Documenting your data in Yoda

It is important to document your data to make sure that your data will be understandable to yourself, your collaborators and potentially other scientists who want to work with your data.

You can document your data in multiple ways: 

  • A README.txt file in the root of your data package that provides context to your data package (what is this project about, who were involved, when was it conducted, what does the data package contain, etc.). You can find a template for a README file in the FAIR data cheatsheet. 
  • Data-level documentation, such as a codebook, a lab notebook or a data overview file. 
  • Other project-related documentation, such as a study protocol, scripts, experiment files, analysis workflow, et cetera. 

You can read more about general documentation guidelines in the RDM Support guide Metadata and Documentation.

Documentation: use the metadata form

In Yoda, besides adding the described documentation, it is possible to add structured metadata to a research group and subfolders of the research group. The Yoda metadata conforms to the DataCite metadata standard and broadly describes the data package, how it can be reused and cited, and, if published, make it findable in data catalogues. When you archive and publish your data package, it is mandatory to add metadata.

How to add metadata

1. Log into the Yoda web portal and navigate to the folder that you want to add metadata to.
2. Select ‘Metadata’.

Screenshot of the Research environment in the Yoda web portal. A folder is shown called research-training/test that contains a test-upload.txt file. Highlighted is the Metadata button.
Step 2: Select ‘Metadata’

3. Fill in the form as completely as possible. Mandatory fields are marked with an asterisk (*). Some fields can have multiple values, such as authors (creators), contributors, keywords, and related resources. You can click the Plus (+) icon next to those fields to add a new value. See The Yoda metadata form explained for more information.
4. When you are done filling in the form, click ‘Save’ and then ‘Close’ at the bottom of the form. A new file called ‘yoda-metadata.json’ will appear in the folder.
5. You can always continue filling in the form later if needed. Simply click the ‘Metadata’ button again.

Once the metadata form is filled in, it is possible to submit the data package for archiving, and afterwards for publication. If you need help filling in the metadata form, please feel free to ask your data manager for help.

Reusing metadata

If the ‘parent folder’ of your folder already contains a Yoda metadata file, the metadata form will include a ‘Clone from parent folder’ button. This will copy the contents of the metadata form from the parent folder to the just opened metadata form in the subfolder. This way, you can reuse, and potentially adjust that metadata.