]And suddenly you find out that thing
- [00:25:46.740]is so much better than what I'm using,
- [00:25:48.600]it's worth switching to.
- [00:25:49.800]Same thing with data analysis, I would argue.
- [00:25:51.540]And I've had some students, like, switch RMSs, right?
- [00:25:56.430]And same thing with, again, that analysis piece.
- [00:25:59.490]Like, if you've got,
- [00:26:01.170]if you get a month free subscription,
- [00:26:04.830]what's a chunk of analysis
- [00:26:06.600]that you can do in depth for a month?
- [00:26:08.790]Get a sense of how that software works.
- [00:26:11.610]Is that gonna work
- [00:26:12.600]when you explode it into a larger project?
- [00:26:16.620]Is that going to make sense for you, right?
- [00:26:19.770]So taking advantage of those
- [00:26:20.940]because you don't want to invest, not a ton of money,
- [00:26:25.770]but, like, some of these,
- [00:26:26.730]some of these programs are expensive.
- [00:26:27.960]Some of the software is expensive.
- [00:26:29.340]So you don't want to, you don't want to invest in,
- [00:26:34.710]it's like you don't wanna invest in clothes you don't wear-
- [00:26:37.320]That is definitely true.
- [00:26:38.520]you don't wanna invest in software
- [00:26:39.960]that you're not gonna use. Absolutely.
- [00:26:41.940]It may not be the, like, most streamlined,
- [00:26:46.170]like Transcend is not particularly streamlined.
- [00:26:48.240]However, it gets the job done, and I like it.
- [00:26:51.630]And that's important.
- [00:26:52.800]Eventually it is,
- [00:26:54.060]there's a point where it's just as important.
- [00:26:57.000]I mean, there might be something
- [00:26:58.050]that is a little bit better,
- [00:26:59.220]but if it's a little bit better,
- [00:27:00.420]but you know the thing you have
- [00:27:02.610]and you know how to make it go,
- [00:27:03.930]that's going, the efficiency there is tremendous.
- [00:27:07.260]I'm trying to remember,
- [00:27:08.093]what was the qualitative software?
- [00:27:10.890]It was really popular, like three or four years ago.
- [00:27:13.320]Studio, something.
- [00:27:17.160]I don't know.
- [00:27:18.000]It'll come to me.
- [00:27:19.290]I could never play around with it
- [00:27:20.340]because it was, like- Inaccessible.
- [00:27:23.070]a thousand dollars.
- [00:27:24.270]Oh, okay. Yeah.
- [00:27:26.730]And that just was not, that's not in my budget.
- [00:27:30.180]I don't have money for that.
- [00:27:31.830]And that's been always one of those questions,
- [00:27:35.160]the question of price is a really important question,
- [00:27:37.800]and that's what sometimes turns you off
- [00:27:39.330]from a piece of software.
- [00:27:40.500]For a while, SPSS when they got bought up by IBM,
- [00:27:45.090]the price jumped, and it became impossible
- [00:27:48.000]to really have a full license.
- [00:27:49.710]I used to have an SPSS with all the bells and whistles,
- [00:27:53.490]and I had to give all the bells and whistles away.
- [00:27:56.040]Now I, in quantitative, which is more my jam in many ways,
- [00:28:02.460]I have three or four pieces of software that I use,
- [00:28:05.250]depending on what I want.
- [00:28:06.390]So SPSS is really good for me
- [00:28:07.890]for just getting quick results.
- [00:28:09.420]But the agility and the ability to do some programming
- [00:28:13.320]and get finer-grained results leads me back to SaaS usually,
- [00:28:18.332]and I use also HLM.
- [00:28:21.180]So it really depended for a long time
- [00:28:23.640]about what was the use case, going back to use case.
- [00:28:27.870]And in qualitative, I've used a few as well.
- [00:28:30.570]So it's gotta be something manageable
- [00:28:33.030]from a cost perspective because you can't hold all of these.
- [00:28:35.820]Now more and more campuses create campus-wide licenses.
- [00:28:40.770]We definitely do with the survey with Qualtrics,
- [00:28:43.920]which is great
- [00:28:44.940]because then you don't have to spend the money
- [00:28:47.070]and it is secure,
- [00:28:48.780]which is really important when you're conducting research,
- [00:28:51.450]unlike throwing something on Google Forms
- [00:28:55.080]and hoping that it'll be okay.
- [00:28:57.772]Which I'm seeing way too much, to be honest.
- [00:29:00.540]And so those are the things that are kind of on my mind
- [00:29:03.420]as you're trying to find what you can get.
- [00:29:06.360]So as a graduate student, go and try things out.
- [00:29:09.030]As a young assistant professor.
- [00:29:10.590]But actually, at any point, get the trial period.
- [00:29:13.703]Start. Two weeks.
- [00:29:15.360]Start. Do something with it,
- [00:29:17.100]see if it works for you.
- [00:29:18.150]You'll find something that is so much more amazing.
- [00:29:20.880]Or it's like, no, I like what I have, and that's fine.
- [00:29:23.820]But don't avoid trying
- [00:29:26.400]just because this is what you have
- [00:29:29.229]and this is what you know.
- [00:29:31.350]Try to move forward.
- [00:29:32.490]Says the person.
- [00:29:33.480]It's good to date every once in a while.
- [00:29:34.500]Put yourself out there, you know?
- [00:29:37.320]Just as long as,
- [00:29:39.450]as long as it's, you know, ethical.
- [00:29:41.820]But, like, you know, like,
- [00:29:43.740]see what else is out there every once in a while.
- [00:29:45.600]What is happening?
- [00:29:47.430]Could you use it?
- [00:29:48.510]And then, if you go back to what you,
- [00:29:50.250]if you go back to your comfort zone,
- [00:29:54.840]it's perfectly fine, right?
- [00:29:57.180]But, like, if there's stuff out there
- [00:29:58.260]that will allow you to do things differently,
- [00:30:00.840]it pushes your ability
- [00:30:02.400]to think through what's possible, right?
- [00:30:04.680]Like Deduce has pushed me to think
- [00:30:06.180]through different ways to use Transana
- [00:30:09.090]minus the monthly subscription fee, right?
- [00:30:12.480]Resolution for 2024. Get my financial house in order.
- [00:30:16.350]So no subscriptions. At all?
- [00:30:20.670]Lies.
- [00:30:21.664]I do have a cycle for streaming services.
- [00:30:24.540]So I am in an HBO Max and Amazon Prime phase.
- [00:30:29.839]That's my cyclist streaming life at the moment.
- [00:30:32.640]We're gonna move into Hulu as Amazon Prime goes away.
- [00:30:37.200]But, like, trying to be better
- [00:30:39.390]'cause oof those subscriptions.
- [00:30:41.580]Yeah.
- [00:30:42.690]I did want to bring out also an important point
- [00:30:45.900]about cloud storage, or storage in general,
- [00:30:48.750]and especially as a graduate student,
- [00:30:51.090]but even as a faculty member,
- [00:30:53.070]realizing that you're not gonna be forever
- [00:30:55.920]at the same place,
- [00:30:56.850]says the person who's been here for 22 years.
- [00:30:59.100]But you have to think about if and when, right?
- [00:31:06.167]You are moving, you get a job as a graduate student,
- [00:31:08.580]or you move to a new institution,
- [00:31:10.920]you have to think about how does your data move with you.
- [00:31:13.890]Because the institution always provides cloud storage,
- [00:31:17.400]but it is the institution's cloud storage, not yours.
- [00:31:20.700]So you have to think about,
- [00:31:22.440]do I have an external drive where I back things up?
- [00:31:26.100]Do I have a cloud storage
- [00:31:28.470]that is not linked to my university
- [00:31:30.900]that I can back up some files,
- [00:31:33.510]and you have to think about security,
- [00:31:35.190]but definitely ownership there.
- [00:31:38.640]So as someone who has not been here for 22 years,
- [00:31:41.040]and who has moved institutions a couple of different times.
- [00:31:46.050]One thing to keep in mind is like when you leave a position,
- [00:31:53.160]when you come into a position, you get a laptop, right?
- [00:31:56.370]Or a computer of some sort.
- [00:31:57.960]When you leave a position, you give up that laptop too.
- [00:32:01.470]So you have to think through what is your plan
- [00:32:07.050]for technology transition, right?
- [00:32:10.650]In between those jobs when you're,
- [00:32:13.350]when you are moving from being a graduate student
- [00:32:17.940]to being an assistant professor.
- [00:32:19.530]And then, if you move, what is your plan for that?
- [00:32:23.670]I've always fallen on the side of,
- [00:32:28.740]I like a good encrypted, solid-state drive, quite honestly.
- [00:32:34.380]It backs up nightly.
- [00:32:37.650]It just helps me feel better about, like, where's my data?
- [00:32:41.730]And I literally have images of every computer
- [00:32:45.180]from dissertation computer on that hard drive.
- [00:32:50.970]That's one of those things that I bought myself.
- [00:32:55.500]Because with startup funds,
- [00:32:57.690]technically, the institution still owns that technology.
- [00:33:01.260]So if it's something that I am moving with,
- [00:33:05.850]and at that point, I didn't have enough money
- [00:33:07.860]to buy a totally separate computer, right?
- [00:33:10.740]So I bought a hard drive,
- [00:33:13.560]and that's what I used as a transitionary point.
- [00:33:16.230]And then when I moved here,
- [00:33:18.150]I don't know if you remember that summer
- [00:33:19.140]trying to work on that grant,
- [00:33:20.700]and I was working on my iPad Pro, that was not a smart move.
- [00:33:25.290]Like, that was not a productive.
- [00:33:27.390]Like, I was able to be somewhat productive.
- [00:33:29.340]But it's not a productivity device.
- [00:33:31.020]No, it is not.
- [00:33:31.860]So I don't think that I would go in that direction again.
- [00:33:37.380]But if you're looking to avoid, again that subscription,
- [00:33:43.770]solid-state drive,
- [00:33:45.930]you can use it as a backup on your computer,
- [00:33:47.490]which you should normally do anyway.
- [00:33:50.070]And then that provides a transitionary plan
- [00:33:54.330]as you move from one device to the next,
- [00:33:56.100]one institution to the next.
- [00:33:57.420]And even within institutions,
- [00:33:59.430]as your computer, you know,
- [00:34:01.530]wears out and you move into a new computer,
- [00:34:04.890]that's helpful to just,
- [00:34:07.140]oh, got a new computer, I'm gonna hook up my SSD.
- [00:34:10.530]And I can get everything, yeah.
- [00:34:12.180]Poof.
- [00:34:13.013]It's, you know,
- [00:34:14.549]it's like River Song in "Dr. Who."
- [00:34:17.340]It's just there, right?
- [00:34:18.900]That's a good reference.
- [00:34:19.950]And, you know, like, it just,
- [00:34:21.420]it lives in the hard drive and poof.
- [00:34:23.340]It's like I don't have a new computer,
- [00:34:26.130]but I have a new computer.
- [00:34:27.510]It's faster, but all my stuff is here.
- [00:34:29.670]It's like the best-case scenario for moving.
- [00:34:33.750]Yeah, that's actually, if you have that,
- [00:34:36.060]it's the easiest part of moving.
- [00:34:37.680]Oh yeah, no, it's totally the easiest part of moving, so.
- [00:34:40.167]And that's the thing,
- [00:34:41.550]because having seen a few people go through,
- [00:34:44.597]"Oh, oops, my computer has crapped up."
- [00:34:50.220]If you are backed up, the transition is minimal.
- [00:34:53.520]It really becomes just a box, and you can use any other box,
- [00:34:57.630]and within a few minutes you have access to everything,
- [00:35:00.540]so you've lost nothing, and that's good.
- [00:35:03.000]Well, and I think that, I think backing things up
- [00:35:07.380]is perhaps if you take anything from this podcast,
- [00:35:14.184]I think it would be to back your stuff up
- [00:35:18.930]and have that somewhere that's not on this computer.
- [00:35:21.630]Because regardless of,
- [00:35:23.640]you might have the best RMS software,
- [00:35:26.100]the best analysis software,
- [00:35:28.140]and you might have done all this beautiful work.
- [00:35:30.240]It ain't gonna matter if your computer fails
- [00:35:33.000]and you don't have that backed up somewhere.
- [00:35:35.280]So if you're thinking about utilizing this software,
- [00:35:40.140]think about that backup plan,
- [00:35:43.740]because stuff happens.
- [00:35:45.600]Yes, absolutely. Stuff happens.
- [00:35:47.400]Videos disappear, right?
- [00:35:50.820]Things go away.
- [00:35:52.590]And then, if you have a backup to go back to,
- [00:35:57.000]like, that's essential.
- [00:36:01.050]Don't assume it's always gonna be there.
- [00:36:02.730]Yeah, and once you do,
- [00:36:04.620]and this was my experience the last few times
- [00:36:06.780]when I had a problem with my computer,
- [00:36:08.790]is I borrowed another computer
- [00:36:10.650]just for a period while this one.
- [00:36:12.330]It's like, you know, the car is in the shop
- [00:36:14.490]and I've got a replacement car,
- [00:36:17.160]but within five minutes I'm running.
- [00:36:20.190]It's like, it doesn't matter, really.
- [00:36:22.620]It's just a box. Instantly moving.
- [00:36:23.910]Yeah. Right, right.
- [00:36:25.530]Like, things should not,
- [00:36:28.080]this should not be the home, right?
- [00:36:29.730]This is the tool for things, right?
- [00:36:32.430]This is really the interface at this point in our lives.
- [00:36:35.340]Yeah. All right.
- [00:36:36.450]So we've talked about RMSs.
- [00:36:40.110]We talked about- Analytical software.
- [00:36:43.680]And finally, back things up.
- [00:36:46.560]Back that hard drive up, back it up.
- [00:36:51.150]Make like a pickup truck, put it in reverse, and back it up.
- [00:36:56.730]Yep.
- [00:36:58.767]Is that, like, enough? That is it.
- [00:37:01.343]Okay. We are done.
- [00:37:02.826](upbeat music)
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