Cassandre is a free open source software for computer assisted

qualitative data analysis Qualitative research is a type of research that aims to gather and analyse non-numerical (descriptive) data in order to gain an understanding of individuals' social reality, including understanding their attitudes, beliefs, and motivation. This ...

and interpretation in

humanities Humanities are academic disciplines that study aspects of human society and culture, including Philosophy, certain fundamental questions asked by humans. During the Renaissance, the term "humanities" referred to the study of classical literature a ...

and

social sciences Social science (often rendered in the plural as the social sciences) is one of the branches of science, devoted to the study of society, societies and the Social relation, relationships among members within those societies. The term was former ...

. Although it refers, like other CAQDAS-software, to Grounded Theory Method, it also allows to conduct

discourse analysis Discourse analysis (DA), or discourse studies, is an approach to the analysis of written, spoken, or sign language, including any significant semiotic event. The objects of discourse analysis (discourse, writing, conversation, communicative sy ...

or quantitative

content analysis Content analysis is the study of documents and communication artifacts, known as texts e.g. photos, speeches or essays. Social scientists use content analysis to examine patterns in communication in a replicable and systematic manner. One of the ...

. The software is designed as a

server Server may refer to: Computing *Server (computing), a computer program or a device that provides requested information for other programs or devices, called clients. Role * Waiting staff, those who work at a restaurant or a bar attending custome ...

to support collaborative work. Formerly focused on semi-automatic coding, it now provides

diaries Diaries may refer to: * the plural of diary A diary is a written or audiovisual memorable record, with discrete entries arranged by date reporting on what has happened over the course of a day or other period. Diaries have traditionally bee ...

assisting qualitative analysis. In academia, Cassandre is used by social scientists in

sociology Sociology is the scientific study of human society that focuses on society, human social behavior, patterns of Interpersonal ties, social relationships, social interaction, and aspects of culture associated with everyday life. The term sociol ...

psychology Psychology is the scientific study of mind and behavior. Its subject matter includes the behavior of humans and nonhumans, both consciousness, conscious and Unconscious mind, unconscious phenomena, and mental processes such as thoughts, feel ...

management Management (or managing) is the administration of organizations, whether businesses, nonprofit organizations, or a Government agency, government bodies through business administration, Nonprofit studies, nonprofit management, or the political s ...

communication studies Communication studies (or communication science) is an academic discipline that deals with processes of human communication and behavior, patterns of communication in interpersonal relationships, social interactions and communication in differ ...

education Education is the transmission of knowledge and skills and the development of character traits. Formal education occurs within a structured institutional framework, such as public schools, following a curriculum. Non-formal education als ...

and

political science Political science is the scientific study of politics. It is a social science dealing with systems of governance and Power (social and political), power, and the analysis of political activities, political philosophy, political thought, polit ...

. Some researchers also use it in

computer science Computer science is the study of computation, information, and automation. Computer science spans Theoretical computer science, theoretical disciplines (such as algorithms, theory of computation, and information theory) to Applied science, ...

, namely in

knowledge management Knowledge management (KM) is the set of procedures for producing, disseminating, utilizing, and overseeing an organization's knowledge and data. It alludes to a multidisciplinary strategy that maximizes knowledge utilization to accomplish organ ...

, design, human-computer interaction and

topic map A topic map is a standard for the representation and interchange of knowledge, with an emphasis on the findability of information. Topic maps were originally developed in the late 1990s as a way to represent back-of-the-book index structures ...

ping. Many of the Cassandre users are academics and PhD students. The software tool is also used in public services (police and government departments) and in the industry (namely by

Cockerill Maintenance & Ingénierie John Cockerill, formerly Cockerill Maintenance & Ingénierie (CMI), is a mechanical engineering group headquartered in Seraing, Belgium. It produces machinery for steel plants, industrial heat recovery equipment and boilers, as well as shunting l ...

). In 2010, in the so-called KWALON experiment, representatives of selected CAQDAS-Software were invited to analyze a dataset composed of newspapers articles and videos related to the 2008 financial crisis. The software packages Atlas.ti,

MAXQDA MAXQDA is a software program designed for computer-assisted qualitative and mixed methods data, text and multimedia analysis in academic, scientific, and business institutions. It is being developed and distributed by VERBI Software based in Berl ...

NVivo NVivo is a qualitative data analysis (QDA) computer software package, formerly developed and marketed by QSR International, which is now part of Lumivero. NVivo is used in the social sciences, such as anthropology, psychology, communication, soci ...

, Transana and Cassandre were taking part in the experiment. Commentators depicted Cassandre as the only software limited to text material and as an integrated approach between algorithms and hand-made coding. The experiment, however, suggested that the outcome of the analysis depended more of the analysis strategy than the software.

Features

Its features include: * Semi-automatic coding (through registers) * Collaborative writing (through shared diaries) * Participative research (through shared memos) * Organizing memos * Diagramming

History

Christophe Lejeune created Cassandre's first version in 2006 after his post-doctoral stay in the

University of Technology of Troyes The University of Technology of Troyes (''Université de Technologie de Troyes''; ''UTT'') is a French university, in the academy of Reims. The UTT is part of the network of the three universities of technology, found by the University of Tech ...

where he involved in the

Social Semantic Web The concept of the Social Semantic Web subsumes developments in which social interactions on the World Wide Web, Web lead to the creation of explicit and semantically rich knowledge representations. The Social Semantic Web can be seen as a Web of ...

team and participated the definition of the Hypertopic protocol. This protocol was used by Cassandre to exchange data with other software tool from the Hypertopic suite. As a server, Cassandre was storing texts and provided a semi-automated coding feature. Rather than highlighting excerpts (like in most of QDA software), the user highlights keywords or idioms (markers) that instantly match several excerpts of material. These markers are gathered in into registers, which represent analysis categories.Lejeune, Chr., 2011
From Normal Business to Financial Crisis... and Back Again. An Illustration of the Benefits of Cassandre for Qualitative Analysis
''Forum Qualitative Sozialforschung / Forum: Qualitative Social Research'', 12, 1. Markers and registers are created, managed and browsed with Porphyry's Portfolio, a Hypertopic

client Client(s) or The Client may refer to: * Client (business) * Client (computing), hardware or software that accesses a remote service on another computer * Customer or client, a recipient of goods or services in return for monetary or other valuable ...

developed in

Java Java is one of the Greater Sunda Islands in Indonesia. It is bordered by the Indian Ocean to the south and the Java Sea (a part of Pacific Ocean) to the north. With a population of 156.9 million people (including Madura) in mid 2024, proje ...

by Aurélien Bénel. Cassandre also provided meta-data and some lexical analysis (words counts) accessible through the Porphyry sidebar, a Firefox add-on. Cassandre second version surfaced in 2010. Initially designed as

PHP PHP is a general-purpose scripting language geared towards web development. It was originally created by Danish-Canadian programmer Rasmus Lerdorf in 1993 and released in 1995. The PHP reference implementation is now produced by the PHP Group. ...

/SQL server (first

MySQL MySQL () is an Open-source software, open-source relational database management system (RDBMS). Its name is a combination of "My", the name of co-founder Michael Widenius's daughter My, and "SQL", the acronym for Structured Query Language. A rel ...

then

PostgreSQL PostgreSQL ( ) also known as Postgres, is a free and open-source software, free and open-source relational database management system (RDBMS) emphasizing extensibility and SQL compliance. PostgreSQL features transaction processing, transactions ...

), Cassandre was

refactored In computer programming and software design, code refactoring is the process of restructuring existing source code—changing the '' factoring''—without changing its external behavior. Refactoring is intended to improve the design, structure, ...

as a

CouchDB Apache CouchDB is an open-source document-oriented NoSQL database, implemented in Erlang. CouchDB uses multiple formats and protocols to store, transfer, and process its data. It uses JSON to store data, JavaScript as its query language using ...

application. Lexical analysis was optimized and included in the per text view. Coding was integrated to the browser thanks to a Firefox add-on, LaSuli, developed by Chao Zhou. Released in 2017, the third version of Cassandre consists in a in-depth refactoring. Resting on a typology of memos inspired by Grounded Theory Method, the application provides collaborative diaries aimed at structuring qualitative analyzes. Rather than coding, analysis is made through writing.

References

External links

*
Online diariesCassandre development page (GitHub)
{{Computer-assisted qualitative data analysis software , state=autocollapse Free QDA software Cross-platform free software Science software for macOS Science software for Linux

Features

History

See also

References

External links