Cloud QDA - Qualitative Data Analysis on the Web
Keep your data safe but accessible with QDAcity
Why choose the QDAcity cloud?
As a cloud application QDAcity offers seamless accessibility from any device with an internet connection, eliminating the need for local installations. QDAcity enables real-time collaboration, allowing multiple researchers to work on the same dataset simultaneously, enhancing teamwork and efficiency. Automatic updates and cloud storage ensure that you always have access to the latest features and never lose data due to hardware failures or losing your thumbdrive or laptop. Hardware requirements for you are minimal. As cloud-based solution, QDAcity can handle large datasets without requiring high-end local computing power.
QDAcity prioritizes the protection of valuable and sensitive research data through robust measures for both data safety and security. We further ensure that you are in control of your data so you can archive it yourself and switch between analysis tools through import and export functionality.
Data protection
Research data is valueable. Often it is also sensitive and your data subject needs to consent to the processing of their data for specific purposes (see Informed Consent).
Therefore, you need to be sure that your data is safe from accidental deletion (data safety) and protected from unauthorized acceess (data security). We take this responsibility seriously and in the following lay out our measures to protect your data. In the following we transparently lay out our measures that we took to protect your data.
Therefore, you need to be sure that your data is safe from accidental deletion (data safety) and protected from unauthorized acceess (data security). We take this responsibility seriously and in the following lay out our measures to protect your data. In the following we transparently lay out our measures that we took to protect your data.
Data safety
- Data replication: our database is replicated across two geographic regions and within those regions, the data is replicated in at least three physical data centers.
- Database backups: In addition to the highly available database provider, we implemented two additional layers of safety that guard against user error. Within 7 days we can restore data modified or deleted within this time frame on a fine granular level. In addition to this point-in-time-recovery (PITR) we also create weekly full database backups and store those for 3 months. Data in this category includes things like the account settings and project meta data
- Soft-delete storage: Contents of your project (like your documents and analysis results) are not stored in the database mentioned above. They are protected from accidental deletion through a 10 day soft delete. So any data in this storage category that is deleted will be retained for 10 days before it is fully deleted
- Infrastructure certification: The infrastructure partner QDAcity uses is certified as compliant to ISO/IEC 27001:2022.
Data security
- Encryption: All data at rest is encrypted using the Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) algorithm, AES-256 using a FIPS 140-2 certified encryption module.
- Professional key management: Encrypted data is only as safe as the keys to the data are being handled correctly. We don't handle creation of encryption keys an their status ourselves, but use Goolge-managed encryption keys.
- Password safety: Your password is the most sensitive information we have of you. It is never stored as-is on any of our persistence layers. We use a powerful one-way hashing algorithm that adds information to your password (salting) and then stores a hash that lets us verify the correctness of a given password but not reverse it into the original plain-text password. After authentication access is given through a token with an expiration date whose origin we can cryptographically verify.
You are curious about QDAcity now?
Create your free account today, or explore our coding editor demo with no registration required.
Collaborative QDA using QDAcity
As a cloud application, QDAcity is well suited for teamwork. This includes the management of your team and capabilities for collaboration within a project.
To support effective collaboration, QDAcity includes awareness features that show where others are working within the project, helping to prevent duplication and streamline efforts. This is especially useful for large or geographically distributed research teams. By keeping everyone aligned and minimizing conflicts, QDAcity helps you focus on your analysis, leading to more efficient and cohesive results.
Real-time collaboration
QDAcity enables real-time concurrent coding, allowing you and your collaborators to work on the same dataset simultaneously. Similar to collaborative text editing, this ensures that updates are immediately visible to all team members, improving transparency and coordination.To support effective collaboration, QDAcity includes awareness features that show where others are working within the project, helping to prevent duplication and streamline efforts. This is especially useful for large or geographically distributed research teams. By keeping everyone aligned and minimizing conflicts, QDAcity helps you focus on your analysis, leading to more efficient and cohesive results.
Access control
Access to your data can be easily managed using a variety of roles which you can assign to individual users or user groups which you can create. Giving ownership of your projects to a user group managed by you can also help make sure that all projects within your working group or professorship are always accessible and the data and the analysis artifacts don't leave the group when the employee doing the research leaves the group.Interoperability and self-archiving
When chosing QDAcity as your QDA cloud you can be sure that you retain control and the freedom to take your data elsewhere if you have this requirement. We are confident we provide a reliable service, but even with exceptional service, no application will do everything imaginable. You might want to do additional analysis with different tools or you might simply have a requirement by your institution to archive all data on servers operated by your organization.
QDAcity makes interporability and self-archiving possible by supporting the REFI-QDA exchange format to which you can export your projects. You can also import QDA data from other Software projects supporting this format. Besides this full project export, QDAcity also offers other types of exports for your code book, and coded data segments which you can open with any spreadheet application.
QDAcity makes interporability and self-archiving possible by supporting the REFI-QDA exchange format to which you can export your projects. You can also import QDA data from other Software projects supporting this format. Besides this full project export, QDAcity also offers other types of exports for your code book, and coded data segments which you can open with any spreadheet application.
We use cookies for a number of purposes, including analytics and performance, functionality and advertising. Learn more about QDAcity use of cookies.
Analytics:Performance:Functional: