You can endorse or discuss Science Code Manifesto published this week at http://sciencecodemanifesto.org/
Software is a cornerstone of science. Without software, twenty-first century science would be impossible. Without better software, science cannot progress.
But the culture and institutions of science have not yet adjusted to this reality. We need to reform them to address this challenge, by adopting these five principles:
- Code
- All source code written specifically to process data for a published paper must be available to the reviewers and readers of the paper.
- Copyright
- The copyright ownership and license of any released source code must be clearly stated.
- Citation
- Researchers who use or adapt science source code in their research must credit the codes creators in resulting publications.
- Credit
- Software contributions must be included in systems of scientific assessment, credit, and recognition.
- Curation
- Source code must remain available, linked to related materials, for the useful lifetime of the publication.
Nick Barnes, the author of the Manifesto, explains its creation as follows:
I wrote it for the Climate Code Foundation, initially as a response and contribution to the Royal Societys policy study on Science as a Public Enterprise. It is partly inspired by the Panton Principles, a bold statement of ideals in scientific data sharing. It refines the ideas I laid out in an opinion piece for Nature in 2010.
However, I did not originate these ideas. They are simply extensions of the core principle of science: publication. Publication is what distinguishes science from alchemy, and is what has propelled science and human society so far and so fast in the last 300 years. The Manifesto is the natural application of this principle to the relatively new, and increasingly important, area of science software.
My own ideals, influenced by the Free and Open Source Software movement, go beyond those stated in the Manifesto: I believe that Open Source publication of all science software will be one outcome of the current revolution in scientific methods, a revolution in which I hope this Manifesto will play a part.
