Thread by @suhas_prameela

To all the new PhD students out there, naming your files (research data or manuscripts) is an important skill set that you should develop quickly! Don’t name your files as “final”, instead do version control (ver_1, ver_2 etc.). (1/2) #phdchat #AcademicChatter

Also make sure to add things like date, sample name, project title etc. You can also ask your senior lab mates or PI what best practices they use to name the files. Finally, never delete your data and back it up in multiple places so that your hard work is not wasted :)

Naming files poorly can sometimes have grave consequences. I once heard that someone uploaded a wrong research proposal (they had named it has final and they were two versions of "final"!) and it was too late by the time they realized the mistake.

Great that this thread is resonating well! Just to clarify, yes, Git & similar tools do "proper version control" and should be used when possible. For eg, using ver_1, ver_2 for codes seems tedious. But for many disciplines, people & cases, using ver_x is a good place to start.

And, never rely on the date/time stamp that you see when you click on "properties" of the file. It can change when you make edits and it may be difficult to click on properties of hundreds of files to check. So putting a date/time into the file name is important.