File formats and organization

Directory structure

Consider creating a readme.txt file, in your project's main file folder, that gives an explanation of the directory structure and describes the contents of the major folders. See MIT's README file & folder schema example.

Best practices

• The main folder should have an informative name. For example: title, unique identifier, and date (year).
• Subfolders should be divided by common theme. For example:
  • research activity (interviews, surveys, experiment)
  • parameter assessed
  • data type (images, text, databases)
  • kind of material (publications, deliverables, documentation)
• Consider restricting the level of folders to three or four deep and not to have more than ten items per folder.
  
  

Directory structure examples:

Psychology example	Marketing example
Source: Berenson, K.R. 2018. Managing your research data and documentation. American Psychology Association.	Source: UK Data Service