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Open Science Framework

A free and open-source project management tool that helps researchers manage, store, and share research material throughout the entire research lifecycle.

What is Open Science Framework (OSF)?

Open Science Framework (OSF) is a free and open-source project management tool that helps researchers manage, store, and share research material (documents, code, data, pre-registration, preprints, etc) throughout the entire research lifecycle. 


OSF HOME: Create a free personal repository of public or private ‘projects’. Each project contains a wiki, file storage, ‘components’ (file structure), and tracks changes. Users also have the option to assign the project tags, copyright license, create a DOI, and integrate a number of ‘Add-Ons’  including GitHub, figshare, DropBox, Google Drive, Amazon S3, etc. The integration of Add-Ons allows the user to have an OSF repository without the need to duplicate research materials already available in other tools (such as data in a GitHub repository). 


OSF REGISTRIES:  An open repository of pre-registrations for experimental science. Pre-registrations do not need to be discipline or subject-specific and can follow a number of templates including AsPredicted.org, Registered Report Protocols, Replication Recipe (Brandt et al., 2013), Post-Completion, etc. 


OSF PREPRINTS: An open preprint repository. Preprints do not need to be from a specific subject or discipline. However, a number of preprint repositories use OSF’s open-source infrastructure, including PsyArXiv, MetaArXiv, and MindRxiv


Institutional support for Open Science Framework (OSF) is provided by Princeton University Library and Princeton Research Data Service.

Benefits for Princeton Affiliates

What you should know about OSF

  • Longevity: OSF has secured funding for at least the next 50 years.
  • Individual file size limit: 50GB
  • Storage limit per private project: 5GB
  • Storage limit per public project: 50GB
  • Additional storage can be added through the use of Add-Ons such as GitHub, figshare, or Dataverse

Getting Started

How to get started

  • OSF
  • “Sign in through institution” with your Princeton email address 

Getting set up

Helpful Tutorials

A complete list of videos from the Center for Open Science can be found here.

Examples Princeton OSF Repositories

  • Index of public repositories and pre-registrations by Princeton researchers.
  • Musslick, S. (2020, October 20). Supplemental materials for preprint: SweetPea: A standard language for factorial experimental design. Retrieved from osf.io/b4nsy  
  • Cheek, N. N. (2020, September 4). Seeing the subjective as objective. Retrieved from osf.io/5cfbt
  • Goldberg, A. E., Mon, S. K., Nencheva, M. L., Citron, F., & Lew-Williams, C. (2020, October 11). Pupillometry Data and Analysis. https://doi.org/10.17605/OSF.IO/DSN9W 
  • [Pre-registration] Baek, S., Testerman, M. M., & Emberson, L. (2020, July 29). Attrition Rate in fNIRS-Based Infant Cognitive Neuroscience: A Meta-Analysis. Retrieved from osf.io/uc436
  • [Preprint] Kumar, M., Michael Anderson, Antony, J., Baldassano, C., Brooks, P., Cai, M. B., … Norman, K. A. (2020, December 9). BrainIAK: The Brain Imaging Analysis Kit. Retrieved from osf.io/db2ev 

Point of Contact

For questions about Open Science Framework (OSF) please contact Meghan Testerman, Behavioral Sciences Librarian at mtesterman@princeton.edu