The Economic and Social Data Service (ESDS) Kevin Schürer ESDS/UKDA ESDS Awareness Day 5 December 2003
What is the ESDS? new national data archiving and dissemination service, running from 1 Jan 2003 jointly supported by: –Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) –Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC) initial five year funding commitment
UK Data Archive, Essex MIMAS, Manchester Cathie Marsh Centre for Census and Survey Research (CCSR), Manchester Institute of Social and Economic Research (ISER), Essex Partners
ESDS Overview provides access and support for key economic and social data distributed service, bringing together centres of expertise in data creation, dissemination, preservation and use provides seamless and easier access to a range of disparate resources for UK Higher and Further Education sectors core archiving services plus four specialist data services
Sources of data Data for research and teaching purposes and used in all sectors and for many different disciplines official agencies - mainly central government international statistical time series individual academics - research grants market research agencies public records/historical sources qualitative and quantitative links to UK census data access to international data via links with other data archives worldwide
Collection held at UKDA 4,000+ datasets in the collection 200+ new datasets are added each year 6,500+ orders for data per year 18,000+ datasets distributed worldwide p.a. history data service in-house (AHDS)
ESDS Core Services ESDS Management –central 'first stop' help desk service –coherent and flexible collections development policy –central registration service operating across the ESDS –universal data portal ESDS Access and Preservation –collections development strategy –ingest activities - including data and documentation processing –metadata creation –data dissemination services –long-term preservation
Joining up ESRC –joined-up portfolio (e.g. Question Bank, ULSC, Census) –implementation of ESRC Datasets Policy –ESRC Information Strategy –e-Science initiatives JISC –interoperability standards –Development Strategy Group Digital Preservation Coalition, NA/PRO
Specialist data services ESDS Government ESDS International ESDS Longitudinal ESDS Qualidata greater emphasis on: value-added data and documentation enhanced resource discovery improved delivery services support and training for the secondary use of data for research, learning and teaching outreach and promotion
Enhanced access to data one-stop registration and Athens –important part of ESRCs goal of establishing a common entry point for all socio-economic data –extension of the Census Registration Service enhanced data delivery: –Download Now service and Nesstar online data delivery: ESDS International online data delivery: ESDS Qualidata
Accessing data web access to data and metadata data are freely available for the majority of users data supplied in a variety of formats –statistical package formats (e.g. SPSS) –databases and spreadsheets –word processed documents –pdf documents
Online access to data and user guides web pages - easy to navigate format –web catalogue with variable level searching –subject browsing - e.g. major series and geo web pages –access to online doc - pdf user guides and forms registration –one-stop registration with userid/password –online account management and Shopping Basket ordering data download –web download in three software formats –Nesstar - browsing metadata and exploring data
Nesstar software browse detailed information (metadata) about these data sources, including links to other sources simple data analysis and visualisation on microdata bookmark analyses download the appropriate subset of data in one of a number of formats (e.g. SPSS, Excel)
ESDS: supporting research and teaching service specific help for each service –help desk, FAQs, analysis support generating new researchers –series of workshops around the country teaching datasets, online samplers discussion lists, newsletters
Contact ESDS FAQ: