Five qualities of a good DH project include:

1. Goal oriented: Clear specifications of what the project is and the content it creates.
2. Organized: No one likes a confusing and hard to understand tool they are using for the first time. Therefore, an organized DH project will allow for easier navigation of the website, and using the tool in everyday life situations.
3. Aesthetically pleasing: If a DH project is dull and boring, chances are people will begin to stray away from it. Therefore, a project must incorporate techniques that will grab users attention right from the start.
4. Clear citations: Many DH projects are used by researches (especially students who may be writing a paper). Therefore, having clear citations from where information is taken is essential for both legality purposes, and for viewers who also need citations.
5. Thematic: Each DH project should have a central idea that their website is based on. Having a central theme allows scholars to narrow down which websites they will find useful in their studies, and which they will not.

Besides the five qualities listed above, I believe a good DH project is one that brings scholars to understand the information that is otherwise looked passed. For example, before actually completing the mapping unit, I had never thought of looking up certain streets in Sherlock Holmes to see if they were actual streets. Instead, I just assumed they were. However, DH projects prevent assumption, and prevail actualization. By completing the mapping unit, I was able to see which streets were actually real, and which were falsely created. I also feel that a good DH project will provide scholars with knowledge that they hadn’t known before visiting the website. It is easy to find websites that reiterate what everyone knows, but it is difficult to find websites that teach everyone something new, and have citations to prove it! I have quickly learned that the DH projects and websites we have taken a look at in class have done that very well, which is specifically why I have enjoyed using them.

DH lets scholars ask new questions, because as I mentioned before, every time they go on a DH website, they are learning something they hadn’t known before. Therefore, I can imagine questions such as “Is that true?” or “How have I never used this digital tool before?” have become frequent questions. Not to mention, because DH is relatively just becoming prevalent in the digital world, many DH scholars may question what other DH projects are available to them and how they can use them in their studies. DH projects also allow for peer-to-peer interaction, as well as peer-to-scholar interaction, allowing for everyone to ask questions and have them answered by the DH community.

In our collaboration, and by reviewing our topic modeling results, we have learned that the number of topics and iterations has a major effect on the results produced. Increasing the number of topics made it easier to find cohesive topics with an identifiable label, though it made picking through data much more labor intensive and got overwhelming as numbers increased. It seems like a small sacrifice to make, as reducing the number of topics increased the presence of unusable topics. We both seemed to agree that 40-60 topics was an ideal range for achieving good results. In terms of iterations, increasing the number really seemed to increase how well the words within topic groups related to one another. We both increased our number of iterations with each output and noticed that it got easier to identify topics. Ideal settings for the topic modeling tool, to us, seemed to be 50 topics, at least 2000 iterations and 20-25 words printed.

In choosing three of our favorite topics we narrowed it down to suicide, physical appearance, and written document.

Suicide: found man body dead lay blood head struck hand shot revolver blow knife stick heavy weapon unfortunate left death sign lying wound bullet handle formidable pistol finally escaped wounded tied fired carried world struggle dragged grotesque injury spot shirt gun

This topic was most prevalent in Norwood Builder, and least prevalent in Empty House.

Questions:

1. What can these topics tell us about Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s writing style?
2. Was suicide an actual phrase in twentieth century London?

 Physical Appearance: black red white hair hat head large broad coat heavy small middle set short dress cut brown round thick centre grey faced dressed clean glancing

This topic was most prevalent in A Case of Identity, and least prevalent in The Blue Carbuncle.

Questions:

1. What do the colors symbolize in this short story?
2. Did the weather factor into the physical appearances of characters in short stories based in twentieth century London?

Written Document: paper note table read papers box book pocket put handed writing written drew sheet glanced picked document slip envelope piece

This topic was most prevalent in The “Gloria Scott,” and least prevalent in The Second Stain.

Questions:

1. What prevalence does this document have in “Gloria Scott?”
2. Were written documents important for all investigations?

This week’s digital tool was very different from the others we have used in class. After playing around with Mallet and topic modeling, I actually enjoyed trying to “un-puzzle” the words (so to speak), and figure out what the major topics were for each Sherlock Holmes story. For the first three topics I chose, I displayed the modeling tool with 1,000 iterations, 20 words printed, and 50 topics. In reviewing the long list of topics I could have chosen, I actually struggled in finding one that I understood and thought was relevant enough to twentieth century London. For my first topic, broken home, I learned that these groups of words were most popular in the Sherlock Holmes story of The Solitary Cyclist. From reviewing the topics, it seemed as though 25% of the words were those of my topic. When identifying what I thought the topic would be, I eventually labeled it abandoned. However, after reviewing the words again I felt broken home was more appropriate, seeing as how even though a father left, the siblings remained in contact-not an ideal family, but still there version of what a family is. My second topic had to do with investigation. I chose this as a topic because not only did I get it right away, but it also proves that the majority of Sherlock Holmes stories are revolved around investigation! It seemed as though 39% of the words in the story revolved around this theme of investigation, but it didn’t rely to heavenly on it. My third topic was household. It seemed as though 25% of the words in Sussex Vampire revolved around the topic; however, it was only a small portion of the story seeing as how it only outlined the characters of the short story. Lastly, the fourth topic I chose was written document. I was surprised by these results because only about 13% of the story included this topic. Although it may not have been a major theme in “Gloria Scott,” I assume the document was the premise for what the investigative story was based upon.

When I played around with Mallet again, I decided to change it up. Instead of doing 1,000 iterations, this time I did 1,500 iterations, 25 words printed, and 40 topics. I found it easier labeling topics for these various groups of words because I had more to work with and more to compare. Therefore, the first topic I chose was characteristics. It became very clear that this was the topic for these words because words like “face, grey, man, thin, lips” were very prevalent. The next topic I chose was emotions. This was one of the harder topics I had to label because words like “god, voice, words” threw me off- but after reviewing it once more, I decided that a general topic for these words and more would have to do with a person’s emotions. My last topic for this set was physical appearance. This was kind of a fun group to label because it there was a lot of imagery and colors involved, so it was very clear for me to imagine this person standing in front of me. Therefore, I knew this topic had to involve some sort of appearance. When I reviewed the top Sherlock Holmes stories for these related topics I got The Priory School, Lion’s Mane, and A Case of Identity. Interestingly enough, all of these topics were slightly similar, leading me to believe these stories may have similar themes.

For my last set, I chose 2,000 iterations, 40 words printed, and 60 topics. I was a bit more overwhelmed with this set because although I had a lot more to work with, I felt like it was almost too much to work with. When looking at the different sets of words I felt like most of the words matched one another to create a topic, but I felt that others were kind of strenuous and took away from the major theme of the topic. With that being said, I said my first topic was schedule. A lot of the words had to do with timing and places to be, which reminded me a lot of when I plan my day out. For this topic, 12% of The Missing Three-Quarter had to do with my topic, and although another 6% had to do with a different topic, one of the major themes still pointed to scheduling. My second topic was suicide. This topic was very easy to label because all of the words involved with it pointed to something tragic and done to self. Therefore, I thought suicide would be an appropriate label. Looking at the percentages it seemed as though The Norwood Builder was the top story that had about 13% of the words listed for this topic. Although it was not the number one topic for the story, it is prevalent seeing as how a murder must have taken place. Lastly, I chose the topic of traveling for my next set. This was another topic that I was iffy about because I felt like it could have been journey or travel, but I leaned more toward travel because of words such as “bridge, town, (and) cross.” It seemed as though traveling was prevalent in Final Problem, with a total of 29% of topic words mentioned throughout the short story.

Overall I thought Mallet was a fun and interesting tool, and I would most definitely try it out again sometime. It taught me a lot about gathering a major theme based on prevalent words in a short story, but in a unique way. Every time I figured out a topic I felt as though I was unscrambling a really difficult puzzle piece; however, once I came up with the correct topics the whole process became extremely entertaining!