1. PLE-PhD project workshop
Open University of Catalonia, 31 October 2013
http://blogs1.uoc.es/phdple
Session I: innovative tools enabling e-supervision
What tools did my supervisor and I use
for e-supervision during my PhD?
Oskar Casquero Oyarzabal
oskar.casquero@ehu.es @ocasquero
University of the Basque Country (UPV/EHU)

2. The areas of supervision
• Title: “PLEs from institutional perspective.
Application to the study of personal networks”
– Review of the literature
– Definition of the research questions
– Proposals (e.g., a model)
– Developments (e.g., a software tool)
– Design of a case study

3. The tools (I)
• For daily work:
– Mendeley: for reference management
• share collections of papers
• import references from the web
• plugin that makes it easy to import references into a document
– Tumblr (type of blog): for unstructured information
• short drafts of new ideas
• clips of information from the web
• fast, informal writing; temporary validity
– Wiki: for structured information
•
•
•
•
summary of the literature
development of ideas based on previously collected info
gateway to the final dissertation document
formal writing; permanent validity

4. The tools (II)
• For the final dissertation document:
– Dropbox: a Word document for each chapter
• For specific outcomes (papers):
– First, write the skeleton of the paper in Gdocs
– Then copy it to a shared Word document in Dropbox
• Why did we use Word documents in this stage if
they do not scale?
– Reference management  Mendeley plugin

5. Conclusions
• It is all about selecting the tools that help
– support the process of development of ideas
– increase the writing/reviewing pace
• When a set of tools are set to meet user’s needs and
preferences, this set of tools ends up becoming an
indispensable element in the user's daily activity.
• The supervisor becomes more active.
• How are these tools being supported by doctoral programs?

6. PLE-PhD project workshop
Open University of Catalonia, 31 October 2013
http://blogs1.uoc.es/phdple
Session I: innovative tools enabling e-supervision
What tools did I use for e-supervision
as a PhD student?
Oskar Casquero Oyarzabal (oskar.casquero@ehu.es)
University of the Basque Country (UPV/EHU)