The TextGrid project started in February 2006. During the first phase of the project the development of the software begun. In consequence an infrastructure for the virtual research environment was built. During the second project phase a productive version of the software was created and the user base was broadened. Meanwhile, the project reached its third funding phase entitled "TextGrid - Virtual Research Environment for the Humanities". The objective within this phase is the transformation of the project for the continuous operation in financial, legal and technical terms. The following partner institutions are participating during the third funding phase of TextGrid:
Scholars from humanities and cultural studies can do their research on textbased data jointly or alone by using the TextGrid software. This environment consists of two main components:
The TextGrid Repository is long-term storage of subject specific contents where digital research data can be stored. This is to guarantee the long-term availability and access to data and also to provide cooperation for the scholars.
The TextGrid Laboratory is the client software of the virtual research environment and combines diverse services and tools within the interface that can be used intuitively. The TextGridLab can be extended and therefore be used by scholars from diverse fields of research and interest. The software is available for all prevalent operation systems.
Further services
User of TextGrid are able to contact the developers of the software and further involved persons. For this purpose there are different open mailing-lists available. Furthermore, user meetings are arranged on a regular basis and training courses and workshops are offered.
User projects
Meanwhile, a number of user cases and edition projects which are working with TextGrid are established. More information on these projects and their experiences with TextGrid can be found on the TextGrid Homepage.
Literature
TextGrid. In: Heike Neuroth, Martina Kerzel, Wolfgang Gentzsch : Die D-Grid Initiative. Universitätsverlag Göttingen, Göttingen 2007,, S. 64–66.
Heike Neuroth, Felix Lohmeier, Kathleen Marie Smith: TextGrid. Virtual Research Environment for the Humanities. In: The International Journal of Digital Curation. 6, Nr. 2, 2011,, S. 222–231.
