Draft Wssspe Thoughts

Scratching out notes for lightning talk at WSSSPE…

(CB from ropensci, Karthik too. )

Responses to the challenges of academic software can be divided into roughly two categories. Give them better tools! Give them better training!

We do software: over 50 packages for accessing data repositories, integrating and manipulating, annotating and publishing data. We do training: workshops, online tutorials, developing course materials. But most importantly, we aim to build community. At rOpenSci, it’s not about us and them, it’s about the community. Through mostly informal mechanisms – hackathons, workshops, blogging, and Github – we have brought people together to write software that does what they need it to do.

what does it look like? Engaging domain scientists. reviewing new contributions on Github – from bugs and Pull Requests to completely new packages. Hackathons, bringing people together to code away on whatever itch they’ve always wanted to scratch. Discussions on blogs on social media, conferences, and even here at WSSSPE. We want domain practioners to look up and see other domain practioners learning this process, learning to code, to write tests and rely on version control, and to think how things can be done differently.

Because the hardest part isn’t walking the path to sustainable software. The hardest part is knowing you want to walk it in the first place. At the end of the day, our success isn’t measured in software packages, publications, or grant dollars; but here, in new faces (on Github, blog, or live events) that say “I’m here! I get it!”

Thank you,