NEPTTP WITS Data Carpentry Workshop

29-31 January 2020

29 January: 10:00 - 16:30, 30 January: 9:00 - 16:30, 31 January: 9:00-13:00

Instructors: Angelique van Rensburg, Juan Steyn

General Information

Data Carpentry develops and teaches workshops on the fundamental data skills needed to conduct research. Its target audience is researchers who have little to no prior computational experience, and its lessons are domain specific, building on learners' existing knowledge to enable them to quickly apply skills learned to their own research. Participants will be encouraged to help one another and to apply what they have learned to their own research problems.

For more information on what we teach and why, please see our paper "Good Enough Practices for Scientific Computing".

Who: The course is aimed at graduate students and other researchers. You don't need to have any previous knowledge of the tools that will be presented at the workshop.

Where: MSL11, Mathematical Sciences Laboratories, Mathematical Sciences Building, West Campus, Wits, Enoch Sontonga Avenue, Braamfontein. Get directions with OpenStreetMap or Google Maps.

When: 29-31 January 2020. Add to your Google Calendar.

Requirements: Participants must bring a laptop with a Mac, Linux, or Windows operating system (not a tablet, Chromebook, etc.) that they have administrative privileges on. They should have a few specific software packages installed (listed below).

Accessibility: We are committed to making this workshop accessible to everybody. The workshop organizers have checked that:

Materials will be provided in advance of the workshop and large-print handouts are available if needed by notifying the organizers in advance. If we can help making learning easier for you (e.g. sign-language interpreters, lactation facilities) please get in touch (using contact details below) and we will attempt to provide them.

Contact: Please email angelique@carpentries.org for more information.


Code of Conduct

Everyone who participates in Carpentries activities is required to conform to the Code of Conduct.This document also outlines how to report an incident if needed.


Collaborative Notes

We will use this collaborative document for chatting, taking notes, and sharing URLs and bits of code.


Surveys

Please be sure to complete these surveys before and after the workshop.

Pre-workshop Survey

Post-workshop Survey


Schedule

Day 1

10:00-10:30 Pre-workshop survey, Installation and Welcome
10:30-12:30 Tidy data
OpenRefine
13:30-16:30 OpenRefine
16:30 END

Day 2

9:00-12:30 Introduction to R
13:30-16:30 Introduction to R
16:30 END

Day 3

9:00-13:00 Introduction to R
13:00 Post-workshop survey
END

Syllabus


Setup

To participate in a Data Carpentry workshop, you will need access to the software described below. In addition, you will need an up-to-date web browser.

We maintain a list of common issues that occur during installation as a reference for instructors that may be useful on the Configuration Problems and Solutions wiki page.

The setup instructions for the Data Carpentry Ecology workshops (with R) can be found at the workshop overview site.