Research Methodology

A research report is a documentation review: a structured reading of what named authorities publish on a defined question, reported with its method, its sources, and an explicit statement of what it did not establish. It is not a survey of opinion, not an aggregation of user reports, and not a measurement study.

1. State the question in a form that a document can answer.
2. Enumerate the authorities that control the answer, and read their own published material in full.
3. Record the exact wording of anything bearing on the question, including statements that contain no number.
4. Classify conservatively. Silence is recorded as silence, never as agreement.
5. Record the retrieval method where a publisher blocks automated access, so the review is reproducible.
6. State the limitations before publication, not in response to criticism after it.

Every report carries a version number and a publication date. Substantive changes increment the version and are recorded, so that a reader can tell whether a finding has moved or merely been reworded. A report is never rewritten in place to match a new conclusion — a new version says what changed and when.