associates.infonomics.ltd.uk

It's been a while since the last update but the next few bulletins will more than compensate for our absence!

Qualitative Methods Mini-series

In response to client requests for qualitative methods we've developed a range of tools that we will share with you over the coming months.  We hope that you're interested in using these approaches in your projects.

Qualitative data is typically provided as passages of semi-structured text.  That text can be researched and analysed, qualitatively and quantitatively.  The matrix below lists possible techniques for each approach.

First we will focus on reverse mail merge, the remaining topics will be covered in later bulletins.



Reverse Mail Merge

This unlikely title has been chosen to describe those occasions when you have text (e.g. in a Word Document) that you want to extract, field by field, record by record, into a table (e.g. an Excel Spreadsheet) - like a mail merge but in reverse¹.

In an ideal world text extraction of this nature would be unnecessary because the data would already be fully structured with forms that describe the fields and records².  In reality the data we work with has not been prepared for analysis.

The typical scenario for this tool would include occasions where you have a large body of documents that you want to read, and an associated excel template that you want to populate.  The documents should be semi-structured as the tool uses the consistent elements of formatting or styles to find the data to extract (un-structured text will be covered in a later bulletin on Annotation).  Examples include:

• proformas/ templates
• application forms
• visit reports
• web pages (e.g. search results that aren't provided as a table for download)
• reports and proposals (e.g. to gather a document index for ISO version/ quality management).

An extraction algorithm - that works like a glorified find and replace - is prepared to suit the document structure.  The program will then scan thousands of documents in a matter of seconds and provide a tables of results.
Although very small, one-off, requirements would not justify the time required to prepare the algorithm, economies of scale are soon apparent even with short tasks like extracting names and addresses from a dozen files.



Using reverse mail merge in your projects

This bulletin provides a brief introduction to one tool for the quantitative research of qualitative data.

Clearly this approach has the potential to offer you a massive saving on the resources required to read and extract data from documents, allowing you to focus on the higher-value added, and frankly more exciting, parts of the job.

Please get in touch if you want to know more about the technique (or about normal mail merge or forms) or would like to see a demonstration.



¹Mail merge creates personalised documents from a template (e.g. an envelope label) and a spreadsheet (e.g. of addresses).  If you're not familiar with mail merge then we can offer on-site training based upon the Microsoft Office course.

²Forms are pages comprised of text and "fields" for a user to fill in with information - such as a window or tick box into which the user is able to input data - in order to have the data processed by another application.  If you're not familiar with forms then we can offer training based upon a range of software programs to suit your needs.