Disciplinary data publication guides

Many academic disciplines have very comprehensive standard for data publication and clear guidance from funding bodies and academic publishers. In other cases, whilst much good-quality general guidance exists, there is a lack of information available to researchers to help them decide which specific data elements should be shared. This is a particular issue for disciplines with very varied data types, such as engineering, and presents an unnecessary barrier to researchers wishing to meet funder expectations on data sharing.

This article outlines a project to provide simple, visual, discipline-specific guidance on data publication, undertaken at the University of Bristol at the request of the Faculty of Engineering.