Open Science goes Geo – Part II: Scientific Software

Open Science is a broad movement looking beyond Open Access to publish openly and share scientific research immediately. Accessibility is addressed on all levels for everyone, without fees.

This short course is Part II in the Short Course series 'Open Science goes Geo', covering scientific software and source code. Software has become an integral part of science, and this course looks at how software publications, code archives and persistent identification can be used to properly integrate software into the scientific discourse. The treatment of source code (e.g., in code design, version control, documentation, and testing) is also covered in the context of establishing software engineering rules, best practices and processes when working with software and code in geosciences.

Open Science not only deals with Open Access papers but scientific research results in general including figures, data, models, algorithms, software, tools, notebooks, laboratory designs, recipes, samples and much more. Furthermore, it covers the communication, review, and discussion of research results and considers changing needs regarding incentives, quality assessment, metrics, impact, reputation, grants and funding. Thus Open Science encompasses licensing, policy-making, infrastructures and scientific heritage while safeguarding the dynamic nature of science and its evolving forms.

However, this short course is meant not to carry too far with Open Science. Rather, the short course looks at what open software opportunities are available and ready for application in geosciences today. The speakers present scientific software solutions and cover the ways in which software and code related networks can support researchers. It is aimed to create an idea on how researchers benefit from Open Science regarding scientific software. The drawbacks and opportunities are also outlined.