Be particularly careful when using computer software that lets you move or delete whole files at a time - Windows Explorer and the Mac Finder certainly but also programs like NVivo (or Microsoft Office) that have file deletion features built in. Don’t ignore the warning dialogue boxes that come up when making changes or deletions and - particularly - be careful if you take your eyes off the screen when you are typing. I was typing in NVivo, I looked down at my transcript and somehow I must have typed a sequence of keys that deleted one of my interview transcripts and confirmed it because that transcript vanished! The only way I could think to get it back was to revert to what I had saved earlier.

Update: It happened again - and this time I think I know why. If you are working in NVivo on a transcript and type control-D (right beside control-F which is "find") you will delete that document! And there is no ‘undo’!! That’s a feature they are adding in NVivo 7, coming up shortly. And not a minute too soon…

You are backing up your fieldwork and documents regularly, right? To a separate hard disk or removable disk? And preferably taking that backup to a location far away from where your primary work machine is (in case of fire, flood etc)? Data disasters do happen, and it costs very little to protect yourself from them these days.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, February 7th, 2006 at 5:18 pm and is filed under Academic, Advice. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.