Dear Paul,

I'm not suggesting deleting important long-term archive data. I'm
talking about deleting intermediate data that one does not have time
too look at during the expt. It seems that we take about 100-200 Mb
per imaging session and after about a week of this our primary hard
disk server would be nearly full. We therefore move the data off to MO
where it can reside for as long as one wants...

Also, I would have thought that the primary data belongs to the people
who paid for it, not the PI. This is either the institution (who
pays the PI salary) or the grant body depending on the terms of the
grant. I agree that it does not belong to the post-doc but it also
probably does not belong to the PI either...

Perhaps another line for discussion...

Regards

Mark cannell

On Tue, 29 Jul 1997 09:34:33 -0700 Paul Goodwin wrote:

> From: Paul Goodwin <[log in to unmask]>
> Date: Tue, 29 Jul 1997 09:34:33 -0700
> Subject: Re: Archiving of files - media prices
> To: [log in to unmask]
>
> Our General Counsel has looked at the issue from the Patent
perspective.
> His conclusion is 20 years for primary data. This is the time that
he
> thinks would be necessary for retention of data needed to defend an
> intellectual property suit and prior art issues. Since imaging data,
like
> ratio imaging, is the only primary data, our Counsel would require
that we
> save it for 20 years. Since we are a Shared Resource providing a
service
> to other labs, we feel that it is our responsibility to do whatever
we can
> to retain the data for at least 20 years. That means that not only
must
> the media be readable for that time, but that readers/drivers must
exist
> to permit us to access the data 20 years from now. Right now, I am
in the
> process of migrating 50GB of Optical Disk data to CD. To me, the
cost of
> replicating the experiment far exceeds the cost of any digital
media, so
> why would you ever consider deleting files from an archive
intentionally?
>
> The other issue that we are trying to address is ownership of data
and
> data integrity. We are in the process of changing our archive system
so
> that users do not have write permission for their original data. The
data
> belongs to the PI and the Center where I work takes science ethics
very
> seriously. The data ultimately belongs to the PI, not the user. To
permit
> the user to have write access to the files places in jeopardy the
> financial investment and integrity of the PI and the Center. I would
much
> rather drop another $0.08/MB on archiving than have to explain how
and why
> my resource could have been used to generate fraud.
>
> It is a sticky issue and one that I have spent considerable time the
past
> three years trying to solve.
>
>
______________________________________________________________________
__________
>
>
> Paul Goodwin
> Instrumentation Laboratory
> FHCRC, Seattle, WA
>
> On Tue, 29 Jul 1997, Phil Allen wrote:
>
> > Hi All;
> >
> > Mark Cannell raises an interesting question.  When are images
"Junk" and
> > can be discarded?  We're actively doing ratio imaging and the
question of
> > when we can discard "Junk" data constantly comes up.  What do
people on the
> > list think?  TIA
> >
> > Phil Allen
> >
> > ________________
> > Philip G. Allen; Ph.D.
> > Instructor in Medicine
> > Brigham and Women's Hospital
> > Division of Experimental Medicine
> > LMRC 301
> > 221 Longwood Ave.
> > Boston, MA 02115
> >
> > 617-278-0321 (lab)
> >        -734-2248 (fax)
> >