ActiveCollab: A great tool for managing your group's projects in a web-based environment

Our research group has been using ActiveCollab, a web-based project management system, for the last year to keep all of our projects and teams organized. We have found it quite useful, because most of our team projects involve multiple organizations and people from all over the globe. We can all stay on the same page when we log into ActiveCollab and view the latest messages, milestones, tasks and files related to a specific project. Everything stays in one place and all members for the project can access it at any time!

ActiveCollab has eliminated losing messages in email inboxes, sending around various file versions in email, and not knowing who is responsible for completing what task. All these things are clearly outlined for each project and help immensley when it comes to organizing your team and increasing efficiency.

Take a look at these demos for using the system, both as a regular user and as an administrator.

This program is open-source which means you can take the source code and implement it for your team at NO COST!

Regular User

Tutorial for using Project Management system. Click on google video icon to enlarge the screen.

Administrator

Grant Submission Manager- How we organize our grant submissions using DSRC

Submitting a grant can be a confusing and frustrating process for both researchers and grant administrators at your institution. In an effort to facilitate this process for all parties involved in the submission of a grant, we created DSRC (Duke Surgery Research Central).

DSRC acts as a project manager for each grant that is submitted. This web-based software acts as a communicator between the grant office and the researcher and sets up specific tasks with deadlines and detailed instructions for the submission of any type of grant.

The general work flow looks like this:

1) Researcher logs in to the site and requests to start a new submission
2) Researcher fills out template with information about the grant
3) Grant office receives notification of the submission and creates a list of tasks for the researcher to fulfill in order to submit the grant
4) Researcher receives a list of tasks and deadlines to fulfill, these tasks include forms and templates to submit for completion
5) Grant office receives information from researcher and directs it to the appropriate offices within the institution for approvals
6) Grant information is then compiled and submitted to funding organization by grant office

If this looks like something that can help your institution, let us know, we can help you set up the system!

Watch a demo of DSRC

Why work harder? Search for already existing databases, use Database of Databases

Do you ever wonder if other researchers have already collected patient data on your research interest? Would you like to be able to search for this information in ONE place?

Use the Database of Database tool to freely store and advertise information about your databases. The Database of Databases functions in two main capacities for the user: a search tool for information about other researchers' databases, and a storage tool for your own databases. Your search results will provide you the basic information about the variables collected, the sample population, geographic location as well as how to get in touch with the researchers who collected the data (the site does not have the actual datasets).

Using this portal can result in collaborations among researchers in grant submissions, studies and additional publications and more.

So get started and visit www.ceso.duke.edu/dod to search/store databases!

Web Conferencing: Free up Your Research Dollars by Using These 3 Great Free Tools

After searching high and low for tools to help improve our group's ability to communicate with colleagues all over the world, we discovered a great combination of free web tools that work together to make it possible to screen share and conference for free. We've been using the combination for over a year now and haven't found anything better AND free:

1) First get Skype- VoIP
2) Then set up a conference room atHighSpeedConferencing
3) Finally, register for screen sharing withYugma

To get it started, you must sign up for accounts with each site. Registration for all sites, again, is FREE. After you have your own conference room number from HighSpeedConferencing, you can set up and have meetings with up to 500 people at anytime using your number. The great thing about HighSpeedConferencing and Skype, is that they work together to provide a way for your colleagues to access the conference call for free via VoIP on the net, or if you prefer to call in to the conference call, there is a US number you can dial in to. The only charges incurred are the long distance charges to call the number, if you choose not to call in via Skype.

When your conference room is ready, you can simply instruct your colleagues to access your computer screen via yugma. After you use this system a few times, it becomes very easy to coordinate and set up. Just in case you need some help, we have instructional videos for using Skype and Yugma:

Skype:


Yugma Video (click here)

But don't just take my word for it, try it out for yourself!