Data Service Guidelines

The University of Ottawa Library’s Data Services team offers interdisciplinary data services to our users. With a strong dedication to enriching the educational goals of the university, we firmly believe in supporting our community with the skills and tools needed to enhance research, instruction, and learning.  

Our team offers a broad range of data services and provides guidance for those working with our supported software and equipment. We can contribute our expertise in a variety of areas, including finding and extracting data, GIS and geomatics support, and data management and visualization. The following guidelines are intended to prepare users to discover and interact with our services productively.

Ask a question

• For data inquiries, contact the Data Services team by email for guidance and support.

Consultation service guidelines

• Our consulting model is designed for short consultations, either in person or virtual.
• These appointments focus on strategies for data finding, connecting you to resources to support and understand methodological choices, and/or helping you execute these choices within a supported software package.
• Please note that drop-in consultations are not guaranteed and depend on availability.
• Data services are not intended to be a step-by-step homework help, tutoring support service, or in-depth methodological or statistical analyses.
• If requests fall outside our services, we will strive to redirect/refer requests to more appropriate sources, such as instructors, advisors, academic departments, or tutoring services, for further assistance.
• Members of the Data Services team provide consultations to the uOttawa community only.

Requests for instruction/workshop

• If you are an instructor and would like to request a presentation/workshop for your class, please contact the Data Services team to schedule a session. The duration and content of the session can be adapted based on course/audience needs and can be discussed during the planning stages of the session.
• As standard practice, we ask for a minimum of one-week lead time for planning and scheduling.

Partners in research collaborations

• The Data Services team is pleased to work collaboratively with faculty members and researchers on all types of research projects.
• For involvement in a research project beyond our general data services, we reserve the right to discuss acknowledgement and/or authorship as appropriate.
  • This could include extending authorship rights to a member of the Data Services team if they make a significant contribution to the intellectual direction of the research or research-related activity or play a significant role in the output of the research project (e.g., analysis, visualization, etc).

Disclaimer

While our data services may provide consultations and advice for data projects involving classified or sensitive data, we ask that users follow proper information classification and handling practices, as is outlined in Policy 117 – Information Classification and Handling.