Quality Assurance

Data and Metadata Assessment

TThe ADA expects a data deposit to meet quality requirements specified in the ADA deposit guidelines [5]. All deposits are assessed for quality assurance by an ADA archivist. This assessment includes both content and form. On the content side, the archivist will examine the data for presence of direct and indirect identifiers. On the form side, the archivist will confirm unambiguous, clear labels for all variables and run spell checks and basic metadata consistency and completeness checks. The archivist will then propose any corresponding changes to the depositor in a formal report. If the depositor does not agree to changes the ADA archivist deems necessary, a deposit may be rejected (see R08 Deposit & Appraisal). If approved by the depositor, the archivist will implement the agreed changes and generate publication-ready versions of the data. All deposits are subject to data-level curation (see R00 Background, part 5).

Accompanying documentation should be submitted to ensure comprehension of the study and the data. The archivist will liaise with the depositor to ensure all necessary value labels and codes are defined, that DDI-Codebook metadata fields are completed on Dataverse, and that the data is maximally findable and reusable. It is not a requirement that a depositor completes all DDI fields, but it is imperative to meet a minimum requirement for reuse as determined by the ADA. The ADA also encourages depositors to include references for related publications and other digital resources in their project metadata on Dataverse.

Vocabulary & Classification

The ADA uses APAIS vocabulary for keywords in the Dataverse catalogue, as well as ANZSRC FoR codes for topic classification.

References

[5] Deposit guidelines – (https://docs.ada.edu.au/index.php/Quick_Deposit_Guide)

[33] Quality Assurance – (https://docs.ada.edu.au/index.php/Quality_Assurance)