Open Science – Artefact Management Guideline

The Open Science Artefact Management Guideline is a document designed to advise scientists how to collect, document, licence, archive, and share artefacts, where “artefacts” includes—but is not limited to—scientific protocols, raw and derived data (text, csv, etc.), scripts, figures, tables, and software. Open Science covers many topics including (but not limited to) the actual data itself (“open data”), the material used to analyse the data (“open material”), the disclosure of software source code (“open source”), and the manuscripts reporting on the study results (“open access”). The greater mission is to improve scientific rigour, encourage scientific collaboration, and increase the rate of scientific progression. All science produces artefacts. All scientists have a responsibility to Open Science. Research output should be publicly and freely accessible by anyone, permanently.

The visibility of open science in software engineering (SE) has gained traction in recent years. Most software engineering conferences have an artifact evaluation track (AET), organizations such as ACM and IEEE have official open access policies, secondary-articles are being published regarding artifact availability, meta-articles are being published with detailed descriptions and instructions on open science, and new ideas about Open Science, artifacts, and reuse have begun to arise. Open science first reached the SE community as AETs roughly 10 years ago (2011/2013), and since then the understanding and use of open science has evolved and grown. This expansion necessitates a consolidation and communication of recommended practices in a simple, concise, and easy-to-read way. For this, we have created the Artifact Management Guideline.