TRANSANA PROFESSIONAL
TUTORIAL OVERVIEW

Tutorial Overview

This overview provides a map of all relevant pages in the Transana Tutorial. Each link will open in a new tab, allowing you to easily return here by closing that tab.

Transana is a very powerful qualitative analysis program. It enables the analysis of many different kinds of data using many different analytic methodologies in different analytic styles.

The Transana Tutorial is very comprehensive. There are a lot of sections here to cover most things one can do with Transana. There’s a lot of detail.

The Tutorial is mostly linear from top to bottom. You probably won’t want to visit all of the topics, especially your first time through the Tutorial. You may want to focus on one type of data your first time through, particularly in the Adding Source Data and Making Selections sections. You can always come back to explore the depths of what Transana can do in all of its complex glory at a later time. To facilitate this process, we have added tags like [advanced] to help you decide which Tutorial pages to visit.

If you have questions or comments, please let us know. We are always happy to hear from Transana users.

Ask a Question or Report an Issue

Revision Pending

Unfortunately, parts of the Tutorial are showing their age. Transana is constantly advancing, and we can’t always update every page and video when we add new features. We are working on updating the Tutorial during the fall of 2023. Pages we still need to review are marked with an *. We apologize that some pages contain out-dated, inaccurate information at the moment.

Introduction

These pages cover introductory information that will help you learn to start and configure Transana and to understand some fundamental concepts concerning how to work with Transana.

Overview Videos – What is Transana?

Transana’s Analytic Model

Starting Transana Professional and New Database Configuration

Transana’s Main Screen

Transana’s Organizational Structure – Connecting the Analytic Model to the Software

Adding Source Data

The first step in any qualitative analysis is to bring your source data into Transana. This process is different for different types of data, which have different properties and different analytic needs.

Source data is placed in Libraries in Transana. Libraries are organizational structures that allow you to group your source data in ways that make it easier to find what you are looking for later in the process. Some projects use a single library, while others use multiple libraries to organize large collections of data.

The first step in adding source data to Transana is to create a Library.

Create a Library

Once you have created a Library, you add your source data files.

Data Type	Add Source Data
Text (.docx, .rtf, *.txt)	Working with Text Data – An Overview Prepare Text for Analysis Import a Text File (Create a Document) Edit a Document
Still Image	Working with Still Image Data – An Overview Add a Still Image to a Document or Transcript See the Making Selections section for Still Images below.
PDF	Working with PDF Files – An Overview Import a PDF File (Create a PDF Document)
Media (Video and Audio) data Before Transcript Creation	Working with Media Files – An Overview Preparing Media Files for Analysis
– Media data paired with a transcript	Import a Media File (Create an Episode) Create a Transcript or Import a Transcript – or – Generate an automated transcript
– Media data with no transcript [advanced]	Import a Media File (Create an Episode) Create a Blank Transcript
– Media with Multiple Transcripts [advanced]	Why Use Multiple Simultaneous Transcripts? Import a Media File (Create an Episode) Create and Open Multiple Simultaneous Transcripts
– Multiple Media Files [advanced]	Import Data with Multiple Simultaneous Media Files (Create an Episode with Mutiple Media Files) Create a Transcript or Import a Transcript – or – Generate an automated transcript
Following Transcript Creation	Waveforms See the Transcription section below. Loading Media Files and Controlling Playback
Spreadsheet Data (from online survey tools) [advanced]	Import Spreadsheet Data

Adding Multiple Data Files

Transana includes tools for adding large amounts of data easily.

Batch Document Creation (including PDF Documents) [advanced]

Batch Episode Creation [advanced]

Transcription

Video recordings represent an abstraction from an activity or event in reality. A video cannot capture all aspects of the event recorded. A thousand analytic decisions influence how useful the video is, including when the recording is started and stopped, where the camera is placed, where the camera is pointed, how the image is framed by zooming, where microphones are placed, how many cameras are used, and how intrusive the recording operation is allowed to be. The video cannot capture everything. Still, video can be a very useful tool for research.

Transcripts represent a further degree of abstraction. A transcript cannot capture all aspects of data in a video. What is captured in the transcript? Speech is common, but to what level of detail? Are sounds that are not words included? “Um”s and “uh”s and partial words in imperfect spoken language, and to what level of detail? How is intonation represented, if at all? Movement? Posture? Body language? Facial expression? Does a participant’s sarcasm, grief, or excitement come through clearly? How does one reflect the surroundings, the environment where recording occurs? How do you transcribe music, or dance? Do you even have time to transcribe, given that the customer wants a final analysis by Tuesday? Another thousand analytic decisions must be made.

The following describes how to transcribe in Transana. What you transcribe and how you transcribe are up to you.

Types of Transcripts

Automated Transcription using Speechmatics Server

Manual Transcription

Transana’s Built-In Transcription Shortcut Keys

Time Codes

Advanced Time Codes

Time Codes with Multiple Simultaneous Transcripts [advanced]

Transcript Formatting [advanced]

Transcript Templates [advanced]

Transcript Autocomplete [advanced]

Define New Transcription Shortcuts [advanced]

Loading Existing Media Files and Controlling Media Playback

Add a Still Image to a Transcript [advanced]

Preparing for Analysis

The general model for analyzing data in Transana is to follow these steps:

Bring source data into Transana
Make a selection to indicate a portion of that source data that is analytically important
Use either Coding or Categorization to indicate what is analytically important about that selection in the source data.

This page describes Categorization and Coding, and describes how to get started with both, creating Keywords for Coding and creating Collections for Categorization.

Analysis in Transana – an Overview

Coding and Categorization

Keyword Groups and Keywords

Default Keywords

Keyword Summary Report

Create a Collection

Making Selections

Now that we have source data in the system and we have set up a coding system and a categorization system, we can get into the topic of making analytic selections from source data and assigning analytic meaning to these selections.

Important functional differences exist between different kinds of data, so there are some unavoidable differences in how you work with different types of data. Pick the type of data you have in the table below. (Some of the steps are repeated for different data types in the table.)

Data Type	Select and Code	Select and Categorize
Text (.docx, .rtf, *.txt)	Code a Text Selection (Create a Quick Quote)	Categorize a Text Selection (Create a Standard Quote)
	Viewing Quotes
	Code an existing Quote	Manipulating Items in Collections
Data Type	Select, Code, and Categorize all at once
Still Image	Add a Still Image to a Document or Transcript Code Still Image Data (Create a Snapshot) Add a Coded Snapshot to a Document or Transcript Batch Snapshot Creation
Data Type	Select and Code	Select and Categorize
PDF	PDF Quotes and PDF Snapshots – an Overview
	Code Text in a PDF (Create a PDF Quick Quote) Code a Graphical Element in a PDF (Create a PDF Quick Snapshot)	Categorize Text in a PDF (Create a PDF Standard Quote) Categorize a Graphical Element in a PDF (Create a PDF Standard Snapshot)
Data Type	Select and Code	Select and Categorize
Video and Audio
– Media Files with Transcripts	Code a Media Selection with a Transcript (Create Quick Clips)	Categorize a Media Selection with a Transcript (Create Standard Clips)
– Media Files without Transcripts [advanced]	Selecting Media Data Without a Transcript
– Media Files without Transcripts [advanced]	Code Media Data Without a Transcript (Create Quick Clips without a Transcript)	Categorize Media Data Without a Transcript (Create Standard Clips without a Transcript)
– Media Files with Multiple Transcripts [advanced]	Selecting Media Data without Multiple Transcripts
– Media Files with Multiple Transcripts [advanced]	Code Media Data with Multiple Transcripts (Create Quick Clips with Multiple Transcripts)	Categorize Media Data with Multiple Transcripts (Create Standard Clips with Multiple Transcripts)
– Multiple Media Files [advanced]	Selecting, Categorizing, and Coding Media Data with Multiple Media Files (Create Quick and Standard Clips with Multiple Media Files)
Following Clip Creation	Viewing Clips
	Code an existing Clip	Manipulating Items in Collections

Manipulating Selections

Once you have made initial selections, it is common to re-code and re-categorize those selections as your understanding of the data shifts and grows more complex.

Changing the size of selections

Managing Codes

Common Coding Tasks *

Manipulating Items in Collections *

Visualizations and Filters *

Additional Tabs in the Data Window