Nesstar: A Web-based Data Extraction and Analysis System Richard Pinnell & Sandra Keys, University of Waterloo Libraries

Nesstar – Today’s Agenda Introduction EDS (UW’s Electronic Data Service) Overview of Nesstar Live Demo Actual Teaching Instances of Nesstar at UW WatITis | Life After 50 | December 4, 2007 | Nesstar

Overview EDS: Electronic Data Service WatITis | Life After 50 | December 4, 2007 | Nesstar

Overview (cont’d) WatITis | Life After 50 | December 4, 2007 | Nesstar

Overview (cont’d) Our “Partners” TDR (Tri-University Data Resources) University of Guelph, Wilfrid Laurier (and of course, UW!) Nesstar SWORDC (SouthWestern Ontario Research Data Centre) Statistics Canada OCUL (Ontario Council of University Libraries) Data in Ontario Group (DINO) ODESI (Ontario Data Documentation, Extraction Service and Infrastructure Initiative) WatITis | Life After 50 | December 4, 2007 | Nesstar

Overview (cont’d) WatITis | Life After 50 | December 4, 2007 | Nesstar

Overview (cont’d) Consortia Participation Data Liberation Initiative (DLI) Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research (ICPSR) DMTI Spatial Geoconsortium Etc. WatITis | Life After 50 | December 4, 2007 | Nesstar

Overview (cont’d) Other sources of data on campus Spatial Data Catalog (Faculty of Environmental Studies) Population Health Data Repository...and we’d love to link to more! WatITis | Life After 50 | December 4, 2007 | Nesstar

Nesstar – What it is Software: a web-based data extraction and analysis system Over 700 datasets from Statistics Canada …as well as access to other data resources Dun & Bradstreet International Monetary Fund World Health Organization Grouped by subject Accessible from off-campus via Proxy Service WatITis | Life After 50 | December 4, 2007 | Nesstar

Nesstar – What it is WatITis | Life After 50 | December 4, 2007 | Nesstar

Nesstar – What it is Raw data StatsCan surveys PUMFs (public use microdata files), synthetic files Need to be downloaded to use (statistical software packages, Excel, etc.) Low level/topical statistics Census profiles, Topic-based Tabulations Formats: B2020 files, Excel files WatITis | Life After 50 | December 4, 2007 | Nesstar

Nesstar – What it is (not) For high level/summary statistics, use the Statistics Canada website – free for the general public ( E-STAT (access via EDS page) CHASS (access via EDS page) WatITis | Life After 50 | December 4, 2007 | Nesstar

Nesstar – What it is Documentation Abstracts Codebooks and Record Layouts Questionnaires Etc. WatITis | Life After 50 | December 4, 2007 | Nesstar

Nesstar – What it is WatITis | Life After 50 | December 4, 2007 | Nesstar

Nesstar – What it is WatITis | Life After 50 | December 4, 2007 | Nesstar

Nesstar – What it is Metadata Marked up using DDI (Data Documentation Initiative) Searching Simple Advanced Searching specific fields Specifying retrieval at dataset or variable level WatITis | Life After 50 | December 4, 2007 | Nesstar

Nesstar – What it is WatITis | Life After 50 | December 4, 2007 | Nesstar

Nesstar – What it is WatITis | Life After 50 | December 4, 2007 | Nesstar

Nesstar – What it is Subsetting and Downloading Download all or part of a dataset Statistical Analysis Frequency distribution, weighting, cross-tabulation, regression, etc. Graphic representations, display of descriptive stats Exporting Data Various statistical packages (e.g., SPSS, SAS) Spreadsheet (e.g., Excel,.csv) Text file WatITis | Life After 50 | December 4, 2007 | Nesstar

Nesstar – What it is Quirks Browser: compatible with any stable version of IE or Netscape Pop-up blockers: downloading Password: what/where is it anyway? Searching: “stop” words, phrases, etc. Help From Nesstar From Guelph (Viewlets – animated tutorials) Contact local data service (e.g., UW EDS) WatITis | Life After 50 | December 4, 2007 | Nesstar

Nesstar – What it is WatITis | Life After 50 | December 4, 2007 | Nesstar YES!!! No!!!

Nesstar – Live Demo For those viewing this presentation after the conference, we have included screenshots of the main features of the demo at the end of this powerpoint WatITis | Life After 50 | December 4, 2007 | Nesstar

Nesstar - Actual Teaching Uses REC 672 Choose a dataset Familiarize themselves with dataset by going through the documentation Use the dataset to test the various statistical analysis topics discussed in class Economics Research Papers Use data from surveys WatITis | Life After 50 | December 4, 2007 | Nesstar

Questions?? WatITis | Life After 50 | December 4, 2007 | Nesstar

Thank You! Richard Pinnell Sandra Keys EDS Group WatITis | Life After 50 | December 4, 2007 | Nesstar

Nesstar – Live Demo Slides WatITis | Life After 50 | December 4, 2007 | Nesstar

Library Homepage

Resources for Research

Connect from Home

UW Electronic Data Service

TriUniversity Data Resources

Nesstar Splash Page nesstar.tdr.uoguelph.ca/webview/index.jsp

Catalogue Resources

Metadata and Variables

Variable Descriptions

Searching for Variables 1

Searching for Variables 2

Variable Search Results

Data Download 1

Data Download 2

Nesstar Logon

Data Download 3

Data Subset

Data Subset: Cases 1

Data Subset: Cases 2

Data Subsetting: Variables

Data Subset: Download

Tabulation

Tabulation: Rows

Tabulation: Columns

Tabulation: Choose Categories 1

Tabulation: Choose Categories 2

Tabulation: Barchart

Subset Icon: Another Option

Nesstar Help: User Guide help/index.html

Nesstar Help: Viewlet Tutorials

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