Recently I have been discussing a DH project with a PI who told me that their department was debating if several projects that are being discussed should be developed and implemented separately. The alternative was creating a general tool to address the needs of the current projects which will hopefully be ready for additional future projects.
There is indeed tension between spending money and other resources on software (a database web application) that is going to serve only one research project, versus a general-purpose tool. The idea of a general-purpose tool, with a scope limited to collecting, organizing, presenting and reporting on a reasonably complex data model seems on the face of it quite appealing and sensible.
The problems with the general tool approach are:
The almost certain need for modifications of / additions to a general-purpose application, result in another big drawback of developing such a system in an academic setting – the need to retain the knowledge and expertise for such on-going development, in essence maintaining the capabilities of a software development group dedicated to the tool.
General purpose information management systems for DH do exist. Examples include Nodegoat and Heurist. These are capable solutions but going beyond data management will require considerable modification and customization. Pricing in the case of Heurist is not entirely clear, and Nodegoat requires an annual fee for a publicly available site.
A future post will present a complete, robust and almost free-to-run cloud-based framework for developing such projects.