BA-DS-Research-Software.md

 Research software plays an important role both in quantitative and qualitative research, but (thesis) students often struggle with finding software that is easy to use, GDPR-compliant, safe, and ethically sound.
 
-Ideally, students should abstain from buying commercial software of their own. Especially cloud-based tools often imply that ingested data is used for tool improvement, such as AI training, later, and this can be a problem when working with sensitive research data.
+Ideally, students should abstain from buying commercial software of their own. Especially cheap (temporary) licenses for cloud-based tools often imply that ingested data is used for tool improvement, such as AI training, and this can conflict with academic requirements for storing and processing research data.
 
 Students' first point of information on research software should, therefore, be the UM library, who provide an overview of tools for which we have official UM student subscriptions:
 
@@ -44,7 +44,11 @@ According to its developer Jürgen Fleiss, "[aTrain](https://github.com/JuergenF
 
 </summary>
 
-The Data Science Research Infrastructure (DSRI) is available for thesis students at Maastricht University to collect, process, and analyse data. On the DSRI, you can run Python and R code in environments such as Jupyter Notebooks and RStudio. Many students use code on DSRI to scrape web data (e.g., YouTube comments) for qualitative and computational research projects. If you are using a Git repository or Docker image that includes a course name (e.g. "Machines of Knowledge") although you have never taken the course yourself, this is not an issue. It only indicates the material was originally developed for that course. However, you always have to use the most recent repository version. For example, if you are working in 2024, use the repository labeled with "2024" because earlier versions (e.g., "2023") may lack key updates. If you encounter technical issues, contact the DSRI Support Team directly. They have backend access and can troubleshoot issues much faster than your supervisor or course instructor:
+The [Data Science Research Infrastructure (DSRI)](https://dsri.maastrichtuniversity.nl/) is available to all students at Maastricht University to collect, process, and analyse data. On the DSRI, you can run Python and R code for web scraping, data visualisation, statistical analysis, etc. 
+
+Most BA DS students first use the DSRI as part of the QDA course. Some students reuse the projects they created then for their theses. Other students would like to set up new DSRI projects because they intend to work with different methods or different code. This is definitely possible! In both cases, however, you should contact the DSRI Support Team early on to let them know how long you will need access and why the access is important for your research. The Support Team will then make sure to grant you access for the whole thesis trajectory.
+
+If you are building a new project based on a Git repository or Docker image that includes a specific course name (e.g. "Machines of Knowledge") although you have never taken the course yourself, this is not an issue. It only indicates the material was originally developed for that course. However, you always have to use the most recent repository version. For example, if you are working in 2024, use the repository labeled with "2024" because earlier versions (e.g., "2023") may lack key updates. If you encounter technical issues, contact the DSRI Support Team directly. They have backend access and can troubleshoot issues much faster than your supervisor or course instructor:
 
         📧 DSRI-SUPPORT-L@maastrichtuniversity.nl