Research Software Policy Establishment at Helmholtz - Activities and Results

Abstract

The Helmholtz Association is a pioneer in the establishment of research software guidelines and policies in the German research landscape. The roots go back to one of the first German RSE focused workshops, which took place in Dresden in 2016. Since then, the field of RSE has been successively expanded at various levels through the provision of training and support services, technical platforms and, last but not least, the development of guidelines and policies. In context of research data management, a similar process has been driven with a strong focus on research data policies and data management plans. Guidelines for software development are just as important in modern research, but have hardly been established to date.

The talk is a progress report on the activities and results that have been achieved in the Helmholtz Centers in recent years. We present concrete examples with facts, statistics and user experience reports. In addition, we also share our experiences on how to actively stimulate this process, for example, through awards and visible indicators.The policy implementation at Helmholtz is ongoing and is actively supported in regular Helmholtz-wide research software forums organized by the Helmholtz Incubator Platform HIFIS and the Task Group Research Software of the Helmholtz Open Science Working Group.