After many refinements to both the data repository manager survey and the email request for respondents, I made the survey active and sent email requests this past Saturday, July 21. By Friday morning, we had six responses. Bill Michener and Bob Cook sent out a reminder email later that day, and at this point, we have 15 responses. We are continuing to gather email addresses of data repository managers, including those listed at DataCite and DataBib.
I have continued to work on the common data paper errors categorization, as well. I calculate the number of papers with all identified errors, starting at the top-level categories and working down to detailed categories. This analysis has resulted in some interesting findings. For example, 96% of the ESA data papers had Description or metadata errors. Drilling down, 83% of the papers had errors in grammar, spelling, or citations. At the most detailed level, 58% of data papers had grammatical errors, which could range from awkward sentence structure to problems that a grammar check would catch, such as replacing โwhichโ with โthatโ. The next step is to condense my analysis results into a simple table. After that, I will write an outline for a journal paper publication and start writing the methods section of that paper.