Digital Resources for Mental Health Professionals: Data Organisation (Part 2)

This is part 2 of a series on data organisation. Which is part of a multi-series of posts on digital resources for mental health professionals.

File Names

Naming files in a consistent and logical way can help you stay organised. You should:

avoid relying on your memory,
be able to preserve your ability to recognise your files years from now.

First I would like to introduce you to the ISO date format. This is a way of writing the date in a way that makes computers sort your files from oldest to newest automatically. This blog post explains it in more detail.

I personally try to stick with the following system:

YYYY-MM-DD_TYPE_description-of-content_AUTHOR_version.ext
- YYYY-MM-DD: The date in ISO format.
- TYPE: This is the type of file from your point of view not the point of view of the computer. From the computer point of a view PDF file is a type of file but for me it may contain a presentation, research article or a legal document.
- Description-of-content: This is the main description of the contents of that file.
- AUTHOR: Author initials. I only use this if the file is part of a project with other collaborators.
- version: To keep track of changes or revert to earlier edits.
- .ext: the file type extension such .txt, .pdf, etc..
Example:
- 2024-03-01_PRESENTATION_How-to-name-your-files_MHO_v03.pdf