# Ch 01: Overview

*Commenced: 12 Jan 2024* Documentation rédigée le 07/11/2025 par Barbara Bonazzi mise à jour le 03/03/2026 par Barbara Bonazzi relu le 09/03/2025 par Maxine

Original authors: Ian Johnson, Maël Le Noc (2023 - 2025), Michael Falk (2021-2022), Vincent Sheehan (2016-2020)

Assisted by: Pierre-Yves Saunier

## 1. What is Heurist ?

Heurist website : [https://heurist.huma-num.fr/heurist/startup/](https://heurist.huma-num.fr/heurist/startup/)

Specific reasons for using Heurist:

- Developed by and for Humanities research in collaboration with hundreds of research projects
- Not tied to any specific project or type of data, handles a broad range of Humanities projects\*
- Entrusts development and management of databases to the user rather than the IT priesthood
- Quick set up of complex interlinked databases typical of the Humanities, without programming
- Iterative changes to database structure without corrupting or rebuilding existing data
- Wide range of data import, export and analysis/visualisation functions
- Stable CMS web sites generated and stored as an integral part of the database
- Free and Open Source on GitHub, all data rely on MySQL in a comprehensively documented format
- Generates instant archive packages in XML and standard SQL with internal documentation
- Designed for low cost centralized maintenance shared by many projects
- Humanities-knowledgeable core team and community of users

*\* No one system can do everything. Heurist is a generic system designed around the needs of a broad cohort of Humanities projects needing rich interlinked data and metadata databases. It cannot be expected to provide all the domain-specific features of tools such as text analysis, on-site archaeological recording or spatial analysis, but it may still provide a means of collecting and managing data which is later fed into specific analysis tools such as R, QGis, Gephi, TAPOR etc. \**

## 2. Learning Resources

This document aims to give a reasonably concise but comprehensive narrative of Heurist functionality in an order that corresponds as far as possible with a typical engagement with Heurist. It cross-references to the project website, training materials and pages in the online Help system, all of which give more detailed information and are organised in menu order.

### 2.1 **Website**

There are a range of learning resources, FAQs and links to exemplar projects on the [Heurist Network website](http://HeuristNetwork.org):

[![image.png](https://docs.heuristref.net/uploads/images/gallery/2026-07/scaled-1680-/4Q0image.png)](https://docs.heuristref.net/uploads/images/gallery/2026-07/4Q0image.png)

### 2.2 **Online help**

Our main online help, delivered from a Heurist database via the Heurist CMS, is available [here](https://heuristref.net/Heurist_Help_System).

![](https://heurist-doc.huma-num.fr/uploads/484807a7-9a92-4de8-af48-b65a92b1d395.png)

### 2.3 **Tutorial videos**

A series of 8 (as at Jan 2024) tutorial videos have been created by Dr Michael Falk. These are available in the Learn section of the Heurist Network website [here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-lRjmkpQh4g&list=PLnpUV3fVROXjO_FFDb8K4L6UoQfnhVkqQ).

The videos are accompanied by a text and annotated images which describes the steps to follow through using training data. These texts and images have been used as a basis for some sections of the current document.

![](https://heurist-doc.huma-num.fr/uploads/b0df53c6-46b4-4a03-8308-ad5d6b88b73a.png)

### 2.4 **Exemplary websites**

Annotated examples of Heurist-generated websites are on the [Featured Projects page](https://heuristnetwork.org/featured-projects/).

![](https://heurist-doc.huma-num.fr/uploads/342c0e73-8734-4c5f-a38d-8a897213437a.png)

Additional projects can be accessed through the [Projects Search page](https://heuristref.net/Heurist_Contacts/web/5417/10669) (Exemplar Projects)

### 2.5 **FAQ**

The [FAQ](https://heuristref.net/Heurist_Contacts/web/5417/10718) gathers a set of answers to commonly asked questions. It was created pre 2020, and would no longer cover all the frequently asked questions, but the answers are generally still valid.