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Resources

Things you'll need

  • A text editor that helps you with code and markup
    • Recommended: Atom (various OS including Mac & Windows)
    • Other Examples: Notepad++ (Windows), Brackets (Mac), and many others
    • Some of these editors, like Atom, will allow you to interact directly with a Git repository, to networks via FTP/SFTP, or other means, so that you can edit remote files.
  • Anaconda distribution with the latest version of Python, which includes tools for writing python code and also jupyter notebooks. Make sure to get the version for Python 3.X. The download link will probably take you to the correct version for your operating system, but it is worth double checking that you are download a version for Windows if you use Windows, Mac if you use Mac OS.
  • IF YOU USE WINDOWS: Cygwin. This is a program that will help to emulate the shell environment that we will use to explore the command line interface. We will not use this extensively, however, it is useful to gain familiarity with this type of interface since it is a common way to interact with virtual machines (i.e., remote servers that you might have to interact with to store collections on servers or interact with websites.
  • If you're using a web browser like Chrome, you may want to download an extension to help display and parse JSON. To find one, just search for json at the Chrome extension store. Some browsers, like Firefox, will display JSON in a more readable format without an extension.
  • Open Refine, a free tool for manipulating data, it will run in your browser but you may need to follow this guide to get it up and running
  • OPTIONAL Bagger, a free tool for packaging data, which will create a metadata file, manifest of contents, and generate integrity information (checksums); this tool will also require Java
  • A healthy outlook of exploration and self-confidence. Things won't always work as you think they will or as explained. Learning often doesn't happen by doing things "the right way," but rather through doing and exploring. So don't worry if you get some error messages, things don't work out on the first try, or there are some frustrations along the way. Exploration is part of the learning process, and exercising persistence may be rewarding.
  • Patience. Testing and troubleshooting can be frustrating and time consuming, so sometimes you may just need to trust that you're moving in the right direction, and also because tools and collections will continually be changing, so there is always something new to learn

Python

You should be working in a version of Python 3.X. If you download Anaconda (see above), you will have easy access to Python right away, and if you use Mac, it is installed on your machine already. If you use Windows, you will need to install python (see link below for instructions).

Shell (aka Command Line or Terminal or Bash)

While not the most intuitive way to interact with your computer and files, learning how to work with files in a shell environment is a common task of many digital curators. Learning to interact with the computer via the text-based command line can be a quick and efficient way to extract metadata and design batch processes. While it may take a bit of practice to pick up, command line basics can be useful. You can use the Command Line module to explore basics.

Note: the course will assume working in a BASH environment, which you can access through the Terminal on MAC OS or Linux. If you are working in Windows, please try using CygWin, which will emulate the BASH shell.

Here are a few other resources:

Additional tutorials that try to do similar things, in archives, libraries, &c