Dear Parvaneh,
a statement regarding our software, ATLAS.ti, has already been posted, but there are some aspects in conjunction with longitudinal research which I like to add.
For historical reasons I would like to mention that ATLAS.ti was in fact developed in the context of a longitudinal research project (risk awareness of large technology) that started in the late eighties after the Czernobyl disaster.
One important aspect regarding long termed longitudinal studies is "standards". There are several threats associated with using tools over a longer period of time. One is, that the original tool is simply not available anymore for what reasons ever (which will never happen to us, of course!-). Or you might wish to analyze your data with different tools at some stage of research. For both circumstances an approved standard for the project data might become important. ATLAS.ti supports such standards. For instance, all project data can be exported using the eXtensible Markup Language XML, which we already adopted in the late nineties. With project data being available in this standard "language" there is no need to fear an obstacle for future exploitation of this data or continuation of projects in 3, 4 or a hundred years from now. For an article about XML and QDA see http://www.qualitative-research.net/fqs-texte/3-00/3-00muhr-e.htm
Another aspect touches the size and the source of data to be analyzed. In large projects, accessing files on a hard disk may not be feasible anymore. QUESSY.ti is a client-server based .NET application that allows to extract raw and meta data (represented as "families" within ATLAS.ti) in a range of databases, such as Access, MySQL, SQLServer and Oracle via a unified, simply and powerful browser based user interface. More at: http://quessy.atlasti.com/
Regards
- Thomas Muhr
At 14:49 09.06.2006, you wrote:
>Dear all
>I used the online discussion a few years ago when I used Nvivo 2 for the
>project I was working on at the time and I found it extremely useful. I was
>wondering if, and very much hoping that, you could give me some advice.
>
>I am investigating software options for the study I am currently involved
>in. As a team of researchers (7 people involved) we have recently started a
>qualitative longitudinal study that will go on for 3-4 years. It is quite a
>large scale study involving three groups of people with different
>conditions. All in all, we could have up to 700 to 800 transcripts. We want
>to look at individuals over time, experiences within groups and those across
>groups.
>
>Ideally we are looking for software that:
>o Can support qualitative longitudinal data analysis
>o Can manage large datasets
>o Support team working
>o Has a hierarchical structure for coding
>o Can manage visual images, not just text
>o Offers some kind of visualisation of connections
>o Be user-friendly
>
>I know the list is long and there may not be anything that could do all of
>that but is there anything you could recommend to us? I have come across
>NVivo 7, Atlas ti and MAXqda but I haven't used them and I don't know how
>suitable they are for our study. There may well be something else I haven't
>come across. I greatly appreciate your thoughts and views on this especially
>if you have conducted similar work or have come across any of these issues.
>
>
>Thanks again and look forward to hear from you.
>
>Best wishes
>Parvaneh
_______________________________________________________________________
„Computers, like every technology, are a vehicle for the transformation
of tradition“ (Winograd & Flores, 1987)
ATLAS.ti Scientific Software Development GmbH - Berlin - www.atlasti.com
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