Sustainable Research Software Hand-Over

TL;DR

This paper proposes a developer-focused, size-structured approach with checklists for sustainable hand-over of scientific software to ensure its longevity beyond initial development phases.

Contribution

It introduces a bottom-up, size-based guideline and practical checklists for effective software hand-over in scientific research projects.

Findings

Provides a structured, size-based guideline for software hand-over.

Includes practical checklists for implementing sustainable hand-over processes.

Aims to improve long-term software sustainability in scientific research.

Abstract

Scientific software projects evolve rapidly in their initial development phase, yet at the end of a funding period, the completion of a research project, thesis, or publication, further engagement in the project may slow down or cease completely. To retain the invested effort for the sciences, this software needs to be preserved or handed over to a succeeding developer or team, such as the next generation of (PhD) students. Comparable guides provide top-down recommendations for project leads. This paper intends to be a bottom-up approach for sustainable hand-over processes from a developer's perspective. An important characteristic in this regard is the project's size, by which this guideline is structured. Furthermore, checklists are provided, which can serve as a practical guide for implementing the proposed measures.