EpiData data entry competitors. Where are they?
Hello EpiData friends,
Last week I did teach the 6th edition of "introduction of softwares for research porpuses" here at Rio de Janeiro. Usually we present to the students three softwares: EpiData, zotero, SPSS (although Im have been trying to replace SPSS for R-project for a while).
Because of this course, yesterday, the principal of the institution I work at came to me and asked if it is worth to get engaged at this initiative: http://www.project-redcap.org/ Actually, it seems to be pretty similar to epidata projects in content, except that it is web based and it seems that it is necessary to become a partner to use it. Since then I have looked around and trade a couple of emails with some friends and some other stuff came up...
http://www.rch.org.au/dmo/services.cfm?doc_id=13999 This is one is pretty good, but very expensive, and we had a tough time trying to manage the operator limitations (need to be highly skilled to operate this software) and as more projects are running more licenses are required to get the job done in time and more money is necessary.
http://www.sphinxdevelopment.co.uk/about.html this one has not many information at the webpage, but a friend of mine told me that they have a software similar to teleform, which scans the form and fill the the dataset from the scanned image.
Once in a while a hear someone is using pendragon: http://pendragonsoftware.com/ But this one is for portable devices such as palmOS iPad Android and stuff.
Im writing all this stuff to ask you guys if you have any bad/good experience with other dataentry softwares? This time particularly with redcap. Every time someone asks me about other dataentry software, I take some time trying it and I always come back to EpiData. I believe that there isnt really a good competitor to EpiData so far... free, small, portable, easy to use, and does the job.
Also, I imagine that looking at what other data entry softwares do, may give some insight to improve EpiData functionality. This web idea may be something to think about.
Kind regards,
Abraço forte e que a força esteja com você,
Dr. Pedro Emmanuel A. A. do Brasil Instituto de Pesquisa Clínica Evandro Chagas Fundação Oswaldo Cruz Rio de Janeiro - Brasil Av. Brasil 4365 Tel 55 21 3865-9648 email: pedro.brasil@ipec.fiocruz.br email: emmanuel.brasil@gmail.com
---Apoio aos softwares livres www.zotero.org - gerenciamento de referências bibliográficas. www.broffice.org ou www.openoffice.org - textos, planilhas ou apresentações. www.epidata.dk - entrada de dados. www.r-project.org - análise de dados. www.ubuntu.com - sistema operacional
Hello. Dr. Pedro Emmanuel, I think you should look for CsPro software. http://www.census.gov/population/international/software/cspro/ It has been widely used in most of the under developped countries for ten years. It has large capacities and is used to type census data. It is also used for most of the Demographic & Health Surveys (DHS) in the institutes of statistics. It has a large set of programming capabilities and a high security management system. I usually use epidata for small data entries but what require more expertise I prefer CsPro or Relational DBMS... Kind regards.
Dear all
It is fine with me to discuss alternatives to EpiData Entry etc. on the list her, but before we get too many suggestions I would like to ask those replying to declare which interests (money wise or otherwise) they have on the software they describe.
My only filter is that I suggest to only discuss open-source and or free-ware alternatives.
It makes little sense to compare commercial software with large staff for development with alternatives such as EpiData financed on whatever funding can be attracted and is on a small scale.
Someone might disagree with this, but then discuss functionality in a general way. What we need as professionals is functionality suitable to the needs, we do not need large license fees, patents etc. Just try to open adobe reader for pdf files and see the number of patents shown.
The best option is if someone writes a proper research article in which the softwares are compared in relation to many aspects such as: a. stability b. number and relevance of options c. availability in price and delivery d. speed e. time to install and get to work f. time and possibility to recreate a "broken" database g. the demands in terms of manpower and skills of database people to run the system h. which formal types of data can be securely managed - e.g. sensitive health data i. format and degree of openness of the data file format ...... add to the list....
Regards
Jens Lauritsen EpiData Association - obvious interest in software types
On 2011-07-05 16:34, epidata-list@lists.umanitoba.ca wrote:
Hello. Dr. Pedro Emmanuel, I think you should look for CsPro software. http://www.census.gov/population/international/software/cspro/ It has been widely used in most of the under developped countries for ten years. It has large capacities and is used to type census data. It is also used for most of the Demographic& Health Surveys (DHS) in the institutes of statistics. It has a large set of programming capabilities and a high security management system. I usually use epidata for small data entries but what require more expertise I prefer CsPro or Relational DBMS... Kind regards.
Epidata is by far the best (and cheapest!) data entry program I've used in years. I use it for all my projects except for our large surveys for which we use opscan technology, and I recommend it when asked for recommendations. The seamless lay-out to check file to entry to export cannot be beat. A colleague recently told me that there is now a free cloud-based entry system being used by epidemiologists. I can see that a cloud format would have advantages in certain contexts. He couldn't, however, remember what it's called. Are any others aware of such a program?
From the awful DC summer,
Richard Herrell Psychiatry Branch Walter Reed Army Institute of Research
--- On Tue, 7/5/11, epidata-list@lists.umanitoba.ca epidata-list@lists.umanitoba.ca wrote:
From: epidata-list@lists.umanitoba.ca epidata-list@lists.umanitoba.ca Subject: Re: [EpiData-list] EpiData data entry competitors. Where are they? To: epidata-list@lists.umanitoba.ca Date: Tuesday, July 5, 2011, 4:54 PM
Dear all
It is fine with me to discuss alternatives to EpiData Entry etc. on the list her, but before
Dear Richard
There are freewares for data entry I used or I use until now. May be your colleague talked about one of them? The list is below : - EpiInfo (http://www.cdc.gov/epiinfo/) - CSPro (http://www.census.gov/ipc/www/cspro/)
Regards
Dr Andriamahenina Ramamonjisoa CHUA HJRA/USFRI 101 Antananarivo MADAGASCAR
----- Mail original ----- De: epidata-list@lists.umanitoba.ca À: epidata-list@lists.umanitoba.ca Envoyé: Mercredi 6 Juillet 2011 01:12:03 Objet: Re: [EpiData-list] EpiData data entry competitors. Where are they?
Epidata is by far the best (and cheapest!) data entry program I've used in years. I use it for all my projects except for our large surveys for which we use opscan technology, and I recommend it when asked for recommendations. The seamless lay-out to check file to entry to export cannot be beat.
A colleague recently told me that there is now a free cloud-based entry system being used by epidemiologists. I can see that a cloud format would have advantages in certain contexts. He couldn't, however, remember what it's called. Are any others aware of such a program?
From the awful DC summer,
Richard Herrell Psychiatry Branch Walter Reed Army Institute of Research
--- On Tue, 7/5/11, epidata-list@lists.umanitoba.ca epidata-list@lists.umanitoba.ca wrote:
From: epidata-list@lists.umanitoba.ca epidata-list@lists.umanitoba.ca Subject: Re: [EpiData-list] EpiData data entry competitors. Where are they? To: epidata-list@lists.umanitoba.ca Date: Tuesday, July 5, 2011, 4:54 PM
Dear all
It is fine with me to discuss alternatives to EpiData Entry etc. on the list her, but before _______________________________________________ EpiData-list mailing list EpiData-list@lists.umanitoba.ca http://lists.umanitoba.ca/mailman/listinfo/epidata-list
On Wed, Jul 06, 2011 at 01:12:03AM +0200, epidata-list@lists.umanitoba.ca wrote:
Epidata is by far the best (and cheapest!) data entry program I've used in years. I use it for all my projects except for our large surveys for which we use opscan technology, and I recommend it when asked for recommendations. The seamless lay-out to check file to entry to export cannot be beat.
A colleague recently told me that there is now a free cloud-based entry system being used by epidemiologists. I can see that a cloud format would have advantages in certain contexts. He couldn't, however, remember what it's called. Are any others aware of such a program?
I've used surveymonkey[1] for some very small projects and looked at hosting lime survey[2] for a larger project. That said, I agree with Jens: what is needed is an analysis of needs and how different options meet different needs. Epidata is definitely easier and a better choice for most of my needs.
One idea that has been rolling around the back of my head is using the epidata XML file to create a web-based data entry system, e.g. converting the logic contained in the XML file to PHP or other code, creating a mysql database and importing the data into mysql. Then also exporting it all again back to an epidata XML file. Potentially epidata could then be used as a quick and easy way to create a web-based data entry system. Perhaps something to think about around version 2.0 (i.e. not right now).
[1] www.surveymonkey.com [2] http://www.limesurvey.org/
David --
David Whiting, PhD | Senior Epidemiology & Public Health Specialist tel +32-2-6437945 | mob +32-496-266436 | David.Whiting@idf.org
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On 2011-07-06, David wrote:
One idea that has been rolling around the back of my head is using the epidata XML file to create a web-based data entry system, e.g. converting the logic contained in the XML file to PHP or other code, creating a mysql database and importing the data into mysql. Then also exporting it all again back to an epidata XML file. Potentially epidata could then be used as a quick and easy way to create a web-based data entry system. Perhaps something to think about around version 2.0 (i.e. not right now).
For typical multi-user / multi-centre data entry, users are only presented with the data entry screen - no need for them to see the whole file, just enter one record at a time (e.g. as is done with survey instruments like SurveyMonkey). This would be a relatively simple task for AJAX/jQuery to post records to a server, based on the .epx file.
I think providing multiple users with web access to the full .epx database is not something to contemplate for EpiData. As you say, EpiData could be the tool to develop the mysql. But many times we have wanted a simple way to get data input from many centres There are lots of solutions, including one or two suggested on the list. I agree with Jens that this isn't the place to discuss them.
Jamie
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