Being the extremely well-organized individual that I am (yeah, right!), I've been trying to come up with a good filing system for all my research notes and data. However, I'm better at supervising than organizing so I'm at somewhat of a loss as to how best go about this endeavor.

I'm curious to know if any of you have worked out a filing system that does the trick for you and if so, would you be willing to help out a feeb and post your filing outline?

Any help will be greatly appreciated!

Well ummm...I won't be much help, my files are a mess.

Let's clarify something though. Are you talking computer files or paper files? I have both.

Good point, Arkansan. I'm actually referring to both. As far as my computer files are concerned though, they're fairly well organized but my hard copies of information...simply put, they're dreadful.

Ok, yea same here. My computer files look much more organized than the paper ones. I do have a filing system, but right now it is only separated by states. I need something way better. You can't find anything that way.

I filed by the state and then the parishes or counties.

Ranshirl, that's a good way to go about filing sighting reports, no doubt about that. But what about your personal research notes? Do you have any preference as to the breakdown of those?

I'm still trying to figure out the best way to file this stuff so I don't really have any examples yet.

I just jott all that down in a notebook and put the date, where it is and time and all down.... :roll:

Me too Ranshirl.

I suggest

A time/date log with a breakdown of:

witnesses
area/location
terrain
types of sign/tree breaks
footprint evidence
season/weather
recordings/photos
area wildlife

etc....

I am sure I missed something but that's all I can think of right now. I don't have a good filing system. I need to preach this stuff to myself.

You can always keep your notes on mini cassette tape too if paper becomes too big of a problem.

Now give me a while and I will try to come up with a way to actually FILE the stuff.

Fish...I put my stuff into a binder...any notes are filed chronologically, (with dates at the top of the page) with a notation made in the upper corner as to the topic and or sighting it pertains to or is connected to.

I keep all those together....and then I go back and re-copy any pertinent findings for any given sighting report (or group of reports) and file a copy of just the important stuff right behind the sighting report in my sightings binder... or you could cross reference each note or report to one another with a notation in the corner of the page... whatever you do, be consistent... and include a brief explanation of your system at the beginning of your file... so we can decipher it all after you... when you're... how can I say this?... too drunk to read it for yourself.... :wink:

Hey Fish. I use a daytimer sort of thing with two pages per day. When I get the time I transcribe them into a word doc. In either format they are easy to search through but in some cases you just don't remember a certain event and you have to go searching through everything.

I recently started with a thing called "hot spots" which is essentially a tab at the top of the pages for something that was out of the norm and may have to recalled later. In my word docs I am starting to put *HOT* in preface to the title of the doc. When displayed as a file listing in alphabetical order all the "*HOT*"'s are shown together, one after another.

Cheers,
Don.

Thanks for the tips everybody but I think I'm not making myself clear on this.

I guess what I'm referring to more specifically is how to go about filing all the hard data that gets printed out and (for the moment) stored in a few folders.

I'll try to write up the outline for what I've had in mind and post it back so y'all can see what I'm getting at. It's not so much a "sighting" record that I'm wanting to keep as much as it is an easily searchable file system for photos, news articles, technical data, field information, etc. etc. yada yada.

I do appreciate all the help though. That's what makes this place a great forum!

Just wanted to say that I am following this thread closely, as this spring I plan on really starting some field research.
Until finding this board, I had only a laymans interest in the subject brought on by seeing some tracks.
Now, I have really gotten "into" it, and plan on doing alot of legwork.
Because of this, I will need a good file system, and will steal the best ideas I see!
I am shortly going to get a computer, and plan on storing the large majority of information in electronic form, information that initialy will be largely gleaned from the net'. I will be trying to establish a cross-referenced database of sighting details, flora, habitat types, weather, time of day, anything that might be used to establish patterns.
Anyway, rest assured I will be following along here in order to
find a storage solution.

In this thread, theft of ideas is definitely encouraged! LOL

One thing I'd suggest Nightwing, is to make sure you get yourself a computer with a CD burner. It makes saving your electronic data so much easier than attempting to put it all on floppies!

FLOPPIES!?! People still use those things? I haven't had a computer for with a floppy drive in four years...

Well...they do come in handy for small text documents and spreadsheets that I shuffle back and forth from work.

Thats MACs for you !

...now there's a big surprise... :wink:

Hey bipto, just think of the floppy drives as "handicap" ramps for computers....

I've never met a man before who admitted to having a floppy drive.

Oops, sorry that is out of character for me...but I just had to, you guys left that wide open.

Whoa!

Girl, when you break bad you don't play, do ya'??? :wink:

Yea, but you were the only one brave enough to acknowledge my post!

But that's 'cause I'm crazy.

Just as long as its a hard drive when needed. (Touche')

LMAO!

ROTFLMBO!

Touche'

Don't think I is gonna touch this one... !!!!

Me-e-e-e-e-eeee either Brother !!!

You'll go blind if you do...or grow hair on your palms...something like that.

<--- calmly wiping the spit off of my monitor.

no no no I am not reading this.. calmly backing away... find door... go down hall... no no no

Fishbone asked for suggestions for a filing system. Here are the categories I use:

Sightings.

Searchers. (These stories focus on some of the believers who are out in the field. Of course there is some sighting data in these stories.)

Foreign. I.e., yowies, orang pendek, etc.

Patterson film.

Hoaxes.

Paranormal.

Bones.

Arguments. (Points pro and con BF, and facts that could be used to make a point.)

Skepticism, and critiques of skepticism. (For one of the best of the latter, enter "Winston Wu" in Google & go to the 1st item that comes up.)

To write about. (Items that suggest an article-idea or a paragraph-idea to me.)

Hunting tips.

Book / NL reviews.

Items to maybe get (scopes, cameras, etc.).

Statistics & scientific speculations.

Highlights (Interesting items in NLs like Track Record)

Spooky stuff. (E.g., "Here chicky, chicky, chicky")

Misc./Other.

Of course, there's some overlap in these categories, and sometimes I copy a page from an item in one category and put it into another. It helps to have an on-site copier, as I do. (Incidentally, copier rental firms (check your Yellow Pages) always have obsolete copiers for sale cheap. These have, according to the company's bean-counters, worn out their useful economic life, so you can often get great bargains. I've got a $10,000 copier for under $1000. Of course, you may have to call several places, and also let them know up front that you're aware of their disposal practices with their older machines, or you may not get their best price.)

Hi,

If I had loads of extra time, or if I could make it a full-time job with benefits I would print out every report I could find on the Web and get copies of all the books pertaining to bigfoot.

Then I would break down each report into specific components such as location, weather, campsite, road sighting, etc. I would then enter each report as coded. With that information some statistical analysis might be done and maybe some predictions for the probability of an encounter in a particular area or time of year can be made. In addition you might be able to get a good general overall picture of BF behaviour and habits. (I would include habitat but we already have a very good idea of what BF habitat is already).

JUst an idea, but since I don't have loads of extra time. I'd submit a resume though.

That sounds yummy COCO!!! I love that idea!

If you put all the pertinent info into a database, capturing all the desired fields... you could just do any query you wanted to correlate the data into reports... that's a great idea!

I think someone did that for Washington state and found a correlation between annual rainfall and Sasquatch sightings. (the more inches/yr in an area also had a higher # of S. sightings).

Coco, this is just the sort of thing I have been working on off and on with info in Arkansas. It is time consuming.

There are correlations once you really get to checking it out though and I think well worth the time and effort. I'm hoping my work on it will be useful eventually if not to me, maybe to someone else local.

That's great that you are doing that Lisa. It has to be a very time consuming effort, but I am sure it will yeild results in the end.

Okay here's an idea- create a database, not for the general public, but for those doing bigfoot research/investigation. Whoever wants to use it must pay a fee, and for that fee they could run any query they want. It would might make a differnece in the amount of profitable time spent out in the woods with bigfoot.

Since I don't do any field research and rarely go camping (Yeah I know really cuts down on my chances of seeing one), I really don't know how much time is spent preparing for a weekend trip in the field. But there is a wealth of information in all the sighting reports, if it could just be organized better. I know that with all the information planning field work and carrying out field work might just be all that much more profitable.

I have had some experience with creating and maintaining databases and even the most mundane data can yeild some interesting information once it is sorted out.

Again, way to go Lisa, and anyone else who has a secret database.

New to the forums, and reading some old posts.

Thought that I would suggest a way that I use to keep track of my hard data. I get all sorts of magazine articles, poems, quotes, etc that I want to keep track of. Here's the method that I my mother-in-law gave to me. Works great. It takes advantage of the many database programs that are out there. I'm no computer geek, but this is easy.

You put some paper folders in your standard filing cabinet. Label them 00-001, 00-002, 00-003....00-999. That gives you up to 999 paper folders.

Now, each item you put into the first folder is numbered like this: 01-001, 02-001, 03-001, 04-001....99-001. That gives you 99 items in each folder. You are now set to file 99x999=98,901 items.

Next, you set up your computer database. Include as many fields as you think you might ever use to search by: Format (poem, book, article, photo,etc), Date, Topic (Patty, dermal lines, siting, baits, etc), Location (may only be used for some topics like "siting"), Weather, Result, Evidence Gathered, Participants, Season, Comments, etc. The very first field should be the hard file location where the data will be stored: ie. 23-006.

These fields are then filled out for each item, and the item is then labeled with its hard file location and put into the filing cabinet. That way, the next new item that I get goes into the very next available file location. I don't have to hunt for anything alphabetical or topic-oriented when I file it. Just use the next number.

And I don't have to rely on guessing when I start looking for it. I just go to my computer and do a search for dermal ridges found in the Cascade Mts in the Summer. Poof, the database tells me to pull hard file 23-006. Ta-daa, I look like a filing genius. (Better make a backup, though!!!)

You could even use it for casts. Make all casts in the file series C00-001, C00-002, etc. Lable them and set them on a shelf, but "file" all the pertinants on the computer database. Easy to sort, print, manipulate, etc. Books could be the B series: B00-001, B00-002....But don't have too many series or you've nullified the advantages of the system.

The advantage of this type of filing is really that it removes that nasty problem that a filing cabinet has of making good stuff just disappear. If you don't know which topic you put it under, it just gets lost. Or, you have to make a couple of copies, one for each topic file. Yuck. Or you mess up your alphabet when you file it, and you never see it again. You just label the next piece of data with the next available file number and input the info.

Hope this helps. It did for me.

Chewy, welcome to BFF.

This is basically the idea I was working toward. I actually have a plan but I don't have time to implement it. My schedule now is crazy and I barely have time to post here once or twice a week.

My plan went something like this: Years ago I used to have a direct mail business, and we maintained mailing lists for our clients, I had a great database program called Q&A. I am not sure if it is still available or how it has been changed but it would be perfect for my database.

Next, I would take each written report that I could get hold of and code each report like this:

1) Give it a number
2) Code the location
3) Code the weather
4) Code the encounter
5) Code the investigation if any
6) Code the source
7) Code the emotional level stated by the witness
8) Code level of believability. (Subjective)

There is method to my madness. The prime objective would be to maximize field research time and to allow enthusiasts (such as myself) a chance to maximize the probability of a sighting when travelling. (A prime example: Several years ago I took a vacation to Lake Tahoe, NV. Drove up and down Hwy 50 for 6 days. Didn't see a thing but I wasn't looking. Now whenever we plan a road trip I check the databases and print the corresponding reports.

I also think that staticians could be able to predict the chance of a sighting based on the examples in the database. The research possibilites are significant if it could just get done. Believe me, I understand how pressed for time we all are and I am not pointing the finger at anyone except myself. Its shameful the way I come up with ideas but never the the time to follow through. Everyone here knows they are welcome to any idea I post. In fact I would love to see one tried by a researcher from this group.

Okay now back to the endlessly entertaining hairy creature.

hey fish, i have two 3 bay,5ft metal office file cabinets,its basicly the entire bfro database,by state,county,and country region,each report has its own manilia folder and research info,all other data is grouped by subject(hoaxes,photos,independents,ect...) this works great,for hard copy info,on hand.
then the pc i use has an extra pc tower,networked,to fill up all other updates,and current projects im working on. good luck......evergreen man

Wow! All of these ideas certainly beat my shoebox and paperbag filing system.




KH

Oh, good, all that "floppy talk" happened in January!!! I've
got a floppy drive but don't use it....rail on that one!! I'm not backing up much.


But my field notebook, by default the spiral notebook of the season, is almost full. The few times I have been out, I've used my camcorder as a recording notebook.
I took alot of notes at the symposium and that started my "paper" note taking. Then, I tended to type up what we did in the field on the computer, some of it reinforced by watching what was on the videotape. I tend to tape alot and then filter out the relevant parts. So, I'm also left with a "library" of VHS tapes from the trips to the field.

But I like the idea of a binder and then, when those get full, some sort of closing storage container (the fold over lid kind) will be where I store them along with everything else.

Organization will be challenged this spring/summer!!
-- Tom

Geez, I was really off on that reply. Chewy, welcome and THANKS for the system idea. Looks great! and yours, too, CocoB. I'll have to see how I can apply that to the two investigations I've been on so far. Thanks. and please excuse my last babbling, no-system-identified post. The camcorder idea is good for "note taking" - nothing to do with filing them!