Raw data

Raw data (also known as primary data) is uninterpreted data from a primary source, having characteristics related to it and that have not been subjected to any processing or other manipulation.

Raw data (also known as primary data) is uninterpreted data from a primary source, which have not been subjected to any processing or other manipulation.

The raw data can be entered into a computer program or used in manual procedures, such as the statistical analysis of a survey.
It may be the binary data of electronic storage devices such as hard disk drives.

As it is not processed by the computer, it is considered "raw data". To continue the cooking analogy, computer-processed data is sometimes referred to as "cooked data."

In computing, raw data have the following characteristics:

May contain human or mechanical errors;
May include various formulas (colloquial);
Unencrypted and uncoordinated;
Anomalies, which require confirmation or citation.

For example, data entry from a sheet may contain dates. The raw data are in many forms: for example, "31/12/2017", "12/31/17", “31 December 2017", "31 December" Or "today". Capturing these dates requires converting them into a standardized format for easier reading by humans or computers.

Data and information are distinguished from information that is the final product of the processed data.

For example, point of sale (POS terminals, cash registers) in a busy supermarket collects huge amounts of raw data every day about customers. The list of groceries and their prices and time and date of purchase do not give much information until they are processed. Once analyzed by the software or even by a human researcher using a pen and calculator, this raw data may indicate certain elements that each group of customers buy and serve as statistics.

Tim Berners-Lee (inventor of the World Wide Web) believes that the exchange of raw data is important for society in accordance with the principle of open knowledge, which means that everyone should have rights to exchange all raw data.