Module 2: Part 3
Naming Conventions for Digital Materials
One of the most essential strategies to ensure future access to your digital materials is using consistent naming conventions. Naming conventions matter because they help with our memory. We have an easier time finding things when we know what the file may be called. Files that do not follow consistent naming can quickly become inaccessible and sometimes may lead to accidental deleting.
Consider, for example, all of your digital photo files on your computer, phone, or other devices. Digital cameras often automatically create file names like IMG_001, IMG_002, etc. Once you transfer the files from the camera to your computer, the camera starts all over with IMG_001, IMG_002, and so forth. You can quickly wind up with an entire series of files called IMG_001, IMG_001(1), and IMG_001(2), without any idea of what is in the file.
We suggest that you name your files using a consistent scheme that succinctly describes their contents. It helps if you think about the file’s contents and what keywords may best describe it. Let’s try it out. In this lesson, you’ll find a sample medical record. Download the file to your computer and then name it. “Medical record” may work if you only have one such in your files, but chances are you have plenty of those. What distinguishes this record from the rest?
In addition, we also suggest that you include the date of the file as the first part of its name. Including the date first also helps you organize your material. By sorting files by filename, you also get a chronologically ordered list in your folder. We strongly encourage you to use the ISO 8601 standard. That is a four-digit year, followed by a two-digit number representing the month and a two-digit number representing the day. For example, October 1, 2010, would be written as 2010-10-01. If you want to save up space, remove the dashes, like so: 20101001.
You likely have so many digital files that naming each of them one by one can take up too long, especially for pictures. In such cases, we strongly encourage you to use solutions like the freely available Bulk Name Rename Utility.
Exercise
In this lesson, you have two such records, labeled “1” and “2” respectively.
Let’s look at “1.” If you open it, you will notice that this is an empty form. How do we determine what to name this record? First, we look at the information it holds. The header reads “Report of Medical History.” This 3-
page document is designed to collect basic information about an applicant's health condition, which then will be used to assess their admissibility into military service. In the last field on page 3, field 30 reads: “examiner’s summary and elaboration of all pertinent data.” This suggests that this form should be filled by a member of the recruitment team during a physical examination of an applicant.
At the bottom of all pages, to the left, you can read the label “DD FORM 2807-1, OCT 2018”. Presumably, this is the serial number of the form and the date it was issued or last modified. With this information in mind, a possible name for this document could be “2018-10-DD2807-1-medical-history-report”. The first part of the name, “2018-10” tells you the date of issuance or modification; the second part, “DD-28-07” specifies the serial number of the form; and the last part, “medical-history-report” clarifies its contents in a human-intelligible way.
You may notice that we are using “2018-10” as opposed to “2018-October” to include the date in the filename. We do this because we are following the ISO 8601 standard for date formatting. The advantage of this convention is that when you sort your files by filename, you will also have them sorted by date. This date-formatting convention makes files easier to find.
Now that you have seen an example of a naming convention try it yourself! Take file “2”, check its contents, and re-name it using best practices: 1) mark dates using the ISO 8601 standard, and 2) use a name that encapsulates the information contain in the record.