Where do Archive datasets live?

A dataset consists of the numeric files, the documentation that makes them useable, and (sometimes) input programs to read the data into a statistical software package such as SAS or SPSS.  Of course, the numeric files and input programs are machine readable.  In addition, some--but not all--of our documentation is machine readable.

The machine-readable components of the collection are available on the following media:

Online files

Most of the collection resides on a Unysis file server running the Windows 2003 operating system. (These data are often referred to as being "on tape" or "on the mainframe," although these descriptions are inaccurate.) The server, ciserrschdfs, is part of CISER's computing cluster. This chart illustrates how the server is mapped as the U:\ drive on each of the computing nodes.

     

Although the actual server is located in Rhodes Hall, data on ciserrschdfs can be accessed and used in a variety of ways.   (That's described later or you can read that section of the tutorial now by opening this new window.)

CD-ROM/DVD

We have many studies on CD-ROM and DVD.  Some of these have their own search, display, and extraction software.  For example, the 2002 Economic Census DVDs are packaged with software that has self-contained data search, selection, extraction, and documentation features.