Idea Paper: Establishing a Professional Society for Research Software Gabrielle Allen, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign Urbana, Illinois, USA Email: gdallen@illinois.edu Abstract—This paper provides motivation and an initial plan and wishes of their members, and thus provide the opportunity for creating a professional society (or extending the scope of an to influence change at a high and fundamental level. existing organization) in research software. The aim of this paper is to initiate a dialogue on this topic. This paper proposes the development of an independent entity which could act as a “professional society” for those I. I NTRODUCTION involved in research software. The broad aim of such an This paper is concerned with ”research software”, by which entity would be to bring together those developers, educators, we mean the software which is needed to conduct research, researchers, and professionals with an interest in research whether it is simulation codes, workflow scripts, visualization software to promote dialogue, share resources and experiences, and data analysis tools or low level system software for new address challenges and support professional development and computing environments.1 furthering the profession of research software development and Research software is behind many modern advances in support. In addition, such a society would represent the public science and engineering, facilitates new understanding and interest in promoting the role of research software. research methods in the humanities, social sciences, education This paper lays out initial thoughts on the role this society and the arts, impacts the research and development agenda might play, and how it might be constructed, funded and of our major industries, and contributes to national security. sustained, in the hope that this could be the start of an ongoing In addition, as we investigate new mechanisms of teaching conversation in the WSSSPE community. The end of the short and learning in our schools and colleges we expect research paper lists potentially similar activities, and if there is interest software to play an increasing role across the spectrum of in moving ahead with the ideas here, a first step should be educational activities. to investigate if the activities would fit within an existing The development, use and sustaining of research software organization, or an existing organization might be modified takes place around the world primarily at university campuses to include these activities. and national laboratories by a distributed, unconnected and often unrepresented set of students, postdoctoral researchers, II. P OTENTIAL ROLES programming staff and early-stage faculty. It is a matter of debate as to whether the current credit mechanism can properly This section collects together potential roles that a profes- assess or reward the broad workforce, and the broad activities, sional society for research software might fulfil. involved in providing and supporting research software. The 1) Be the leading voice for research software and an current accepted mechanism is via research or experience pub- authoritative source of information for the advancement lications such as to the SIAM Conference on Computational of research software and its role in benefiting society. Science and Engineering, the IEEE Journal of Computing in 2) Support professional growth of members through oppor- Science & Engineering [1], PLOS ONE [2], and others. Other tunities for life-long learning, career development, and groups, such as within FORCE11 are looking into software professional networking. citation mechanisms [6] which could contribute particularly 3) Advocacy and lobbying for research software and to quantifying how software contributes to scientific discovery, research software providers to federal agencies and and hence towards promotion and tenure. congress including funding and career paths. Many researchers and practitioners in traditional disciplines 4) Coordinating body to collect and analyze information are members of professional societies — for example the about research software. American Physical Society [3], the Association for Computing 5) Provide effective programs in support of the research Machinery [4] or the Institute of Electrical and Electronics software community and the conduct of the development Engineers [5]. These societies are able to represent the feelings and sustaining of research software. 1 The term ”research software” is here specifically chosen over ”scientific 6) Collaborate with national scientific and research soci- software” to emphasis that such software is not limited to scientific disciplines, eties for the advancement of research software, research but is essential across all academic and increasingly industrial disciplines. software education and through this the science commu- This work is licensed under a CC-BY-4.0 license. nity. 7) Advertising of jobs in research software development, 3) Articulate well the scope of issues for the organization potentially leading to a mechanism to facilitate contract- and the demographic and stakeholders it will serve. ing across sites for software expertise. 4) Establish a business plan and staff plan, e.g. Execu- 8) Coordination of awards to reward aspects of software tive Director, communications coordinator, administra- development. tor, come up with a budget plan. 9) Investigating research software alumni and contribution 5) Make sure there really is a need and interest in the to society. organization, and potential funders. 10) Hold and sponsor conferences and workshops in re- 6) Choose a name (with free domain name), and state in search software which non-profit will be registered. 11) Support journal or other communication medium. 7) Assemble a board of directors (3-6 people) with appro- 12) Promote an active, engaged and diverse membership, priate experience and diversity across the target demo- and support diversity and inclusion across the research graphic. software community. 8) Follow steps to incorporate the organization, which will 13) Provide public outreach around research software. be state dependent. This will include finalizing the name, 14) Establish and reward outstanding mentors who can help filing articles of incorporation and creating bylaws. develop the community. 9) File for nonprofit status (involves significant fees, paper- 15) Provide material to help influence the promotion of work associated with federal and state tax exemptions). research software developers, for example providing 10) Develop a sustainable fundraising plan and apply for information useful for improving reference letters, re- foundation grants after being awarded 501(c)(3) status. sumes, etc. 11) Create a marketing plan to recruit donors and volunteers. 16) Develop and monitor education programs in research 12) Provide good communications and online presence in- software development. cluding social media. 17) Through membership establish professional qualifica- tions, e.g. fellows. V. S IMILAR ACTIVITIES As mentioned in the introduction, if the idea of a profes- III. P OTENTIAL F UNDING M ECHANISMS sional society for research software is of interest, then the Funding mechanisms discussions need to include both short very first task should be to consider where there is overlap term plans which are focused around start up activities, and with existing societies, if an additional society is needed, longer term plans focused on appropriate and realistic sus- and whether existing societies might be extended instead of tainable funding models. Realistic understanding particularly forming a new society. Also, there are mature domain-specific of longer term funding is essential. societies in some disciplines which should also be looked at in 1) Short term initial funding from foundations such Gordon regard to their potential role. A close second task should be to and Betty Moore or Sloan to provide necessary flexible consider whether there might be additional new communities funding in preliminary stages. that could be included under the same discussions — for 2) Short term funding for people networking from NSF example in reproducible science or cybersecurity, as well as RCN-like solicitation. thinking about how the research data community overlaps 3) Initial donations from large sites with a vested interest in with the interests of the research software community — and promoting research software (e.g. current HPC centers) whether it could make sense to pursue a society focused on 4) Membership fees for individuals, sites, and software both research data and software. projects. a) Coalition for Academic Supercomputing Centers 5) Gifts/membership fees from vendors and industry. (CASC): CASC [7] is an educational nonprofit 501(c)(3) organization representing many US universities and comput- IV. P OTENTIAL O RGANIZATION ing centers. CASC advocates the use of the most advanced Going ahead with establishing a society would be dependent computing technology to accelerate scientific discovery for on there being individuals interested, motivated, and with the national competitiveness, global security, and economic suc- right skills to organize and lead the activity. This motivates cess, and developing a diverse and well-prepared 21st century the need to understand the essential elements needed to bring workforce. CASC’s mission is to disseminate information together into a comprehensive plan. Generic elements towards about the value of HPC and advanced communications tech- forming a non-profit organization in the US include nologies; provide an ?expert resource? for the Executive Office 1) Find funding to start planning and some operations at of the President, the Congress, and government agencies; and a supportive host university or other organization, then facilitate information exchange within the academic scientific establish a non-profit organization and apply for tax- computation community. exempt status. b) Association for Computing Machinery (ACM): The 2) Establish a group to develop and implement below ACM [4] is the world’s largest computing society. The ACM plans, think about leadership, mission statement, advi- carries out it’s mission through conferences, publications, sory team/board. educational programs, public awareness activities, and special interest groups. ACM has more than 100,000 members from formal specific-topic conferences, a tutorial program, a special industry, academia and government institutions around the interest group for system administrators, student programs, an world. ACM publishes, distributes and archives a large number online library, involvement in standards efforts, international of research and experience publications in computing and programs, and annual awards. information technologies. ACM includes a large number of VI. C ONCLUSIONS Special Interest Groups (SIGs) to represent major areas of computing including Software Engineering and Simulation. This short paper gathers very preliminary ideas around the c) Research Software Engineers in the UK: In the United need for a professional society of research software, or for Kingdom, the Research Software Engineers (RSEs) in the UK incorporating research software more fundamentally under the group citerse is based around staff engineers rather than the wings of an existing professional society. The aim of this field of research software as a whole. It’s objectives are to paper is to stimulate discussion among potential members and create a community to represent UK RSEs, raise awareness stakeholders of such a society. of RSEs; campaign for the recognition and reward of RSEs; ACKNOWLEDGMENT campaign for RSE to be a formal role in academic; organize networking events for RSEs. The author would like to thank the anonymous reviewers d) Software Sustainability Institute (SSI): Based at the whose suggestions and comments helped improved the paper. Universities of Edinburgh, Manchester, Oxford and Southamp- R EFERENCES ton, the mission of the Software Sustainability Institute [9] [1] IEEE Journal of Science & Engineering. http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpl/ is to cultivate better, more sustainable, research software to RecentIssue.jsp?reload=true&punumber=5992 enable world class research. 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