About Data sharing

The CISM has setup two web services for sharing data:

  • Nextcloud, which acts as a DropBox-like service. It can be connected to the mass storage infrastructure to enable sharing of data from the mass storage servers to collaborators outside UCLouvain through protected download web links (URLs).
  • Dataverse, which is a platform that allows publishing datasets and obtain a DOI for them.

Access and conditions

Nextcloud

Nextcloud is a tool, similar to Dropbox, that allows sharing files easily through the web. It is the most convenient way to give access to your file on the storage to colleagues who live abroad.

Dataverse

Dataverse is a tool to publish data in a similar way papers are published. It allows submission, review, and publication of data associated with published articles, and more generally to embrace Open Data.

Connection and file transfer

Nextcloud

Nextcloud is accessed through the following URL: https://nextcloud.cism.ucl.ac.be. You will need to use your CISM login and password. The default storage space in Nextcloud is very small ; it is primarily dedicated to sharing files that are on the storage. To do so, you will need to configure your Nextcloud profile and enter your CISM login and password.

Once connected, click on the triangle near your login, and choose ‘Personal’. Then click on ‘External Storage’ and give the name you want it to have in your Nextcloud space, choose SFTP as protocol, and ‘Username and password’ as Authentication. Then enter storage.cism.ucl.ac.be, your home directory (which you can discover by typing pwd when you are connected to the storage server), your CISM login and password.

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Once done, you will have a new folder in your Nextcloud space that lists the contents of your space on the storage servers.

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From there you can use Nextcloud’s sharing features to exchange files with other colleagues.

Dataverse

The UCLouvain Dataverse website is accessed through the following URL: https://dataverse.uclouvain.be. In the login form, choose “Catholic University of Louvain” and click “Continue”.

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You will then be redirected to the UCLouvain single sign on where you will enter your UCLouvain global login and password. Once you are authenticated, you will see the Dataverse home page.

Dataverse creation

Datasets are organised in groups named Dataverses. The hierarachy of dataverses follows the hierarchy of the University. The creation of a dataverse for an institute or a department must be requested by the head of the institute or department. They must first login once to https://dataverse.uclouvain.be so that their login is created, and then send an email through the “Support” link in the upper right corner, with the follwing information:

  • name of the institute or department ;
  • name of the parent institution in the case of a department ;
  • link to the logo of the department or institute, and,
  • optionally; the name of a person to which the management of the dataverse must be delegated in the case the head of the institute/department does not want to endorse that role.

Warning

The ‘Support’ link in the top right corner of the page is context-sensitive ; depending on the dataverse you are looking at, it will direct your email to the person responsible for that dataverse. Therefore, you must make sure to be in the correct dataverse when requesting the creation of a dataset (see below)

Dataset publication

Once the dataverse is created you can request the manager of the dataverse (the head of your institute/department or the delegate) permission to create a dataset. Once it is granted, you can upload and describe the dataset as explained in the Guide.

When the dataset is ready, the manager of the dataset must then publish it. At that stage, the dataset is attributed a DOI and cannot be modified anymore.

Should the manager need to request some adaptations or modification to be implemented before allowing publication, they should release the dataset back to the author by choose option “Return to author” from the “Publish dataset” button. Indeed, after an author has submitted a dataset for review, the dataset cannot be modified anymore, until it is “returned” to him or her.

Encryption

If you wish or need to encrypt the data that you are storing on the CISM infrastructure, the Cryptomator software can help you. Cryptomator is designed to work with local and external storage, which can be a cloud-like storage, such as Nextcloud, and One Drive, or with a Samba mount, or even a USB disk.

The encrypted data is stored in a directory of your choice (called vault), and protected by a password that you choose. To share the data, you will need to :

  1. make sure the directory with the encrypted data is accessible by the recipients ;
  2. share the secret password with the recipients.

With the secret password, you and the recipients can unlock the vault. It then appears as an additional disk in your laptop. Any file that you copy in that disk is encrypted on the fly and stored in the vault. The synchronisation of the vault is take care of by the technology used to share the data (cloud drive, network drive, etc.).

Whenever you stop working, you will lock the vault and from there, the additional disk disappear and data only exist in encrypted form on your computer. Cryptomator is open-source and free in its desktop version. A licence is necessary for the mobile (Android, iOS) version. An installed for every platform can be downloaded from the Cryptomator website.

Here follows an example use with Nextcloud. The vault will be stored in the Nextcloud folder “testvaul” and will be named “SecretFolder”.

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Once installed, you can start Cryptomator ; you will see the main window.

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Click Add and choose New vault.

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Choose a name for the vault, for instance SecretFolder

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And choose a location using the Choose button, for instance here in the Nextcloud folder

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Click Next

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and choose a password. Cryptomator offers to generate a recovery key that can be used to decrypt the vault in case you loose the password.

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Cryptomator lists good practices to store that recovery key.

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You can now Unlock the vault.

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You must provide the secret password, and then

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you can Reveal the additional drive:

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In the Cryptomator window, the vault is shown with an open lock. You have there the option to reveal the drive or lock the vault.

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If you lock the vault, it is shown with a closed lock in the list

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and the additional drive disappears.

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Note that in the Nextcloud web interface, you can only see the encrypted vault. The clear-text files never reach the Nextcloud server. Here, the vault is shared in Nextcloud with another user.

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That other user can install Cryptomator, and once the Nextcloud folder is configured, open the Existing vault:

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To do that, they will need to locate the vault.cryptomator file in the Nextcloud folder SecretFolder

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They must then provide the secret password

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They can now Reveal the drive.

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and Lock the vault when they are done working.

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About the costs

The usage of Nextcloud is free ; as far as Dataverse is concerned, the details are available on the UCLouvain portal.