Structured Data, Databases, and SQL

Collecting, analyzing, and managing data is the bread-and-butter of any research project, and standard tools like Microsoft Excel are the go-to apps as they're omnipresent and easy to use. But these start to show their limitations when one needs to handle tens of thousands of rows or merge data from multiple sources. Using a relational database, such as SQLite, can meet this gap and is the logical next step for bigger data projects. This class will discuss the fundamentals of structured data, introduce you to using SQLite (a lightweight database available on all most computing platforms), and teach you the basics of querying and summarizing data with SQL. Meeting these objectives could open up new opportunities for research and help you with your research data management goals. Prerequisite: This workshop is appropriate for those with little or no prior experience using SQLite or SQL. Some familiarity with databases is helpful. This workshop is free for Harvard and MIT affiliates and is held at IQSS. Click here to sign up! For details and registration information, please contact research@hbs.edu. See also: Upcoming Workshops