@@ -24,10 +24,12 @@ OK, so where _should_ you keep your data? There are basically two types of place
For most of you the first option may be the only one available for institutional policy reasons. In the case of the University of Southampton you should [read the policy on data storage](https://library.soton.ac.uk/researchdata/storage) including the advice on how to store and transfer data securely. Our suggested options are:
* your [personal filestore](https://knowledgenow.soton.ac.uk/Articles/KB0011651)`AKA \\filestore.soton.ac.uk\Users\<username>\, AKA “My Documents”)` which, by default, _only_ allows 50GB or
*the research filestore (**preferred**) which is accessible via the [web](https://fwa.soton.ac.uk/), via SMB (i.e. `J:\` drive (AKA `\\soton.ac.uk\resource\`) - use the VPN) and, in the case of SERG data, via `/mnt/SERG_data` on the University's [RStudio server](https://rstudio.soton.ac.uk/).
***preferred ->** the resource drive (AKA `J:\` or `\\soton.ac.uk\resource\`) which is accessible via the [web](https://fwa.soton.ac.uk/), via SMB (use the VPN) and, in the case of SERG data, via `/mnt/SERG_data` on the University's [RStudio server](https://rstudio.soton.ac.uk/).
We recommend you use the research filestore because it can hold much larger data volumes and can be made accessible to your colleagues/supervisors if required. For reasons of speed this implies you either:
We recommend you use the `J:\` drive because it can hold much larger data volumes and can be made accessible to your colleagues/supervisors if required. For reasons of speed this implies you either:
* use the [University SVE](https://sotonac.sharepoint.com/teams/IT/SitePages/Services/SouthamptonVirtualEnvironment.aspx/) to run RStudio 'on campus' and thus close to the data. We have found some problems with persistence of installed packages in between SVE sessions if you try this
* mount the filestore/`J:\` drive on your laptop/PC and use a local version of (e.g.) RStudio to load the data. If you are doing this you might want to learn about [drake](drake.md) so the data is only loaded over the network the first time you run your code, not each time.
* mount the `J:\` drive on your laptop/PC and use a local version of (e.g.) RStudio to load the data. If you are doing this you might want to learn about [drake](drake.md) so the data is only loaded over the network the first time you run your code, not each time.
*[get access to and use](https://git.soton.ac.uk/SERG/uosrstudioserver) the University's [RStudio server](https://rstudio.soton.ac.uk/)**<- best option**, this will let you run your code on the research filestore directly
As far as we know the University's `Research Filestore` does not allow direct access so it can only be used to archive data you are not actively using. See https://library.soton.ac.uk/researchdata/storage for more info.
