Final Year Projects: Five Apps that’ll Make Your Phone a Research Wand.

Final Year Projects: Five Apps that’ll Make Your Phone a Research Wand.

Research writing for as long as we can remember, is the most important form of writing in an academic environment. Before I proceed further, it is pertinent that one is reacquainted with what a research is. Simply put, a research is a systematic process of gathering, compilation and analysis of data from respondents using various methods and instruments. It is a task all undergraduate students eventually undertake during their academic programme, research writing such as final year projects constitutes the most important requirement for graduation from a tertiary institution.

There are several forms of research writing; final year projects, seminar, term paper, thesis and dissertations. However, the focus of this article is final year projects in particular.

With the advent of the digital age, heralded by the invention of the internet and other communication technologies, most of research has gone electronic. The Internet is a mega hub hosting various super-highways of information cutting across all niches, disciplines and areas of interest. Research has been made much easier and more readily accessible with a vast majority or in most cases, a totality of the information making up the content of one's research being found online.

Aside the internet which is regarded as the mainstay of the digital age, another hallmark of this era is the invention and development of softwares such as mobile applications. Which brings us back to the subject of this article;

5 apps that makes your phone a research wand.

There are definitely more than 5 research applications but just five will be discussed. So, the 5 are listed and discussed as follows;

 Google Scholar

It is an online application offered at no cost by Google and is very useful for any researcher, which in this case are undergraduate final year students. Armed with nothing more than a smartphone, internet connectivity, and a topic for research, Google Scholar will give you an edge in researching on any project.

Google Scholar is an academic search engine. It allows its users to source the net for all kinds of academic literature, ranging from journals to scientific articles and patents. There are other softwares that provide a similar facility, but Google Scholar’s service has a scope that makes it stand out.

It doesn't just navigate the best-known databases for academic papers, but it also grants the user viable access to a vast collection of university archives. This of course will increase your chance of finding something relevant to contribute to your own research.

Scrivener

This application was originally intended as a tool for fiction writing mostly utilized by screenwriters and novelists.

Scrivener then expanded its scope of writing and became an essential application for any niche of lengthy writing, including research articles and dissertations.

No matter how well researched your paper might be, if it has low readability then it will attain very low readership. Scrivener helps you avoid this research mishap by adding an important content structure to your finished work.

You can customize your own writing layout if you wish, but the software comes complete with an extensive range of writing templates you can use.

 Mendeley

For a science research, this is indispensable, it is an academic social network platform, which enables you to chat and connect with about six million users worldwide.

It is also a powerful research application in its own right. It provides facilities that will enable you to manage your references and allows you to import data sourced from other research applications such as Google Scholar.

Of course, its own online database of academic literature is available and readily accessible to its users, who can use it to contribute further to their own completed work. This application will automatically create a bibliography for you as you write your own research papers. It is also capable of generating comprehensive and accurate in-text citations when you incorporate other research works into yours.

Wikipedia

Known as "Wiki" for short, this mobile research application is a multilingual online encyclopedia invented and maintained as an open collaboration project by a vast community of volunteer content editors using a wiki-based editing system. It is the broadest and most popular general reference work on theinternet. The application is frequently used for research on a vast number of disciplines.

Teamscope

This research application is a data collection platform with a user-friendly interface, specially createdfor sensitive data and clinical research. In a field where most toolsare web-only and can only be accessed via internet connectivity, Teamscope ensures a secure offline data-gathering on such content. The application ensures you access them offline, making access to such information very convenient.

These are five of the best apps for research. They will serve as useful tools for every final year student undertaking whatever research on their various disciplines. These apps come in highly recommended if you want to make your mobile phone a research wand.