How to Extract Data on macOS

Learn how to extract your collected Survey and Routine data into a CSV format from your study profile in Zamplo Research.

PGP (pretty good privacy) based encryption

 Zamplo uses PGP based encryption, a public/private key encryption scheme, to protect your exported files. This allows us to encrypt files so only someone with your private key can open them, even the Zamplo team can’t decrypt the files without your private key. 

PGP uses a public key and a private key to encrypt and decrypt files. The public key is the key you share with the Zamplo team, and the private key you keep only to yourself. Zamplo uses PGP encryption to protect your participant data. 

 Install GPGTools: https://gpgtools.org/

• Run the installer and double click on “Install.” Read through the license and click through the install screens until complete.
• GPG Keychain should automatically run once it’s been installed. However, if it didn’t, you can find it by going to “Application” and selecting “GPG Keychain.”
• The first time GPG Keychain runs, it will ask for some permissions. Accept “Access to control GPG Keychain.” Additionally, you can optionally accept “Access to your contacts” to help with filling out new key details later.
• You may see a popup asking to enable GPG Mail Big Sur Activator. This isn’t required when using Zamplo Research. If your organization doesn’t use GPG for securing email, you can click “Not Now.” 

Next, you will need to create a new key that can be used with Zamplo’s file encryption. To do this: 

1. Enter your first and last name 
2. Enter the email you use to log into Zamplo Research 
3. Create a password to protect the encryption key 
4. Click “Create Key” 
5. You will be asked to enter a password again, enter the password you created on the previous screen 
6. Once the key creation is complete you will see a prompt asking you to upload to a public server, select “No, Thanks!” 

You will now be on the main screen of GPG Keychain. Let’s go over how to back up your key: 

1. Press the control key and click the encryption key that has your email address on it 
2. Click the “Export” option and choose where you want to save your key to 
3. Important: Check the “Include secret key in exported file” checkbox 
4. Click “Save” 
5. Enter your key’s password and click “Ok” 
6. Note: Don’t share this file with anyone and ensure its stored in a safe place 

If you use multiple computers, you can import this key. Importing works between operating systems such as Windows and MacOS. 

1. Next, you’ll need to send the Zamplo Research team your public key in order for us to send you encrypted files. In the GPG Keychain, press the control key and click on the encryption key with your email address on it 
2. Click on the “Export” option and choose where to save the key to 
3. Important: make sure the “include secret key in exported file” IS NOT CHECKED 
4. Click “Save” 
5. Attach this file to an email and send it to support@zamplo.org. Please inform the Zamplo Research team of the email address you entered when creating the key. This should be the same as the email address you use to login to Zamplo Research 

Next, let’s complete an encrypted export test. To do this we will export the participant list. 

Make sure you have configured your encryption key before starting this step. 

1. Open Zamplo Research 
2. From the top of the screen, select the “Study Profile” drop down and select the study name 
3. Navigate to the left side of the screen and click on “Manage Participants” 
4. Make sure you have at least one participant in the list. If there isn’t one, you can add one by selecting “Add Participant” at the top 
5. Click the “Export List” button in the top right 
6. Enter the name of the file and click the “Export (csv)” button 
7. Note: if prompted, make sure to save the file in a location you will remember. If you aren’t prompted, you will find the file in your downloads folder 

Now that the file is downloaded, it’s time to decrypt it. 

1. Open the Finder and navigate to where you saved the file 
2. Double click on the encrypted file you just saved 
3. When prompted, enter your key’s password 
4. Click “Show in Finder” once the decryption is finished 
5. You will now have a new file that has a “2. Gpg" at the end of the file name. We need to remove this before opening the file 
6. Press the control key and click on the decrypted file 
7. Choose the “Rename” option 
8. Remove the end of the file name so that only .csv remains at the end 
9. Hit the Enter key 
10. Open the file in any spreadsheet program 

You are now ready to download encrypted files from Zamplo Research!

Let’s go over how to download survey and routine data that has been collected for your study. 

1. In Zamplo Research, navigate to the left and click on “Extract Data” 
2. Click on “Export Data” in the upper right corner 
3. Give the file a name 
4. Select the data items you want included in the export 
5. Click on “Export (Zip)” 
6. Before opening any exported file, it must first be decrypted 
   1. Double click on the zip file you want to decrypt 
   2. Enter your key’s password if prompted 
   3. Double click again on the file you wish to decrypt 
   4. Once decryption is complete, select “show in finder” 
   5. You can now open the file in any spreadsheet program 

And that’s it! You now know how to export data from Zamplo Research using macOS.